CalDigit is a popular maker of docks, external storage, and other accessories that work well with Apple’s ecosystem, and the company recently released a new Tuff Nano external solid-state drive that packs blazing-fast transfer speeds into a small package.
I don’t have much need for external storage with my MacBook Pro, but when I did I used CalDigit’s previous Tough SSD, which I reviewed a few years ago. The original Tuff was available in both SSD and traditional hard disk versions, with hard disks offering more capacity at slower speeds while SSDs offered faster speeds but with less capacity and a higher price.
The cost of SSDs has come down over the past few years as drive modules have gotten smaller, and CalDigit has taken advantage of that progress to create the Tuff Nano.
The Tuff Nano is currently only available in a 512 GB version for $150, and while it’s big enough to back up my entire MacBook Pro, some power users may want more. Regardless, when you need fast data transfer in a compact form factor, it’s a great option, and CalDigit plans to launch a 1 TB version late in the first quarter of next year (price to be announced closer to launch), so if you need a bit more storage I want to keep it if necessary.
Built for the tough Nano road, the compact size fits easily in a pocket or bag and the SSD offers excellent shock protection. The drive casing is made of aluminum to help dissipate heat, but the whole thing is wrapped in a silicone bumper to protect against drops of up to three meters.
The silicone bumper also includes a tab that fits over the drive’s USB-C port, which helps make the Tuff Nano IP67 water and dust resistant, meaning it’s completely dust-tight and can be submerged in water up to one meter deep. The tab felt a bit snappy to firmly seal the 30-minute USB-C port, so make sure it’s properly seated before potentially exposing the Tough Nano to liquids.
The Tough Nano comes in a selection of four bumper colors (Tomato Red, Olive Green, Royal Blue and Charcoal Black), allowing you to choose your favorite if you only need one drive or to easily differentiate between multiple drives. The whole thing comes in a plastic archive case measuring about four inches (10 cm) square by 0.75 inches (2 cm) thick that fits both the drive and the shorter 0.25-meter USB-C to USB-C and USB-C to USB-A. Cable that comes with the drive.
The Tough Nano itself is just three inches (7.6 cm) long and two inches (5.5 cm) wide and just half an inch (1.5 cm) thick with bumpers. The drive weighs just 2.6 ounces (74 grams).
Moving on to performance, the Tuff Nano boosts speed by using a Toshiba M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD over a 10 Gbps USB-C connection, which CalDigit says offers read speeds of up to 1055 MB/s.
In my tests with the Tuff Nano directly connected to a 2016 15-inch MacBook Pro, I didn’t quite reach that level, but it was still plenty fast, with read speeds of 920 MB/s and write speeds of around 765 MB/s for the same machine. Compare that to the original Tuff bundled with, which has read speeds of just over 500 MB/s and write speeds of around 485 MB/s.
This also makes the Tuff Nano faster than Samsung’s popular T5 portable SSD, although slightly smaller than the T5 Nano and certainly cheaper per gigabyte, Samsung is rumored to be preparing a new T7 successor. Another contender is SanDisk’s new Extreme Pro Portable SSD, which offers the same speed as the Tough Nano at a solid price but in a slightly larger form factor that also lacks the Tough Nano’s water and dust resistance.
The Tuff Nano is formatted in HFS+ for macOS and connects directly to an iPad Pro via USB-C. For use on Windows, you need to reformat Tough Nano. Likewise, it should work with most Android phones, provided they are exFAT or FAT32 formatted.
Caldigit clearly sees the Tough Nano as the future of its highly portable SSD lineup, as it has reduced its original Tough offerings to just a 2TB hard disk model, and even that seems to be out of stock, so that wouldn’t be surprising. If it disappears completely in the not too distant future.
The Tuff Nano is an early entrant in next-generation portable SSDs that take advantage of NVMe-to-USB technology to deliver blazing-fast data transfer speeds with versatile connectivity, and are a welcome advancement in portability and performance. CalDigit blends a strong set of features, including fast speeds, a compact design, and excellent water and shock resistance, all to provide convenient storage for a variety of users at a reasonable price.
Note: CalDigit provided MacRumors with a Tuff Nano for the purpose of this review. No other compensation was received. MacRumors is an authorized partner with Amazon. When you click on a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small payment, which helps keep our site running.
