Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex 500 GB USB 3.0 Ultra-Portable External Hard Drive STAA500105 (Black)

by Seagate

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 3.3 x 0.6 x 4.9 inches ; 5.3 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B0045JLPOM
• Item model number: STAA500105
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (295 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
  • #26 in Electronics > Computers & Add-Ons > External Data Storage > External Hard Drives
• Date first available at Amazon.com: October 2, 2010

Product Description

Size: 500 GB | Color: Black

From the Manufacturer

The GoFlex ultra-portable drive makes it easy to store, back up and encrypt all your files with its plug-and-play USB 3.0 connectivity. This drive is great for taking with you on business trips, vacations and on the go allowing you to save or access your videos, photos, music or files. The GoFlex ultra-portable USB 3.0 drive interface returns blazing fast USB file transfer speeds and the GoFlex system allows you to upgrade to FireWire 800 or eSATA by pairing the drive with the appropriate GoFlex upgrade cable. Extend your content beyond your PC and enjoy it on your TV, over your network, or on-the-go by using it in combination with our GoFlex family of products.

Store over 16,000 hours of music on the 1TB GoFlex Drive

Available in a variety of colors to suit your style. View larger

Store, back up and encrypt all your files with plug-and-play USB 3.0 connectivity

Protect your files with GoFlex's built-in back-up software

Plug-and-Play with Automatic Backup Software

The Seagate GoFlex's built-in backup software ensures automatic continuous backup of your data. It secures your backed up files and protects your privacy with powerful encryption software. The Seagate Dashboard management tool software provides easy management of backup schedules, file encryption, and at-a-glance drive statistics, including available capacity.

Access Files with the Interface of Your Choice

Use the advanced USB 3.0 interface for maximum compatibility with standard desktops and laptops. USB 3.0 works with PCs equipped with a USB 3.0 port for maximum file transfer speeds, but also works with standard USB 2.0 ports. Or upgrade to FireWire 800 or powered eSATA by pairing the drive with the appropriate GoFlex upgrade cable.

Free your Files

With the included NTFS driver for Mac, you can now interchangeably store and access files from PC and Mac computers without reformatting. The NTFS driver is simply installed once on your Mac computer, allowing it to access and store files in a PC compatible format. (Reformatting to HFS+ required to use backup software for Mac or Time Machine software.)

Extend Your Content Beyond the PC

The GoFlex ultra-portable drive is the heart of the GoFlex Storage System, and by combining it with other GoFlex Storage System products you can enjoy your content on your TV, access files from any PC or Mac computer on your network, from a mobile device, or via the internet while on-the-go.

Enhanced Versatility Is a Snap

Plug-and-play connectivity options let you protect, store, and do more. The GoFlex Storage System allows you to upgrade the way you access your digital content without having to replace your drive. Upgrade cables and kits make it easy to move from USB 3.0 to eSATA or FireWire 800 for even faster transfer speeds for your large files and HD movies. Extend your digital life so you can access and share your files from anywhere.

What's in the Box

The Seagate GoFlex ultra-portable drive, backup with encryption software pre-loaded on drive, NTFS driver for Mac pre-loaded on drive, GoFlex USB 3.0 interface adapter, 18-inch USB 3.0 cable, quick start guide, 2-year limited warranty.

Get the Most from Your Drive with GoFlex Upgrade Cables

GoFlex eSATA Upgrade Cable 6X faster transfer speeds than USB 2.0 Powered by eSATA/USB combo port, no external power required

GoFlex FireWire 800 Upgrade Cable 2x faster transfer speeds than USB 2.0

Seagate GoFlex Ultra-Portable Drive Specifications

	500GB1	750GB1	1TB1	1.5TB1
Model Number	STAA500105	STAA750101	STAA1000101	STAA1500100
Interface	USB 3.0	USB 3.0	USB 3.0	USB 3.0
Available Colors	Black | Silver | Blue | Red	Black	Black | Blue	Black
How Much Will it Store?
Digital Music (Hours)	8,330	12,495	16,660	24,990
Digital Photos (Files) Average file size using cameras highest resolution JPEG mode	160,000	240,000	320,000	480,000
Digital Videos (Hours)	500	750	1,000	1,000
DVD Quality (Movies) Based on standard 2 hour movie	125	188	250	375
HD Video (Hours) Based on H.264 compression at a 6.75Mbs bitrate	125	188	250	375
1One gigabyte, or GB, equals one billion bytes and one terabyte, or TB, equals one trillion bytes when referring to hard drive capacity.

The Seagate GoFlex Family Hard Drives

GoFlex
Ultra-Portable Drive

GoFlex Pro
Ultra-Portable Drive

GoFlex Desk
External Drive

GoFlex Home
Network Storage System

Product Description

The GoFlex ultra-portable drive makes it easy to store, back up and encrypt all your files with its plug-and-play USB 3.0 connectivity, but this is no ordinary external drive. As the core of the GoFlex Storage System, the GoFlex ultra-portable drive is the world's most upgradable external drive allowing it to deliver a truly customizable experience. Use the included USB 3.0 Adapter or upgrade to FireWire 800 or eSATA by pairing the drive with the appropriate GoFlex upgrade cable. Extend your content beyond your PC and enjoy it on your TV, over your network or on-the-go by using it in combination with other GoFlex products.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

283 of 295 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Seagate 1TB hold up!, April 1, 2011

By 

Vidsavage - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex 1 TB USB 3.0 Ultra-Portable External Hard Drive in Blue STAA1000102 (Personal Computers)

Honestly to make this easy, here are some steps you can follow, since I believe this to be the better of the 3 mainstream external 2.5" drives (Toshiba, Western Digital, and Seagate).

1. Why bother with the software in the first place?? just reformat the drive, or delete the software. Sure it is a bit annoying having 40 gigabytes taking up space right out the box, but is that really the only main source of concerns for this drive?

2. Now for the USB cord. out of the multitude of variations of 1tb usb 3.0 drives I have run and tested, every manufactuer has just about the same length of cord. If you want a longer cord, and or are wondering how you are going to power this drive other than with the supplied USB, then why are you buying this particular external HDD? this model is not for you if you are NOT an on the go type of person. what I mean by that is, if you do not lug your external drive around, why dont you go buy a powered 3.5" external HDD model for the same price as you would this one and have twice the space?

3. As far as the construction of the drive goes it is solid. I have tested the Toshiba 1TB 3.0 as well as the Western Digital 1TB 3.0, and my opinion is that Toshiba and Western Digital were too concerned about how slim and compact they could make the case of their external HDD, which has resulted in may more failures of those particular brands than I have seen from Seagate. Small shocks, such as light drops and accedental shock is a killer for the Western Digital as well as the Toshiba more than the Seagate models I have seen. Yes I know that there are about 3 or more warning labels stating the these drives should never be hit, moved, droped, abused, etc... but If it WERE to happen I have noticed that the Seagate construction has had a better chance from failing due to these certain cercumstances than the other brands I have tested and seen.

4. If there is any con's about this drive I will say that I am not a fan of the two piece adapter. they should have included their USB 3.0 "Upgrade" cable with this drive and not the two piece unit that is currently supplied with it, as the upgrade cable is also a few inches longer and one solid piece. The two pieces I am referring to are the adapter that plugs into the drive itself and the USB 3.0 cable that goes from that adapter to your USB device.

5. Im not here to bag on any one company, and or promote Seagate as the best of the best when it somes to drives in general. I am just stating overall that if you are looking for a 1TB 3.0 USB 2.5" drive, then this is what you are looking for. I just thought I would post this up as I keep seeing negative reviews on this drive just because of a bloatware issue not a material type defect. hope this helps! If not im sorry for wasting you time.

155 of 165 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An attic for your hard disk, January 3, 2011

By 

ringo (California) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex 1 TB USB 3.0 Ultra-Portable External Hard Drive in Black STAA1000101 (Personal Computers)

I got this with one purpose in mind - to get the MP3s off my hard drive. (Seagate apparently wants me to use it for movies - more on that below). I have so far found it to perform flawlessly, with a few caveats:

Pros:

- My laptop (WinXP) treats it like another hard drive, so I can drag-and-drop stuff directly onto my player, and can extract winzip files on the drive to another directory on the drive, and move stuff around in general.
- It runs off the USB power, so no need for a power cord
- The upload transfer speed (USB2) from my internal hard drive is just over a gig a minute for MP3s - I moved 18gb of music, in files of between 2 and 5 megs each, in just over 17 minutes, and 5 gig of audiobooks, in zip files of up to 300meg, in 4.5 minutes. This may change as the disk gets more fragmented.
- This will be upwardly compatible for my next laptop, which will probably have USB3.

Cons:

This isn't so much an external drive as an internal drive in a case. The "GoFlex" connector (which is not shown in the pictures) is a bus-to-USB adapter, and other adapters are available (Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex Upgrade Cable USB 3.0 - STAE104). This is great for sharing files, and perhaps for eventually putting multiple drives in a jukebox or desk brick, but it means there's a third bit of electronics between the USB cable and the drive, with all the potential for loss and breakage that implies. The connection was already a tiny bit wobbly right out of the box, though I note that the snaps are metal, not plastic, which does mitigate. (The drive says "Made in Thailand and assembled in China" Sheesh).

I decided not to install the backup software, so can't comment on that.

Movies:

Seagate wants you to use this drive for movies (and one of the GoFlex adapters will output directly to a compatible TV). And to this end, my drive came preloaded with about 45 gig of movies from Paramount. They're not free, however, just preloaded, with a promise of a free Star Trek: Reboot if you register the drive.
I did redeem the Star Trek movie (a short series of hoops, including agreeing to share my data with "third-party vendors", two different EULAs - from Seagate and Paramount, a DRM agreement from Microsoft, and registration on the Paramount site in case I want to buy more). I note that the movies seem to be $10 or $15 each, that they don't include any bonus materials (unlike my Star Trek DVD), and that "buying" a movie gets you three "licenses" - trying to play ST:R from the same Seagate drive on another laptop spawned a pop-up asking if I wanted to download another license, so I guess the licenses are associated with the individual computer, not the drive. (In a further loss of geek creds, the registration software automatically popped up IE as the browser.)

Fortunately, the movies can be deleted.

136 of 148 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Ugh., March 7, 2011

By 

bkbyte - See all my reviews

This review is from: Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex 1 TB USB 3.0 Ultra-Portable External Hard Drive in Black STAA1000101 (Personal Computers)

After only 6 weeks of use and no noteworthy physical trauma, this drive failed catastrophically, corrupting most of the data on it in the process. I wish I listened to the voice in my head saying, "Hmm, this doesn't seem very sturdy," when I took it out of the box, but I instead used it as planned for housing files I need at home and at the digital lab that I use for work. As another reviewer observed, this hard drive had an annoying spontaneous ejecting habit. My real problem was when it imploded - with a backup in progress - after less than 2 months of use. It was functioning normally one minute and then the drive's light started blinking and my computer was unable to recognize it. We tried the drive in another enclosure and hooked to a linux computer that usually will recognize even corrupted drives. Nothing. The data recovery lab I ultimately sent it to had to replace multiple "physically damaged" components to restore functionality and found more than half of the data was in fact corrupted. Mind you, this drive had never been dropped and travelled primarily in a protective camera bag. Call me crazy, but I think that a drive billed as "ultra-portable" should be able to withstand a few weeks of regular desktop use and the occasional commute. Do not recommend.

Note: I have a few older Seagate external hard drives (different models) that I've used for 1-2 years without incident. I've travelled extensively with them and had nothing but good things to say. That's why I went with Seagate on this one. I might even have been able to forgive the company its obvious construction and quality departure on this line but for the nightmarish customer service experience I had with Seagate after the drive crashed. Suffice it to say, I've sworn off Seagate products indefinitely.

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