I had an opportunity to check out the fireproof and waterproof ioSafe Solo ($149 and up), and man, this thing is incredibly massive. And for good reason. Your data is precious and ioSafe keeps it very secure. I’ve spent the last few days sorting through the data on my hard drive that I must keep, and am now using the ioSafe Solo as my new storage unit. I’m fairly confident that disaster won’t destroy those precious bits and bytes.
The hard drive passed the many preliminary tests I performed, from dousing it to exposing it to heat (but not fire, though the picture below speaks thousands of words). It’s massive — it weighs 15 lbs (more than my 3 month old son!), but the assembly looks pretty sturdy and secure.
The hard drive itself wasn’t disappointing either. I got the 500GB model (there are also 1TB and 1.5TB versions) and determined that it is a Hitachi HDP72505GLA360 (7200rpm 500GB S-ATA2). Transfers to other hard drives in my system were over 12MB/sec.
If for whatever reason you get into a disaster and data is actually damaged, ioSafe promises a guarantee that your data will be recovered (valued up to $1,000). Hopefully, I’ll never need to use that, but it’s great to know that the opportunity is there.
If security is important to you and your data is precious, this is an affordable option to keep your data secure. If you want to mirror your Mac via Time Machine, this could keep a duplicate of your Mac HDD any day.
