Unlike any other segment of the computer industry, the developments in the storage market aren't as impressive as those in CPUs, GPUs or other system components.

However, we must not underestimate the significance of the new USB 3.0 and SATA 6Gbps interfaces, which will ultimately increase the speed of the upcoming storage solution, including both hard drives and solid state drives. On that matter, solid state drives continue to gain market share, as new technologies deliver increased speed and better pricing, making SSDs more affordable and appealing to the end-user.

Today, we aren't going to talk about SSDs, which have been increasingly present in our reviews; instead, we are going to direct our attention to one of the latest HDD-based storage solutions. To be more specific, we will take a look at the Seagate BlackArmor PS110 USB 3.0 Performance Kit, which the Scotts Valley, California-based storage vendor announced around the time of the Consumer Electronics Show, back in January. What's interesting about this product is that it will provide notebook users with a choice for an external drive featuring the latest USB 3.0 interface, delivering a much welcomed boost of performance.

Much in the same way that Kingston does with its SSDNow series of solid state drives, Seagate will be selling this drive as part of a bundle that will deliver all the necessary to take advantage of the drive's features and performance with a non-USB 3.0 laptop. When you get right down to it, the PS 110 USB 3.0 BlackArmor drive is an external storage solution that offers great capacity, at 500GB and enhanced transfer speed. Also, Seagate has included a software package that adds a bit more functionality to the drive.




The drive was released a bit over a month, and we have managed to get one to put it through its paces. Included in a small box, we received the entire kit with all of the things we required for testing purposes. Now, without further ado, we shall proceed to the review itself, as there are plenty of things to talk about.