LaCie Rugged Safe

LaCie Rugged Safe 500GB HDD Review

With hardly a week passing without another case of misplaced data cropping up in the headlines, taking steps to secure the contents of mobile storage seems all the more topical. Into the fray steps LaCie's Rugged Safe, a 500GB external hard-drive that promises not only basic bump protection but an integrated biometric fingerprint scanner paired with 128-bit AES hardware encryption. Check out the full SlashGear review after the cut. A chunky silver box with a black rubberised outer “bumper”, the Rugged Safe certainly feels sturdy. It's also relatively large for a portable drive - 90 x 28 x 145 mm and 298g - and while the upper and lower sections may be aluminium, the edges aren't; peel off the rubber band and there's grey plastic there. Ports include USB 2.0, two FireWire 800 and a power input, while slightly recessed on the top is the biometric finger scanner. The two FireWire ports allow for daisy-chaining multiple peripherals. Inside, the 7,200rpm 500GB hard-drive is mounted on rubber bumpers for added shock protection. Setup is straightforward, with LaCie preloading their Safe Manager security app for Windows and Mac onto the drive itself.