SanDisk Extreme Pro leverages our lightning-fast in-house NVMe technology to dramatically increase transfer speeds to up to 1050 MB/s 6 and fully saturate the USB 3.1 Gen 2 interface. 6 So you’ll be able to edit right from the drive – providing full-frame editing with little interruption while saving you time and keeping your computer’s internal storage free. From SanDisk, the brand professional photographers worldwide trust to handle best shots on their toughest assignments. For most practical purposes, USB 3.2 Gen 2 at 10Gb/s is fast enough. I can edit 4-5 streams of 4K 10bit h.264 off of it just fine without proxies or ProRes. But higher-bitrate video, like RAW, 6K, 8K and beyond, I would recommend a faster TB drive. Otherwise, save some money and go with the other SSDs, like the Extreme Portable, or build your own. The newest version of the SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD V2 has been launched today, doubling the speed of the last-gen SATA model due to its newly equipped NVMe technology and USB 3.2 Type-C support. This mid-level portable drive is ideal for design professionals who need a storage solution that can handle directly editing high-res photos and videos while in the field. It’s also a viable device for adding extra gaming storage on newer PCs or game consoles as well as an option for those who simply need a speedy offline alternative to the cloud. Getting this drive makes sense if you are building (or have) a PC that supports it, and you're willing to give up Thunderbolt, or you'd rather hold out just in case your future computer has a multi-lane USB 4.0 port. In that case go for it!

UPDATE: Apple has also since released the M2 series of MacBooks, which change nothing with its ports compared to M1 (non-Pro), so still Thunderbolt 3 and USB 4. Lame. The standout feature of the SanDisk Extreme Pro is, without a doubt, its mind-boggling write speeds of up to 2000 MB/s. Whether you're transferring large files, editing 4K video on the fly, or running resource-intensive applications, this SSD handles it all with ease. It's a game-changer for creative professionals who demand top-tier performance from their storage devices. Build quality - EXCELLENT. The combination of the plastic/rubber outside with an aluminum frame not only gives this drive better durability, but also great feel in the hand. Feels significantly more substantial than the regular, non-Pro (portable) version, and provides peace of mind over something like the Samsung T5/T7. Another thing about the flash memory is the indurance of the cell, how many times the memory cell accepts write/erase cycles until it starts to "wear" and not store anymore the information. That number is in the hundreds now days. If you read correctly the specification of an SSD drive, you will find a specification called "TBW", total bytes written. Dividing that number by the capacity of the drives yields the number of erase/write cycles that will wear the cells.When converted, 2000MB/s (or 2 Gigabytes per second) is equal to about 16 GigaBITS/s. And its competitors are hitting about 1000MB/s, which is 8Gb/s. Now, to answer your question, powering up the drive containing that memory does not refresh it's content. You can keep it powered up continuously, the information stored in the transistors is NOT UPDATED OR REFRESHED by the power applied to device, unless you write again the information. This principle of refreshing the data from time to time is used in the RAM memory in computers, and losing power leads to losing data. Overall a solid drive. But if you have a need for speed, go for a Thunderbolt 3 SSD instead. It will NOT hit the max 2000 MB/s speed. It will max out around the same top speed as the other USB 3.2 Gen 2 drives (1000 MB/s)! Go for the regular extreme pro at a cheaper price, or instead, build your own. However, stay away from the Samsung T7. But I'll save that review for another day.

The Extreme PRO SSD works with PCs and Mac computers right out of the box and connects with USB Type C and Type A, making it easy to start and keep working in almost any situation. Water resistant Get fast NVMe™ solid state performance featuring 1050MB/s 2 read and 1000MB/s 2 write speeds in a portable, high-capacity drive that’s perfect for creating amazing content or capturing incredible footage.

Customer Reviews

The SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD also features a USB bridge that has a water-resistant Type-C connector, though the port does not have or need a cover. SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD V2 performance With IOMeter, we measured both 1 and 4 thread, the latter which is a higher load that pushes the drive hard. First up is the 1 thread performance, where the SanDisk performed very well against the other two drives with a leading 921.5MB/s read and 861.4MB/s write. In comparison, the My Passport NVMe drive recorded 810.53MB/s read and 723.8MB/s write for 2MB sequential transfer speeds while the T7 hit 692.1MB/s read and 713.4MB/s write. Preformatted ex-FAT for PC and Mac compatibility; Can be reformatted and repartitioned to user desire Editor’s Note, August 17, 2023: As recently reported in Ars Technica , a critical mass of users on SanDisk’s forums and Reddit have reported failures of some SanDisk Extreme, Extreme Pro, Extreme V2, and Extreme Pro V2 SSDs, resulting in data loss, as well as the drives becoming unreadable/unmountable. In May, parent company WD released firmware updates for the 4TB SanDisk Extreme, as well as the 4TB, 2TB, and 1TB Extreme Pro models, plus the 4TB Western Digital My Passport, but complaints continue. We are doing our own stress-testing of the sample drives we originally reviewed. As of today, however, we no longer recommend buying any of the aforementioned SSDs, until we are satisfied the issue has been resolved. ( A class-action suit has been levied against WD surrounding issues with these drives.) We have left our original review in place here for reference.]

USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 is a "DUAL-LANE" or "TUNNELED" USB process. Meaning it requires 2 lanes of data going at 10Gb/s both ways, upstream and downstream, to reach the max 20Gb/s. You are totally right. It IS supposed to. That makes sense. But that's not how the USB-IF defined it. They like to confuse people, you see? Who put them in charge?? Definitely not mathematicians...or anyone with logic... On a positive note, the drive comes with two 9-inch cables: USB-C-to-USB-C and USB-C-to-USB-A. That's better than an awkward converter dongle. Get extra peace of mind with a 5-year limited warranty 3 and a durable silicon shell that offers a premium feel and added protection to the drive’s exterior.It's a well-built, fast drive. But your host computer must support USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 or (dual-lane) USB 4.0 to run at that 2000MB/s speed. Unless you have a specific Gen 2x2 USB port - which you can find boards for custom-built PCs - it's not on most (if any) mainstream computers - then this drive will not hit its advertised speed. It's a marketing tactic. Companies know this, and most of them go out of their way to hide the USB spec on their computer's Thunderbolt ports because of this. SanDisk is getting away with it because they added "Requires compatible devices capable of reaching such speed" in their product description. While the SanDisk Extreme Pro is undoubtedly a premium product, its price is justified by its exceptional performance and build quality. If you demand the best, you won't be disappointed by the value it provides. Hard drives based on magnetic retention of data are better in this respect, since the retention time is greater if the device is kept properly.

Whether you prefer to do your work on a laptop or a desktop computer, you’re likely need to get yourself some additional storage space. With computing moving to an increasingly mobile workflow, the best cloud storage services have made it easier for computer makers to include less storage space in our laptops and PCs. This makes something like one of the best external hard drives a necessity for people with large media libraries, or who need to take varying types of media with them for creative projects and the like. This is where the SanDisk portable SSD can provide a lot of value.

Integrating WD’s Blue SN550E and leveraging BiCS4 TLC flash, the SanDisk Extreme offers responsive performance in a secure and portable package.

Also, we are not discussing the physical port types in this review (Type-C, Type-A). The only thing you need to know is that USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 REQUIRES a USB-C port. So if you have the "fat USB" or Type A ports, it will never exceed 10Gbps. Flash memory based drives have now implemented a special "wear" algorithm, such that new data is written on cells that are not progammed with data, and so files are moved continuosly across the drive to mentain a balance of erase/program for all the cells, otherwise if a file is continuously written and modified on the same memory cells, these will wear after those few hundred of cycles and not be able to be used anymore. That is why a worn out SSD drive, that has reached a TBW spec, will not retain the information for long. With 2MB random performance, the SanDisk hit 1.03GB/s read and 870MB/s write. As for the other drives, the WD saw 985.82MB/s read and 742.67MB/s write, while the T7 hit 978.7MB/s read and 920.0MB/s write. Finally, 4K random the SanDisk hit 18,787 IOPS read and a massive 66,585 IOPS write. In comparison, the My Passport showed 17,616 IOPS read and 39,793 IOPS write while the T7 recorded 17,805 IOPS read and 37,202 IOPS write. Conclusion Why not just use one lane of 20Gb/s? Well it can't. Because of the Strong Link Policy. While USB 4 allows 20Gb/s over one lane, every single link in the chain has to support USB 4. Hence, USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 is not allowed since it uses PCIe tunneling (2x 10Gbps each way) while USB 4 (1x 20Gbps each way) does not. Haltbarkeit (★★★★★): Die SanDisk Extreme PRO ist stoßfest und robust. Sie hält den Strapazen des täglichen Gebrauchs stand und schützt Ihre Daten zuverlässig.