ADATA DashDrive Elite HE720 review

SiSoft Sandra HD test

Let's do one more benchmark, a synthetic test with Sandra, just to see if we can match the results we've seen in HD Tach. The drive index test is what I refer to. Higher = Better.

Sandra also needs an unformatted partition to be able to measure write performance, hence the lacking result for that one as well as we can not cache an unformatted partition. But 86 MB/sec is reached quite easily.

Final words and conclusion

The ADATA DashDrive Elite HE720 is an incredibly fun product. Granted, it would have rocked if it had an SSD instead of an HDD but we can see why that would be a complication factor in terms of price and storage volume.

The overall performance is as expected really at the maximum levels the internal Seagate HDD can handle. You'll be hovering at roughly 100 Mb/sec for reads and writes over USB 3.0 and well, there's nothing wrong with that.

What is however key to this release are the looks and aesthetics. The storage unit is simply ultra thin, light-weight and very easy to carry around. Armed with its sexy metal looks the ADATA DashDrive Elite HE720 simply has stunning aesthetics while easy to carry around. The weight as well, only 164g (0.4 lb) and the best thing yet, you don't need to power is externally. Simply plug on the USB 3.0 connector and it will feed of the host controller. 

Where you need fast read performance, the DashDrive will do its job nicely. Copying many small MP3 files resulted at less than 13MB/sec, which we find to low for a USB 3.0 device. Once you move onwards to big sized files and content speed will picks up real fast. Copying an ISO for example would get you great write speed at roughly 100 MB/sec (depending on the source).

When we fire off synthetic tests at the storage unit we see it max out at roughly 100 to 110 MB/sec if you give it the perfect conditions. That is just really nice. Read performance, it's good really. We had no problem copying our files at 100 MB/sec from the DashDrive towards the PC. Each and every test we performed confirms these findings.

The DashDrive matches its advertised read speed and writes well almost, but as stated it will be slower with small write files, small file I/O operations remain a bottleneck, it is however portable external storage so you can expect that.

Keep in mind if you can’t find a USB 3.0 port, it will work just fine at USB 2.0 port with respective speeds. The DashDrive is a fast device for what it needs to be, easy to carry around and you get a 3 year warranty. 

The 500GB model as tested today will sell for roughly 90 EUR, we thing that's a fair deal considering the gear you receive. We had no problems whatsoever with it and it is just the coolest looking easy to carry around portable storage unit. As such we can definitely recommend it.

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