Lexar SL200 portable USB SSD review - Fast external drive - Faster than a External Hard Drive

The Lexar USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C drive is a compact and portable storage solution that offers fast data transfer speeds. The device is roughly 50 centimeters long, including the connections on the end, and features a small LED light that indicates when it's powered on.

When connected to a USB port on a laptop, the drive's status can be seen, and the user can access the quick start guide, Lexar Data Safe Windows, and Mac version of the software. The software is pre-installed on the drive itself, eliminating the need for manual download. This feature makes it convenient for users who want to encrypt their data or use the drive's built-in security features.

Speed tests were conducted using Atto and CrystalDiskMark to evaluate the drive's performance. In the synthetic tests, the drive achieved read speeds of around 540-541 megabytes per second, slightly above the advertised speed of 550 megabytes per second. This is exceptionally good, considering the quoted speed was much lower.

The results were verified by running another test with CrystalDiskMark, which yielded a read speed of 568.31 megabytes per second. When averaged with the Atto test, the overall read speed came out to be around 550 megabytes per second, which is very close to the advertised speed.

To further demonstrate the drive's performance, a file copy test was conducted using the drive as both the source and destination. The file, which is 20.6 gigabytes in size with 55 files and four folders, was copied onto the drive at a rate of around 360 megabytes per second. This speed is not far off from the quoted read speed, indicating that the drive's performance is consistent.

However, it's worth noting that real-world copying speeds may vary depending on the type of files being copied and their sizes. Smaller files tend to copy faster than larger ones, so actual speeds can differ from the quoted read speeds. Nevertheless, the Lexar USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C drive performed well in this test, with a relatively consistent speed throughout.

After completing the file copy test, the file was renamed on the drive and then copied back to the computer for verification. The resulting copy rate using the read speed of around 465-470 megabytes per second is very good, indicating that the drive's performance remains consistent even in real-world scenarios.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhi everyone phil from tech for text today we're going to be looking at this from lexar it is the sl200 it's basically a portable solid-state drive now prices on solid-state drives and especially a lot of hardware at the moment it seems to be going up and down on a daily basis so suggest for checking the latest prices you click the link in the description below okay as you can see we've got the lexar sl200 portable ssd gives you a nice picture of the ssd there from the picture it looks like a traditional two and a half inch ssd which you've been putting some sort of casing it says up to 550 megabytes per second and that's read i have read on the website it's 400 megabytes per second right now this is the 512 gigabyte version it's usb 3.1 type c it's got performance portability durability and protection on there as well so pretty straightforward looks like the same use the same box for all the different sizes that just change the sticker on it on the size it gives you the different connections it's a type c connection on the actual drive i'm guessing it comes with a cable and it gives you the dimensions and the whips and everything there on the back it gives you a bit more information up to the 550 megabytes per second so it includes 256 bit encryption software on there as well so that's pretty good so you've got really fast speeds protection durable so pretty much everything you need so let's have a look inside the box okay so this is what we've got inside the box we've got the lexar ssd quick start guide and warranty like any other man on the planet i'm generally not going to read the instruction manual and hopefully we don't need to to use this so otherwise inside we have two cables you've got a usb type c to usb type c cable so that usually plugs into your newer types of devices like smartphones new laptops pc generally have type c connections tablets and stuff like that as well so one type c would go in that end another type c would plug into whatever device you were going to be using it with we've also got a usb type c to standard usb type a or classic type a connection as i'll call it because a lot of people don't know the difference between all the letters but this is the normal connection you would use for most pcs devices laptops and so forth it is a blue on the end which doesn't mean it's usb free type this is actually 3.1 speeds on here so again you would just plug that cable into the drive and then this end you would plug into your laptop or pc or any other device what takes that connection so it's pretty straightforward to use let's have a close-up look at the actual device so here we go so as you can see on there it says lexar it's sort of a plain finish and then it goes on to sort of textured finish along the top is feels like feels like plastic rather than aluminium i might be wrong one second it's hard to tell but i would say that is a plastic plastic finish on there but it does feel quite sturdy you would have to give it a good bump or bang for it to break the other side again that texture flows through tells you the physical size as well as the model numbers on the bottom as well but otherwise that's pretty much it there's no buttons there is a little light which will light up when you plug it in bear in mind this cable here just so you know is roughly 50 centimeters long including the connections on the end so if i was to plug that into a usb port on my laptop here you can hear it go ping ping and there you can see the little light flashing as it's loading it up and on the drive itself when i pulled it into my pc it does say there is a quick start guide in there as well as lexar data safe windows and there's also a mac version in there as well so that's for obviously if you're wanting to encrypt it and stuff like that so the software is on the drive itself you don't have to download it so otherwise that's pretty much it we're going to do some speed tests now see if it does actually get up to that 550 megabytes per second read and 400 right and see how consistent it is okay as you can see here we've done the tests on the drive with the speeds we've used ato as well as crystal disk mark to test the speeds we've also got the drive open and i'm going to do a quick copy test as well just to see obviously real time how long it takes to copy we have got this connected to a pc using usb 3.1 gen2 connector so it's using the type c connector so it should go at the fastest speed it's possible so there shouldn't be any issues there as you can see the atto disk benchmark there it picked up read speeds of around about 540 541 megabytes a second which is pretty good they do advertise 550 though um the right speeds will get in quite a bit most of the time above 400 nearly 500 and even slightly over 500 megabytes per second which is exceptionally good because they only quote 400 and well it definitely got well above 400 just to verify those tests we run crystal disk mark as you can see here and you can see the read speed is 568.31 megabytes the right speed is 523 so again the read speed here is actually slightly faster than what the quote so 550 the quote and the right speed is way faster than the 400 the quote again if you average the readout between ato and crystal dismark you're pretty much dead on that 550 so that is pretty good to considering the only quote especially on the right 400 and i'm going to copy this file here and just to show you the properties of it is 20.6 gigabytes it's 55 files altogether and four folders it's got a combination of pictures documents uh as well as a video footage in there just to see how quickly it copies so if i copy that and paste it straight onto this drive as you can see it's the l drive and you can see it says lex are there and you can see all the stuff they actually put on the drive i'm going to paste it directly in there and see how quickly that copies obviously when you're copying files you'll never get that full speed the quote that's mainly because obviously different sizes of files and stuff like that the way that the file format works but generally if you're getting more than half of what the quote and you're doing well and basically we are we're getting around about 360 megabytes per second copying onto the drive so that's writing onto the drive itself so that's not far off that 400 what the quote so in real time you're getting around about 350 360 and again as i said that all depends on exactly what you're copying the smaller files larger files will copy at different speeds and rates and we've got a good combination of different files there so that's pretty good now what we're going to do is when that's finished is rename the file so here we go so we'll rename it on the drive and we'll just call it test on the end okay so and then i'm going to copy that back to the computer and here it is and that's copying back so that's using the read speed so in real time read speed we're getting around about 465 to 470 megabytes per second so that's going pretty good to be honest with you it's not far off the actual speeds of quote on the box for real time read speeds on the synthetic tests using crystal disk mark and ato it was reading slightly higher especially on the right speeds than the quote on the box so whatever way you look at it it's performing pretty well in all honesty so i've got no issues recommending this drive obviously depending on the price you're able to get it for we do have links in the description so you'll be able to find the best price in your country thanks again for watching see you next timehi everyone phil from tech for text today we're going to be looking at this from lexar it is the sl200 it's basically a portable solid-state drive now prices on solid-state drives and especially a lot of hardware at the moment it seems to be going up and down on a daily basis so suggest for checking the latest prices you click the link in the description below okay as you can see we've got the lexar sl200 portable ssd gives you a nice picture of the ssd there from the picture it looks like a traditional two and a half inch ssd which you've been putting some sort of casing it says up to 550 megabytes per second and that's read i have read on the website it's 400 megabytes per second right now this is the 512 gigabyte version it's usb 3.1 type c it's got performance portability durability and protection on there as well so pretty straightforward looks like the same use the same box for all the different sizes that just change the sticker on it on the size it gives you the different connections it's a type c connection on the actual drive i'm guessing it comes with a cable and it gives you the dimensions and the whips and everything there on the back it gives you a bit more information up to the 550 megabytes per second so it includes 256 bit encryption software on there as well so that's pretty good so you've got really fast speeds protection durable so pretty much everything you need so let's have a look inside the box okay so this is what we've got inside the box we've got the lexar ssd quick start guide and warranty like any other man on the planet i'm generally not going to read the instruction manual and hopefully we don't need to to use this so otherwise inside we have two cables you've got a usb type c to usb type c cable so that usually plugs into your newer types of devices like smartphones new laptops pc generally have type c connections tablets and stuff like that as well so one type c would go in that end another type c would plug into whatever device you were going to be using it with we've also got a usb type c to standard usb type a or classic type a connection as i'll call it because a lot of people don't know the difference between all the letters but this is the normal connection you would use for most pcs devices laptops and so forth it is a blue on the end which doesn't mean it's usb free type this is actually 3.1 speeds on here so again you would just plug that cable into the drive and then this end you would plug into your laptop or pc or any other device what takes that connection so it's pretty straightforward to use let's have a close-up look at the actual device so here we go so as you can see on there it says lexar it's sort of a plain finish and then it goes on to sort of textured finish along the top is feels like feels like plastic rather than aluminium i might be wrong one second it's hard to tell but i would say that is a plastic plastic finish on there but it does feel quite sturdy you would have to give it a good bump or bang for it to break the other side again that texture flows through tells you the physical size as well as the model numbers on the bottom as well but otherwise that's pretty much it there's no buttons there is a little light which will light up when you plug it in bear in mind this cable here just so you know is roughly 50 centimeters long including the connections on the end so if i was to plug that into a usb port on my laptop here you can hear it go ping ping and there you can see the little light flashing as it's loading it up and on the drive itself when i pulled it into my pc it does say there is a quick start guide in there as well as lexar data safe windows and there's also a mac version in there as well so that's for obviously if you're wanting to encrypt it and stuff like that so the software is on the drive itself you don't have to download it so otherwise that's pretty much it we're going to do some speed tests now see if it does actually get up to that 550 megabytes per second read and 400 right and see how consistent it is okay as you can see here we've done the tests on the drive with the speeds we've used ato as well as crystal disk mark to test the speeds we've also got the drive open and i'm going to do a quick copy test as well just to see obviously real time how long it takes to copy we have got this connected to a pc using usb 3.1 gen2 connector so it's using the type c connector so it should go at the fastest speed it's possible so there shouldn't be any issues there as you can see the atto disk benchmark there it picked up read speeds of around about 540 541 megabytes a second which is pretty good they do advertise 550 though um the right speeds will get in quite a bit most of the time above 400 nearly 500 and even slightly over 500 megabytes per second which is exceptionally good because they only quote 400 and well it definitely got well above 400 just to verify those tests we run crystal disk mark as you can see here and you can see the read speed is 568.31 megabytes the right speed is 523 so again the read speed here is actually slightly faster than what the quote so 550 the quote and the right speed is way faster than the 400 the quote again if you average the readout between ato and crystal dismark you're pretty much dead on that 550 so that is pretty good to considering the only quote especially on the right 400 and i'm going to copy this file here and just to show you the properties of it is 20.6 gigabytes it's 55 files altogether and four folders it's got a combination of pictures documents uh as well as a video footage in there just to see how quickly it copies so if i copy that and paste it straight onto this drive as you can see it's the l drive and you can see it says lex are there and you can see all the stuff they actually put on the drive i'm going to paste it directly in there and see how quickly that copies obviously when you're copying files you'll never get that full speed the quote that's mainly because obviously different sizes of files and stuff like that the way that the file format works but generally if you're getting more than half of what the quote and you're doing well and basically we are we're getting around about 360 megabytes per second copying onto the drive so that's writing onto the drive itself so that's not far off that 400 what the quote so in real time you're getting around about 350 360 and again as i said that all depends on exactly what you're copying the smaller files larger files will copy at different speeds and rates and we've got a good combination of different files there so that's pretty good now what we're going to do is when that's finished is rename the file so here we go so we'll rename it on the drive and we'll just call it test on the end okay so and then i'm going to copy that back to the computer and here it is and that's copying back so that's using the read speed so in real time read speed we're getting around about 465 to 470 megabytes per second so that's going pretty good to be honest with you it's not far off the actual speeds of quote on the box for real time read speeds on the synthetic tests using crystal disk mark and ato it was reading slightly higher especially on the right speeds than the quote on the box so whatever way you look at it it's performing pretty well in all honesty so i've got no issues recommending this drive obviously depending on the price you're able to get it for we do have links in the description so you'll be able to find the best price in your country thanks again for watching see you next time\n"