ADATA DashDrive HV620 2.5″ 1TB External Hard Drive Review

Final Thoughts

Pricing

In the UK, the HV620 pricing starts at around £45 for the 500GB running up to around £92 for the huge 2TB model. The 1TB unit that we’ve seen here is priced at around £60 and all capacities can be purchased through Amazon.co.uk. US pricing starts at ~$53 for 500GB of storage and goes up to ~$120 for 2TB and similarly can be found on Amazon.com.

Overview

USB storage these days is mainly flash driven due to the reasonably good capacities that can be had now for an affordable place – but most importantly because of their size and convenience. The problem though, as mentioned before, is that when you start to move up the capacity ladder, the price starts to rocket to the point where flash storage is simply not affordable for everyday use. Due to the pricing, hard drives will always have a good position in the consumer market simply on the cost per GB.

When we look across the range of USB hard drives that are available, in a broad sense there is not a lot that sets them apart, what it comes down to is the features and extras that comes with each drive such as backup software, cases and design. ADATA sets the HV620 apart with a scratch resistant coating and a lip around the edge to lift it away from a desk of PC chassis – wherever it may end up being. On top of this they include some interesting free software that allows the drive to password, compress or synchronise data with a host system automatically.

When we look at the performance, USB hard drives can only reach a certain level of performance as expected and ADATA aim to keep this as constant as they can whilst keeping the cost down for the end-user. To do this they typically use drives from Toshiba, although Western Digital or Seagate drives are sometimes used, depending if they work out cheaper to buy whilst keeping the performance above a certain level.

The biggest selling point for the HV620 has got to be its pricing, with 2TB of external storage available well under £100, if you’re in the need of extra storage on your desktop system, but also storage that you can easily take with you wherever you go, then this is going to be a bit of a no-brainer decision in my eyes.

Pros:

• Storage capacities of up to 2TB
• Scratch prevention design
• USB3.0 interface
• Bundled HDDtoGO and OStoGO software
• 3 year warranty
• Good performance for a USB HDD

Cons:

• Glossy surface translates to a fingerprint magnet
• Would benefit from having a slightly longer USB cable

“With large capacity flash drives still costing a small fortune, the trusty hard drive has still got a strong place in the market. ADATA’s HV620 is just one example of a drive that offers a huge amount of storage, with a good level of performance and a sleek design – all for less than £100. If you want to boost your desktop storage with ease, the HV620 is probably the drive for you.”

Thanks to ADATA for providing this review sample.