I would like to thank at first Silicon Power for supplying a sample of their Armor Series A15 USB 3.0 Portable HDD for testing and reviewing.

 

 

 

About Silicon Power:

 

“Silicon Power Computer & Communications Inc., founded in 2003 by a group of enthusiastic specialists in International Business, Global Marketing, and Technical Engineering of flash data storage industry. Well dedicated in brand image and product quality, Silicon Power has been recognized and well accepted by millions of end-users in more than 100 countries, becomes the world's leading manufacturer of flash memory cards, USB flash drives, card readers, DRAM modules, solid state disks, and portable hard drives in less than a decade. Headquartered in Taipei, we continuously established various branches throughout the world including Netherlands, Japan, Russia, Mainland China and other emerging market to reach the worldwide market.

Silicon Power's overall performance has gradually drawn great attention worldwide. In 2006, we received Taiwan Rising Star Award for our foreign business achievement. In 2008, we won 17th National Outstanding Small & Medium Enterprise Award for our outstanding progress. Moreover, with superior quality and innovative design, our products stood out in several competitions and awarded Taiwan Excellence and COMPUTEX Design & Innovation Award in 2009, 2010 and 2011. Winning trust of global consumers, Silicon Power holds a record of successive double-digit revenue growth for last seven years. According to the Common Wealth Magazine's 2010 Survey of Taiwan Top 1000 Manufacturers, our 2009 revenue growth rate was ranked No.11 among Taiwan's top 1000 manufacturers, and even ranked No.1 in semiconductor industry.

Positioned as Passionate, Creative and Hungry for Success, Silicon Power introduces products for users who are seeking individualized, unique and personal digital storage devices. With the mission of creating unprecedented experience for users, Silicon Power will endeavor to deliver a full range of high quality products that have innovative designs, distinctly unique features and comprehensive after sales services to create and fulfill your personal memory.”

Product Features:

 

-Received 2012 Taiwan Excellence Award.

-SuperSpeed USB 3.0 compliant and backwards compatible with USB 2.0

-High transferring rate up to 5Gb/sec

-Durable anti-shock rubber outer case

-Advanced internal hard drive suspension system

-Meet the U.S. military drop-test standards MIL-STD-810F (transit drop test), including (1) free fall drop directly onto concrete or hard surfaces; (2) specific height free fall test (122cm); (3) product’s 8 corners, 12 sides and 6 surfaces all must pass free fall tests.

-Easy Plug in and use - no external adapter required

-One touch quick backup button

-LED indicates power on and data transfer activity

-SP Widget free download software, providing 7 major back-up and security functions

 

Product Specifications:

 

-Dimensions?136.0 x 82.5 x 19.8mm

-Weight?200g

-Standard Compliance?USB 3.0 / 2.0

-Data Transfer Rates?Max. 5 Gbps (USB 3.0 Mode) ; Max. 480 Mbps (USB 2.0 Mode)

-Power Supply?DC 5V (Power supplied through USB)

-Operating Temperature?5?~ 55?

-Storage Temperature?-40?~ 70?

-Supported Operating Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows 2000, Linux 2.6.31 or later, MacOS 10.5 or later ( only USB 2.0 currently supported )

-Color: Black

-Three-year warranty

 

As the previous external drive we have tested from Silicon Power, the rugged A15 USB 3.0 HDD is shipped in a cardboard box, which is fully sealed on the outside:

 

 

 

The exterior appearance of the drive can be seen without removing the seal; here we will also get to see the total capacity of the drive, and some of the product highlights represented as small graphical icons:

 

 

 

On the back side of the packaging we will get the technical specifications, along with the package contents, supported operating systems and more:

 

 

 

The A15 portable HDD along with the USB cable can be found in a transparent plastic mold, along with the documentation:

 

 

 

The User Manual instructs us on how to perform the installation:

 

 

 

 

A15 comes with a rubberized finish on the chassis, but the top side is made from a shiny black plastic; the green/black color scheme is interesting and can be also found on many other sport-oriented products:

 

 

 

 

For protection against scratches during transport, the top side is covered with a transparent plastic film, which should be removed before the first use:

 

 

 

Also here we will find a button which can be used for the “One Touch Quick Backup” function; the button also has a blue LED underneath, which flashing during drive activity:

 

 

 

On the back side of the drive we can find the same design, but this time with some additional logos:

 

 

 

The drive capacity can be also found printed on the back:

 

 

 

The laterals are made in such a way so we get a better handling grip:

 

 

 

Near the USB 3.0 port we will also find the product serial number:

 

 

 

On the opposite side, we’ll find the same rubber finish surface, this time with the black color:

 

 

 

The testbench was composed from the following hardware:

 

CPU: Intel I7 Retail @ stock

Motherboard: Foxconn BloodRage with G42 BIOS

RAM: 3x2GB Patriot PVT36G1600LLK 1600MHz

Video: Sparkle GTX 470 with stock and OMNI A.L.C.

Power Supply: Nexus RX-8500 850W modular

HDD: Seagate Barracuda 500GB 7200.11

Case: Thermaltake Armor+ LCS, stock cooling

OS: Windows 7 Ultimate x64

Expansion: ASUS U3S6

 

When powered on for the first time, we will see that the Armor Series A15 drive comes formatted FAT32, with a single partition:

 

 

 

With the help of AIDA64, we will be able to extract some more information about the drive, which is a Seagate Spinpoint M8, with the rotation speed of 5400RPM:

 

 

 

 

A free-to-download utility is to be found on the Silicon Power website, which contains multiple functions to the drive:

 

 

 

The interface of the software is split into multiple sections:

 

 

 

One of the functions is the ability to backup the My Documents folder:

 

 

 

Next, we can sync and backup any folders from the internal drive:

 

 

 

We can always choose to encrypt or decrypt the data stored on the drive:

 

 

 

Also, we can backup My Favorites folder, Outlook Email contents or different tasks:

 

 

 

 

 

The software also comes with a “PC-Lock” function:

 

 

Some more details about the drives can be found in the “Storage Device Information” tab:

 

 

 

The SP Widget app can be also updated from the same interface:

 

 

 

Finally, with the utility we can also change the language of the interface or scan the drive contents:

 

 

 

 

CrystalMark

AIDA64 Disk Benchmark

 

HD Tach

 

HD Tune

 

PCMark 2005

 

PCMark Vantage

 

The new Armor A15 USB 3.0 Portable HDD from Silicon Power was designed to withstand shocks, vibrations in a better way than the majority of products from the same category. The case comes with a shock absorbent silica gel cover modeled in such a shape to increase the grip so we won’t drop it on the floor easily by mistake.

 

Inside the unit we have found the same 1TB 5400RPM 2.5’’ drive manufactured by Seagate from the Diamond Series. The Seagate SpinPoint M8 drives support linear shocks when operating of about 325G and when off of about 750G. Also, they can operate between altitudes of -300 to 3000m and when in storage from -400 to 15000m.

 

For their drives, Silicon Power also uses SP Widget software, which comes with different functionalities and does not need to be installed on the computer we plug in the drive to, we just have to run it.

 

If we need less storage space, we can either choose the 750GB or the 500GB variant.

 

The A15 is only a little more expensive than its non-rugged counterpart and can be found online for about 109 Euros for 1TB, 93 Euros for 750GB and 79 Euros for 500GB.

 

Regarding the transfer speeds, the product trades punches with the D03 drive from the Diamond Series, scoring more than enough for its main purpose which would be a backup drive.

 

Silicon Power Armor Series A15 USB 3.0 Portable HDD is Recommended For:

 

We would like to thank again to Silicon Power for offering this sample to review!