Teamgroup C212: This USB drive is basically a portable SSD

It might look like your average thumb drive, but the Temagroup C212 far outperforms the pack

- JON L. JACOBI

Having reached capacities of 1TB and beyond, USB thumb drives put a lot of cable-free storage in your pocket. However, most examples of the species suffer a rather salient deficiency-slow performance. Not so with Teamgroup's C212, the object of this review. It's capable of sustained transfer speeds in excess of 400MBps to 600MBps-almost five times the norm, depending the size of the data set being read or written. That puts it on par with the speed of SATA SSDs found inside computers. Buckle up!

FEATURES

The C212 is a USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10Gbps) thumb drive that measures a mere 2.6 inches long (3.08 inches with the connector extended) by 0.8 inches wide by 0.46 inches thick (including the ejection switch). Weight is a mere 9 grams.

It’s available in three capacities: 256GB for $36 (fave.co/3Ehspf1), 512GB for $52 (fave.co/3KEcNX5), and 1TB for $93. Those were the prices from Teamgroup on Amazon at the time of this writing (fave.co/3xD1vKO).

The drive uses a Type-A connector that retracts into the body of the drive by means of slide switch. This protects the connector when the drive is in your bag or pocket. But I have found that when you’re in close quarters or your hand is at an awkward angle, it can be tricky to keep your finger on a slide switch long enough to get the connector into its port.

Note that the C212 is hardly the first thumb drive to employ a retractable connector, and every one I’ve tested suffers from the same issue. I just infinitely prefer a removable cap and would love to see the retractable connector concept go the way of the dinosaurs.

Teamgroup didn’t provide a TBW rating, but the C212 is warrantied for five years—which is a very generous guarantee for the category.