INTRODUCTION

   One of the things i always recommend to friends is for them to never forget to backup all their extremely important files (like work data and/or family pictures and videos) not just in one but two separate external drives if possible since you really can never be too careful with these things. Now although for most people even a portable disk drive (or two) may just be sufficient to cover their needs for some their somewhat "limited" capacity (up to 5TB for portable models currently) automatically means they will need to turn towards a external desktop drive. External desktop drives are currently available with capacities up to 10TB (single drive models) but after testing the excellent D2 Thunderbolt 3 model by LaCie today we decided to thoroughly test the far more "affordable" Backup Plus Hub 8TB Desktop Storage by our friends over at Seagate.

   Founded in 1979, Seagate is the leading provider of hard drives and storage solutions. From the videos, music and documents we share with friends and family on social networks, to servers that form the backbone of enterprise data centers and cloud-based computing, to desktop and notebook computers that fuel our personal productivity, Seagate products help more people store, share and protect their valuable digital content. Seagate offers the industry’s broadest portfolio of hard disk drives, solid-state drives and solid-state hybrid drives. In addition, the company offers an extensive line of retail storage products for consumers and small businesses, along with data-recovery services for any brand of hard drive and digital media type. Seagate employs more than 50,000 people around the world.

   The Backup Plus Hub line by Seagate is currently available in 4/6/8TB capacities, comes in black color (in some areas there's a white MAC version available) and combines a single 3.5" internal hard disk drive with two front USB 3.0 charging ports (hub) and USB 3.0 host connectivity. The drive inside the Backup Plus Hub 8TB Desktop Storage which we have here with us today is Seagate's very own Archive HDD v2 SATA III model which features a total of 6 platters (1.33TB in capacity each) that rotate at 5900RPM, 128MB Cache, on-drive cache (almost 20GB in size - increases write performance) and several technologies including AcuTrac (sustained performance) and PowerChoice (reduces power consumption). In terms of endurance/durability the Archive HDD v2 has an MTBF (mean time between failures) of up to 800.000 hours and a workload rate limit of up to 180TB per year. Last but not least the Backup Plus Hub is compatible with both Windows and MAC systems and also comes with a free two-year 200GB OneDrive Cloud Storage license.