Data Backup Digest

Toshiba have announced a series of brand new wireless transfer and storage backup devices that aims to allow consumers to make the most of their portable devices and computers.

The announcement was made at the 2015 International CES, which is a large technology trade show that takes place in Las Vegas. The range includes backup drives, portable hard drives, wireless data transfer adapters and a wireless flash memory card.

Although the company said that they work well with their own laptops and tablets, they are actually compatible with any manufacturer’s devices.

The Toshiba FlashAir III Wireless SD Card is capable of sharing files like images, videos and more through the magic of wireless. This means you don’t have to plug the SD card into devices that you want to view the data on – in fact, some things like tablets aren’t even capable of connecting SD cards out of the box, making this hugely appealing.

The card comes in either 16GB or 32GB capacity and has a web interface and photo sharing tool suitable for managing the files on the PC. The application, also available on iOS and Android, is compatible with Chromecast, which means that data can be streamed to television sets from any device.

Toshiba also showed off a SD card that has built-in NFC (near field communication). If your phone has NFC capabilities and the Memory Card Preview app then you just need to hold your phone near the card and you’ll be able to see the name and capacity of the card, how much storage is available and used, plus what type of data is stored on it. You will also be able to see up to 16 thumbnail images in order to determine precisely what data is on the card.

Toshiba also announced their TransferJet adapter. This is a neat device that allows wireless data transfer at 560MB/s between two connectors (like a smartphone and a computer). This is 10 times faster than standard WiFi, 100 times faster that Bluetooth and 1000 times faster than near-field communications. For example, the adapter can send a 65MB video from a PC to a tablet in under 5 seconds.

When you have a lot of data to transfer, the TransferJet adapter will come in very handy. Toshiba have created this to ensure that consumers aren’t just limited to storing their data – it can go wherever they want it to.

Another device that Toshiba showed off is called the Canvio Connect II Portable hard disk drives, available for both PC and Mac. These are available in a range of capacities (500GB, 1TB, 2TB and 3TB) and colours (black, blue, red, white and gold). This hard drive allows you to schedule backups of the data stored on your computer and also allows up to 10GB to be backed up into the cloud. Remote access is provided via PogoPlug and data can also be streamed to devices and shared online.

Finally, Toshiba announced the Canivo Basics portable add-on drives that have up to 3TB capacity and is available in white, silver or black.