Buffalo DriveStation (160GB)

The Buffalo MiniStation Metro is a 500GB portable hard drive that hopes to offer a little bit of pazzam into the usual hard drive proceedings with a glossy case and a in-built USB cable that folds out of sight. But does it perform? We plugged it in to...

Looks good, big sizes, price, USB cable tucks inside

Not really that robust, large

Travellers will like the no cluttered cable approach

We're still patiently waiting for a media streamer that offers decent access to the wide range of content stored on a typical PC and the wealth of services available online, and while there have been some worthy contenders to date, the "definitive...

Excellent format support and video control, wide range of online services available for direct streaming, decent performance over a network

Rather expensive, advanced features can be difficult to master, minor issues with usability and stability

Despite the HDX’s faults, excellent file and service support and solid performance should make it the enthusiast’s weapon of choice

The Buffalo DriveStation Velocity benefits from a super speedy USB 3.0 interface that puts other hard drives to shame.

Fast ; Large caacity ; Great build quality

Included software not great

Buffalo's CloudStation Duo combines the company's own LinkStation hardware with PogoPlug software to simplify the configuration and use of a NAS box as an online file server.

We'd love to recommend the Buffalo CloudStation Duo - if only its network performance wasn't so lacklustre. Its build quality is superb, and it's handy to be able to stream media without needing to switch on the PC.

A portable hard disk that uses the faster USB3 connection

Will gain value when USB3 becomes widespread

Need to upgrade or buy new PC to get full benefit of faster USB3 speeds

A good external hard disk but few will enjoy its full benefits for now

The MiniStation Lite is Buffalo's first USB3 portable hard disk. Although the glossy black and matte grey case is made of plastic instead of metal, like some other portable disks we've seen, it still feels reassuringly rigid and robust.

The MiniStation Lite is a good USB3 disk, but there are cheaper and faster alternatives available

Buffalo's DriveStation is the first USB3 external hard disk we've seen. USB3 has a theoretical top speed of around 600MB/s. This is 10 times faster than USB2's maximum possible speed.

Buffalo's USB3 DriveStation is easily the fastest external hard disk we've seen. It's pricy, but it's worth having if time is a big issue.

It looks great next to your white MacBook, but is it worth your money?

Sleek and attractive ; Portable and convenient

Some software is Windows-only ; Low caacity for the rice

Buffalo's 500GB LinkStation Live has lots of useful features.

Storage with plenty of tricks up its sleeve

A decent price for an impressive network hard disk

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A quick view of the Buffalo ministation 500gb.

Bought this Hard Drive for use at home by myself and parents. It works a dream, plugged straight into my computer and ran without faf on both my laptop and desktop computers.

This external harddrive is excellent for a number of reasons:

Bought this last year, and was actually really impressed. Did exactly what it said on the tin, and while the pre-installed 'turbo usb' is a con (since USB is hardware, there's nothing software will do that will increase data transfer speeds) it worked...

Great product. Looks good, nice and compact. Plug it in and away you go. Or, you could hang around and start transferring stuff onto it. Whatever you prefer.

Very happy with this purchase.

very pleased with this product, basically it does what it says inthe description. it looks good, takes up little space and it is very easy to use. already loaded all photos and in the process of transferring music collection. 320 gb capacity is more...

I purchased this item in order to backup all my photographs and other sections of my computer programmes, and found it easy to use, and would recommend this Portable Hard Drive.

I wanted something to store my iTunes folder and a few other things on but didn't want to fork out for 1TB or loads of xtra memory. I know I will never need it so why pay the extra for it?