The Buffalo MiniStation Lite USB 3.0 is another in the wave of new USB 3.0-ready external drives. We tested the 500GB variant; those with a need for more storage could opt for the $229 640GB option. Aside from offering 500GB of hard drive space, the MiniStation Lite also comes with optional utilities for backup and a faster copying mode, dubbed Turbo Copy, which replaces the standard Windows copy user interface. While $199 for a 500GB external drive is somewhat on the expensive side, we were curious to see how well the MiniStation worked over USB 3.0. We used Buffalo’s own two-port USB 3.0 card to test it with a desktop PC, with the Turbo Copy utility enabled and then uninstalled. Turbo Copy worked well with our sample drive, but interestingly only with that drive. Without it installed, we averaged a read and write speed from the drive of 68.2 and 31.3MB/s, respectively. With it installed, write speed jumped to 44.9MB/s, but only significantly for the Buffalo drive; copying with a USB 3.0 Seagate GoFlex drive only shifted speeds from 27.7MB/s to 29.4MB/s. USB 3.0 drives are coming through thick and fast right now and we should see prices drop, hopefully quickly. The MiniStation Lite lacks the multi-interface appeal of the USB 3.0/SATA/FireWire-capable Seagate GoFlex, but it’s substantially faster with Turbo Copy installed if you’re after a USB 3.0-only installation.
