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The headline says it. Western Digital’s new SanDisk Desk Drive, unveiled back on May 7, is highly compact for a desktop storage device.
But if you look at it from a portable drive point of view, it can be bulky. There’s one thing that can’t be disputed: it’s one of the highest, if not the highest, capacity drives for the physical size. You get up to 8TB of storage space out of something that’s about the same physical size as a hockey puck.
Most importantly, the new external SSD has matching performance. In my testing, it proved to be one of the fastest among its peers—you won’t have to sit around all day waiting for it to fill up the way you do with any HDD-based external drive.
Here’s the bottom line: For the current street price, it is just a little shy of $700 for the 8TB version (or $200 less for the 4TB option), and the SanDisk Desk Drive is pricey. But if you can overlook that (or wait till the cost goes down), you’ll get yourself a handsome little drive that can outdo any other desktop peers on all counts.
Dong’s note: I first published this post on May 7, 2024, as a preview and updated it to an in-depth review on July 16 after thorough hands-on testing.
SanDisk Desk Drive: A fast, non-bus-powered desktop drive with massive storage space
Despite the name, the new SanDisk Desk Drive is not a bulky device. In fact, it’s still compact enough to fit on your palm. The “desk” notion means that it’s supposed to be a stationary storage device. There’s a good reason for that: It requires a separate power adapter, making it less portable and a bit cluttering since an extra wire is needed.
Still, the compact design allows it to complement a laptop docking station easily. In this case, you will not need to remove it, which you would have to do with any portable SSD, before taking your laptop with you. Of course, you can also use the new Desk Drive with a desktop.
The new design is a significant departure from the super-compact shape of previous SanDisk portable SSDs, including the SanDisk Extreme Pro and SanDisk Extreme, the last of which was introduced in 2020—the top version of each can hold up to 4TB of data.
The new SanDisk Desk Drive doubles the capabilities of the previous SanDisk portable SSDs, but on the inside, it’s more similar to the non-Pro Extreme drive. It features USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10Gbps) and comes with a single USB-C port for both power and data.
SanDisk says the new drive has a read speed of “up to 1000MB/s,” and in testing, the drive indeed had an impressive matching performance—more below. Still, it’s a bit disappointing that the drive doesn’t support Thunderbolt or faster USB speeds, considering it has a separate power source.
The table below shows the hardware specs for the two.
SanDisk Desk Drive vs. SanDisk Extreme: Hardware specifications
 |  | |
|---|---|---|
| SanDisk Desk Drive | SanDisk Extreme | |
| Connection Standard | USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10Gbps) | |
| Interface | USB-C (USB-A compatible via adapter) | |
| Internal Storage | NVMe SSD | |
| Compatibility | macOS and Windows | |
| Default File System | exFAT | |
| Capacities and SKUs | 4TB: SDSSDT40-4T00-NA25 8TB: SDSSDT40-8T00-NA25 | 500GB: SDSSDE61-500G-G25 1TB: SDSSDE61-1T00-G25 2TB: SDSSDE61-2T00-G25B 4TB: SDSSDE61-4T00-G25M |
| Dimensions | 3.90 in x 3.90 in x 1.58 in (99.2 x 99.2 x 40.2 mm) | 3.96 x 2.06 x 0.35 in (100.54 x 52.42 x 8.95mm) |
| Weight | 0.59 lb (268 g) | 0.17 lb (78 g) |
| Cable Included | USB-C | |
| Power Requirement | Power adapter | USB bus-powered |
| Data Transfer Rate | Up to 1000MB/s Read | Up to 1050MB/s Write Up to 1000MB/s Read |
| Operating Temperature | -20°C to 60°C (-4.0°F to 140°F) | 0°C to 45°C (32°F to 113°F) |
| Features | Kensington Security Slot Automatic backup software (download required) | IP65-rated for water and dust resistance Shock resistant up to 1500G |
| Encryption support | None | |
| Power Input | 110-240V | USB bus-powered |
| Power Consumption (per 24 hours) | ≈ 95 Wh | not tested |
| Warranty | 3 years | 5 years |
| US Price (at review) | $379.99 (4TB) $699.99 (8TB) Buy now! | $89.99 (500GB) $119.99 (1TB) $199.99 (2TB) 299.99 (4TB) Buy now! |
A familiar frill-free external drive
Out of the box, the SanDisk Desk Drive includes a 3-foot USB-C cable with a USB-A adapter. It’s pre-formatted in the exFAT file system to work right away interchangeably betweeen Windows and Mac platforms.
On the back, the drive has a USB-C port (for data) and a power port to work with the included power adapter, which is required. Other than that, there’s a Kensington Security slot to keep it safe from being taken away. Considering how small and eye-catching it is, the slot is a sensible design touch.
The SanDisk Desktop Drive includes a downloadable Acronis True Image for Western Digital backup software application, available for both Mac and Windows, that helps with data backups. Alternatively, you can also use Time Machine (reformatting required) or Windows File History for the job.
And that’s it. The drive is plug-and-play. All you have to do is connect it to a computer’s USB port and a power source, and you’re game. The drive does not even have an LED indicator. Except for the fact it gets a little warm during operation, it looks more like a piece of deco than a storage device.
SanDisk Desk Drive: Excellent performance
I tested the 8TB version of the SanDisk Desk Drive for over a week and was thoroughly impressed with it. The drive did well with all of the USB standards I tried it with, including USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 (20Gbps), USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10Gbps), USB 3.2 Gen 1 (5Gbps), and the legacy USB 2.0.
As shown in the charts, as a 10Gbps drive, the SanDisk Desk Drive was slower than those featuring faster standards, such as 20Gbps USB or Thunderbolt. It’s currently the fastest USB 3.2 Gen 2 drive on the market and even faster than the USB 3.2 Gen2x2 drive in specific tests.
It’s worth noting that the SanDisk Desk Drive worked consistently, even during heavy operating. Its performance remained the same even when I coped with lots of data at a sitting. As mentioned, the drive becomes a little warm to the touch after a couple of minutes, but it never gets hot enough to cause concern.
SanDisk Desk Drive's Rating
Pros
Fast USB 3.2 Gen 2 performance
Compact and beautiful design
Lots of storage space, completely silent.
Cons
Power adapter required; no USB 3.2 Gen 2×2; no redundancy
A bit pricey; runs a bit warm
Conclusion
Considering its cost and configuration, the new SanDisk Desktop Drive is not for everyone—it’s more of a drive for professional users with tons of data to store. However, anyone can enjoy its massive storage space, fast performance, and simplicity. In a way, it redefines external storage for desktops in both design and performance. Hopefully, there will be a future version with RAID for even faster or redundancy options.
Looking to extend your computer’s storage or back it up in a significant way? The SanDisk Desk Drive is the way to go. Get one today!
What i’d love to see is some performance metrics on these drives. I have a laptop with a USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A port and offloaded my Stable Diffusion install to a USB drive (either 3.2 or 3.1) because of space issues. I was astounded by the massive performance hit (around 20x) that I encountered when operating SD from the drive rather than the laptops NVME drive.
Given that this is a large 300GB (and growing) installation footprint, but only needed from time to time, it would be great if I could run it off a remote drive, so I wonder if this is truly a local disk extension or just faster external storage.
You generally can’t use USB drives for that, Kevin. You need Thunderbolt. Backup and extra storage space only.
I think any article about SanDisk drives need to come with a disclaimer about the fiasco with their portable SSDs, widely reported by {…} and others.
I’ve lost all trust having been affected myself and wouldn’t touch another Sandisk drive even if you paid me.
And there has always been one where appropriate, like here, Geoff. You also lost me since you commented before reading.
I very much did read the article, and was able to speed read the bits I already knew about from the press release I had already seen.
Nevertheless, I think the point still stands, {…}
Except, as mentioned, I personally experienced no issue and WD did release new firmware, etc. It’s a matter of degrees. You can embrace your bitterness, even rightfully so, but you can’t expect everyone to feel the same way. This is a new drive in four years and if you follow a link to any of the previous drives mentioned, you’ll see the note. That’s enough.