SanDisk’s Pro-G40 could be the ultimate portable SSD — But there is one big catch

(Image credit: Future)

Western Digital has just revealed its brand new portable SSD — the SanDisk Professional PRO-G40 and, I’ll be honest, it’s looking like it could be one of the best SSDs that money can buy.

But “money” could be an issue, as prices start from $379.99 / £414.99 for a 1TB drive. Let’s look a little closer at what this offers and make an early judgement on whether this will be worthwhile.

Fast, versatile and durable

Aiming for photography and cinematography pros, you need peak speeds, peak reliability and near-bullet proof durability. Western Digital tackles these problems handily with three key features.

First, the PRO-G40 comes in a pro-grade enclosure that features IP68 dust and water resistance, up to 3 meters of drop resistance and up to 4000 pounds of crush resistance. No matter how challenging the shoot location is (or how clumsy you are), your drive will survive it.

Second, there is dual-mode compatibility with both Thunderbolt 3 (40Gbps) and USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10Gbps). If you are sharing your data across multiple systems with different I/O, you should get great efficiency across them all.

And finally, let’s talk about speeds for those high capacity files. With peak read and write speeds of 2,700 MBps and 1,900 MBps respectively, this drive is capable of some blazing transfer rates. Plus, thermal management, courtesy of the cool aluminum core, ensures strong sustained speeds too.

Outlook

When picking the best Portable SSD for your money, there are many criteria to help make your decision — speeds, dimensions, durability. If you are in the camp of requiring face-melting performance with super strong durability, the SanDisk PRO-G40 could very well be the drive for you.

However, in the challenging times we live in, that price is a little hard to swallow right now, which limits this drive to only the top niche of creative pros. If you’re needing something small, durable and fast, maybe check out the SanDisk Extreme Pro. I use it and love it.

Oh, and we’re expecting tons of SSD discounts during the Amazon Prime Early Access Sale. If you want a good deal, keep Laptop Mag bookmarked, as we will be covering them live!

Jason brought a decade of tech and gaming journalism experience to his role as a writer at Laptop Mag, and he is now the Managing Editor of Computing at Tom's Guide. He takes a particular interest in writing articles and creating videos about laptops, headphones and games. He has previously written for Kotaku, Stuff and BBC Science Focus. In his spare time, you'll find Jason looking for good dogs to pet or thinking about eating pizza if he isn't already.