Review: Glyph GPT50 external hard drive

Working in the fast and furious world of post does not allow for fumbling. As an assistant editor working on reality TV shows, I constantly use external hard drives for transferring tapeless media, backing up audio files, backing up project files and QuickTime exports. No matter what drive the company buys, there are always millions of power supplies and adapters that need to be kept with each one.

Ten to 15 external drives in use at one time is not uncommon, and the assistant editors beg for consistency among drive types. We also constantly move tape decks around from edit bay to edit bay; because of the tape decks, each bay has an IEC power cable (standard deck power cable). Glyph, amazingly, uses this standard power cable to interface with their external drives. So the GPT50 is easily accessed using a standard power cable that is already in every edit bay. Now when I need to back-up 10 days worth of dual-system sound, I can run down the corridor with just the drive in my hand and not six feet of cable and a power brick.

A CLOSER LOOK

The GPT50 (7200RPM, 2TB for testing purposes) is a sleek desktop external hard drive that looks, feels and acts like a professional. It showcases a brushed aluminum faceplate and a scratch-resistant black powder-coated chassis. If you have ever worked in a rack-mount environment you have definitely felt solid machinery — the sharp lines and rugged-powder coated cases. I cannot overstate how great it is to not hold a hard drive that mimics the feeling of a book or wacky tetrahedral shape that I tried to leave behind in Mr. Boren’s, Camarillo High geometry class. read more...