INTRODUCTION

   Whenever i happen to sit down and talk with friends and family about portable storage media most seem to only be interested in products with the best price/capacity ratio. This of course also happens a lot in online forums as well and although i understand that for most consumers these are the two things that really matter when it comes to professionals and people who work a lot with portable storage media performance is also a critical factor. USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C portable SSDs have been around for a few years now but it wasn't until somewhat recently that we saw some impressively fast models introduced in the market. According to Silicon Power their brand new Bolt B80 Portable SSD is one such blazing fast drive and today with us we have the 240GB model.

   Founded in 2003 by a group of enthusiastic data storage industry experts, Silicon Power is committed to delivering outstanding product and service quality. Headquartered and with our own state-of-the-art production site in Taipei, we have become a leading manufacturer of flash memory cards, USB flash drives, portable hard drives, solid state drives, DRAM modules and industrial-grade products. As an international player with four branch offices around the globe, we continuously strive to offer the perfect data storage solution for all requirements of modern digitalized life. With a strong focus on combining innovative technology and award-winning design, we live up to our brand promise to reliably preserve and protect your most valuable data. Because memory is personal.

   The Bolt B80 USB 3.1 Gen 2 portable SSD is currently available in 120/240/480GB capacities and features an IP68 certified enclosure (it passed the 122cm military free fall test - shock proof - and is also water and dust proof) made out of machined aluminum. Under the hood of the Bolt B80 we find a PHISON PS3111-S11 single-core NAND flash controller (fully supports SmartECC, SmartFlush, GuaranteedFlush, SmartZIP, built-in static and dynamic wear-leveling, power saving features and end-to-end Data Path Protection) paired with 3D TLC NAND by Micron (thanks to this combination the Bolt B80 can reach performance levels of up to 500MB/s read and 450MB/s write). Finally Silicon Power covers the entire Bolt B80 line of portable SSDs with a 3 year limited warranty and also provides their Power Widget software with which you can configure the drive for data backup, AES 256-bit encryption, and cloud storage.

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

PACKAGING AND CONTENTS

The drive arrived inside a white box that has a large product picture at the front right over the main product features and beneath the company logo and type of connector.

Some of the features are listed on the left side of the box.

Taking a look at the rear we find the product specifications, package contents and contact information about Silicon Power.

Both the drive and its cable are placed inside a formed piece of black foam.

Along with the Bolt B80 portable SSD you will also get a braided USB to Type-C cable and the user manual.

THE BOLT B80 240GB

The UFO-shaped enclosure is made out of machined aluminum and is IP68 certified (dust and water proof).

In terms of size the Bolt B80 measures 75mm in diameter and 11.9mm in height and weighs just 53g (we placed it right next to the T1 and T3 portable SSDs by Samsung for comparison).

The Type-C port is located behind a plastic cover placed at the front of the device.

At the bottom of the drive Silicon Power has placed its capacity along with several certifications (accessing the interior is not hard but we didn't want to tamper with its waterproof feature).

TEST BED

TESTING METHODOLOGY

   Since flash drives are basically plain storage media devices just like solid state drives and hard disk drives we are using almost the same testing methodology to successfully record the achieved performance numbers. The benchmark suites used are HD Tach RW (Read Speeds / Long Bench 32mb Zone Testing), HD Tune Pro (Read speeds), Sisoftware Sandra Pro (Read / Write speeds), AIDA 64 Engineer Edition (Average Linear Read / Random Read speeds), Crystal Disk Mark x64 (100MB-1000MB Read / Write speeds) and finally ATTO (Max Read / Max Write speeds). Every test is repeated a total of 6 times after which the average performance numbers are recorded into our charts (0 = we were unable to complete that test).

   All tests are performed with our main rig running Microsoft Windows 10 Pro installation on a HyperX Predator 480GB PCIe SSD with all updates installed up to the 12th of May 2018. As always for comparison purposes in the charts you will also find many other flash drivers which have been tested using the same exact test bench as the one in this review (we really can't keep every flash drive we get forever and also even if we could testing them all again and again would simply not be possible).

TEST RESULTS - AIDA64 / ATTO

TEST RESULTS - HD TACH RW / HD TUNE PRO

TEST RESULTS - SISOFTWARE SANDRA PRO / CRYSTAL DISK MARK X64

CONCLUSION

   Although we haven’t had the chance to test a large range of portable SSDs to date it’s not hard to see that the Bolt B80 240GB USB 3.1 Gen 2 model is extremely fast and certainly among the fastest portable media one can buy currently (the 480GB variant should offer even better overall performance). For us looks may not play a significant role when testing a storage device but to some people do and the Bolt B80 excels in that area as well. Add the fact that the machined aluminum enclosure is also IP68 certified and there’s not much more one could ask for. The braided USB to Type-C cable is also a nice touch and ensures that you will not need a new one for as long as you have the drive (perhaps even longer). Now I would like to see a wider selection of colors (black and/or red for men and perhaps pink for women would be nice) to cover all consumers out there (especially with current prices pretty much everyone could get one) but I guess we can’t have it all.

   So how much will the Bolt B80 240GB USB 3.1 Gen 2 Portable SSD (SPA240GPSB80S) by Silicon Power set you back? With a current price tag set at 118.54Euros inside the EU (Amazon.de) the Bolt B80 240GB model may not be as affordable as some very fast USB flash drives but its performance is hard to match and since it not only looks great but is also IP68 certified it’s well worth of our Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality (IP68 Certified Machined Aluminum Enclosure)
- Top Of The Charts Performance
- AES 256 Encryption
- Just 11.9mm Thick
- 3 Years Warranty
- USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C Connector
- Price (For Some)

CONS

- Current Availability (USA)
- Only Available In 120/240/480GB