Freecom Mobile Drive CLS Review
We are pretty sure that at least once in a while, you will struggle to find a file just because your external hard disks are too dis-organised. You could just buy a JBOD or RAID capable external hard disk drive array, but these desk bound disks are expensive and not very portable. And, that is exactly the issue that Freecom’s CLS drive system, which stands for “Collect, Label and Store” is designed to resolve. Technically, it cannot get even simpler.
Capacities:
The Freecom Mobile Drive CLS 2.5″ External Hard Drive come in exactly same range of sizes, from capacities of 250GB, 320GB, 500GB and 640GB. Indeed, you can even stick in a FreeCom Mobile Drive XXS drive into one of those CLS slots, however, the snugly shaped design does not allow you to use drives from any other manufacturer.
Interface and Speed:
Freecom’s powered CLS dock connects to the PC via a USB cable and offers you with three slots with mini USB connectors at the bottom of each that can take up to three 2.5in CLS drives. You can only dock three CLS drives at once, although there will be nothing stopping you from connecting additional drives through the standard mini USB cables. It is a simple but elegant solution that we can see coming in pretty useful in the right environment, providing that performance is up to scratch. It works very well and quickly represents any connected drives individually in Windows Explorer, although we did experience some issues when devices are mounted in quick succession. This can be solved by waiting for one to appear on your system before connecting another. There is nothing complicated here as they are just your standard USB 2 devices that offer the standard USB 2 levels of performance around 30 MB/sec when reading and writing large files, falling to around 20 MB/sec with small files.
Warranty:
The Freecom Mobile Drive CLS External Hard Drive comes with two years return to base warranty.
Freecom Mobile Drive CLS External Hard Drive (250GB/320GB/500GBb/640GB) – Technical Specification Table
| Manufacturer | Freecom |
| Model Name | FreeCom Mobile Drive CLS External Hard Drive |
| Model Numbers | 250GB: 35237 320GB: 35238 500GB: 35239 640GB: 35240 CLS Dock 3 ports: 35236 |
| Colour/Finish | Black |
| Type | Portable External Hard Drive |
| Form factor | 2.5 inch |
| Dimensions (W x D x H) | 110 x 79 x 14mm |
| Weight | 146 Grams |
| Capacities Available | 250GB, 320GB, 500GB and 640GB |
| Interface | USB2.0 |
| Hard disk type | 2.5? Samsung HM252HX |
| Data transfer rate | 480 Mbps |
| Connectivity | Integrated USB 2.0 |
| Spindle speed | 5400 rpm |
| Cache | 8MB |
| Seek time | 12ms |
| Compatible OS | PC: Intel or AMD CPU, 1.6GHz or higher, 512MB RAM, 2GB free hard drive space, available USB port (3.0/2.0/1.1), Windows XP SP2/Vista/7 MAC: Power PC G5 or Intel Mac, 512MB RAM, 2GB free hard drive space, available USB port (2.0/1.1), Mac OS X v. 10.4 or higher |
| Software | Nero BackItUp2 Essentials Nero RescueAgent Green Button |
| Power | USB from host, external |
| Power consumption active | 6W |
| Warranty | Two years RTB |
Leave a Reply