CES 2015: Samsung’s 1TB ‘Bizcard’ Storage Turns Heads

Would you shell out $600 for a business card-shaped, NAND flash data storage device that can hold 1TB of content? For at least a sliver of the consumer market, Samsung thinks the answer is yes.

At the CES 2015 show in Las Vegas Jan. 6, the South Korean IT giant introduced its latest solid-state storage product, the SSD T1, which can store up to a terabyte of content and weighs only about an ounce. Using only a few of these units, a person or a small business theoretically could keep all those files in a mere shirt pocket.

The T1 uses 32-layer TLC V-NAND and a MEX/MGX SSD controller inside that small, thin casing.

Besides the 1TB deluxe version, the SSD T1 also comes in 250GB and 500GB editions. The device, which Samsung said will start shipping to retailers later in January, retails for $180, $300 and $600, depending on how much storage capacity you require.

The T1 features USB 3.0 UASP mode, and Samsung claims data-movement speeds of up to 450MB per second. Random performance comes in at 8K IOPS (input/output operations per second) for read and 21K for write, the company said. The T1 also has AES-256 encryption support, which is becoming more important for business all the time.

The drive comes pre-formatted as exFAT (Extended File Allocation Table, which is a Microsoft file system optimized for flash drives). This ensures out-of-the-box compatibility with both Windows- and OS X- based systems.

Easy to lose or accidentally destroy? Perhaps. But think of the mobility, the convenience, the lack of continual maintenance costs, and the absence of security problems.

There are no gray areas in keeping all of one’s eggs in such a virtual basket; it’s all or nothing. Everything’s in one place, unless it’s backed up somewhere, which is what prudent folks certainly will do.