Transcend Introduces JetDrive Lite Expansion Cards Up to 128GB for MacBook Air, Retina Macbook Pro

[moxnet]

I ordered mine when it gave that shipping estimate and I got an email this morning from Amazon saying they will have it to me by June 2nd (Prime 2 day shipping) so I wouldn't worry.

i made a order on June 2, and will be deliver June 26.
i changed Shipping Speed to 2-Day Shipping, don't know what is the day to deliver("We need a little more time to provide you with a good estimate").

i guess high shipping speed have prior deliver queue.

 

[TranscendInfoLA]

I just received my transcend Jetdrive Lite 130 for my mac air 13" 2011.
I placed the card in the sd slot and it reads the card perfectly, however it is block as read only. I can not find a way to unlock the card so I can write to it.
Disk utility doesn't allow me to reformat it either.
Any help would be appreciated. Wishing I didn't buy this product.

Gregory,

I am a technical support engineer with Transcend Information representing our Los Angeles office. I am sorry to hear that you are having issues with your JetDrive Lite. If at all possible, can you ensure that your JetDrive Lite is firmly placed into your card reader? This issue seems to occur with cards in the SD slot not being "fully" inserted. Please let me know if this resolves your issue. If you require further assistance, please feel free to send an email to techsupport-us@Transcend-Info.com with a reference to our discussion here, and I would be glad to assist you further. We are always open to questions and concerns that you may have.

-TranscendInfoLA

 

[grinny11]

Ordered mine on Amazon two days ago, says I should get it by the end of the month.

 

[X Cruz 187]

What do you mean? You should always check before.

Check before what? Can I use any sd card for extra storage space or just this one? I can buy 32g sd for $20

 

[Gjwilly]

I bought the 128gb version for the 13" MacBook Air and it arrived today.
It's near identical to the PNY Storedge -- maybe 1-2 mm shorter -- and it does work in the 13" retina MacBook Pro (while of course sticking out slightly).
I had to insert it twice before it was detected so there might be a problem with the close tolerances.
The Storedge is very very slightly thicker and therefore gives the impression that it's sturdier but time will tell.
I do like that the Storedge displays a generic hard drive icon rather than the (to me) cheesy SD card icon for the Transcend but others may not.
Everything else aside I'm just glad to see some competition and options in the area of MacBook Storedge expansion.

 

[iMacBooked]

Just received mine today from Amazon. I got the JetDrive Lite 130 128GB for my MacBookAir 13".



First, it is formatted in ExFAT and I had to research to understand why. It seems it does have a speed edge over HFS+ so I'll be keeping it as is (plus the I don't have a PC if I want to reformat back to ExFAT). I have no problems with Read/Write, works right out of the box.



I'm running BlackMagic Speed Test and I'm getting avg 52MB/s Write and 85MB/s Read as you can see.

That's great news! Might give it a shot too in the near future. Speed seems fine too.

 

[Intelligent]

Check before what? Can I use any sd card for extra storage space or just this one? I can buy 32g sd for $20

Im saying you should check if it works before you buy it.

 

[MikePembo951]

A few review sites said not to install operating systems on to the PNY storage since it often ended up with errors.
I noticed this card (jet drive 130) has EEC error correction. Would it be suitable for an operating system install? Maybe windows? Is installing windows on the drive possible?

Otherwise id probably just move all my media on to it.

Edit:
For a MBA 2013 so it has fast read/write speeds on sd card

 

[Asanga]

I got my JetDrive Lite 130 128 GB for my MBA 13" (late 2010) today from Amazon.de (I live in Germany). I ordered on the 30th of May. I tried BlackMagic speed testing (with 5GB stress) for both ExFAT and Mac OS extended. They seem to show similar performance stats. Attached are the screenshots. The Mac OS extended shows lower values but I found that this is also dependent on the time at which you take the screenshot. So, I guess a +- a few MB/s can be considered when considering these screenshots.

I guess, this performance is acceptable considering that the SD port is connected over USB 2 and whatever other overheads the reads/writes may have. What I hope to do is to mainly off-load some of the stuff that I am not currently working on, but still have access to them without carrying a disk around or being online. What I like mostly about it is that it fits really nicely.

EDIT: After using a day

Last evening, I let the card in and closed the lid (OS X 10.9.3). In the morning I saw that the card was dismounted but a message saying something like "disk not ejected properly ..." was there. I had to run the following to remount it without removing and inserting the card (from apple.stackexchange.com).

sudo kextunload /System/Library/Extensions/AppleStorageDrivers.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleUSBCardReader.kext; sudo kextload /System/Library/Extensions/AppleStorageDrivers.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleUSBCardReader.kext

EDIT: after 2 days

Rather than doing the kextunload on a terminal as explained before, what I found was to use the Disk Utility and unmount (not eject) the volume before closing the lid for the evening. "disk not ejected properly ..." will not appear when the lid is opened again. Don't eject the SD card as this will make the card disappear from Disk Utility. Then, running the kextunload is required to to make it appear in Disk Utility again (without physically removing and re-inserting).

To make the process of mounting/unmounting easier, I saw that some have used Automater scripts.

 

[Didjt]

Help please, I only wanted it to do what it said in the advert!

I bought a JDL for my 13" Air.
The aim is to use it to relieve pressure on the SSD by storing photos from iPhoto on it.
I am pretty tech illiterate, but have re formatted the Transcend to MAC OS extended Journaled.
Any advice is welcome.
Thanks in anticipation,
Doug

 

[3rdiguy]

Why no 128gb for rMBP?

 

[Asanga]

I bought a JDL for my 13" Air.
The aim is to use it to relieve pressure on the SSD by storing photos from iPhoto on it.
I am pretty tech illiterate, but have re formatted the Transcend to MAC OS extended Journaled.
Any advice is welcome.
Thanks in anticipation,
Doug

Hello Doug,

Take a look at the following video. I did the same to move my iPhoto Library to the JetDrive Lite.

http://scanyourentirelife.com/how-safely-move-your-iphoto-library-hard-drive-video-tutorial/

Good luck.

Asanga

 

[Didjt]

thanks Asanga
going to give it a go with some files of lesser importance then......fingers crossed!
Much appreciated
Doug

 

[RSdsafsdfgold]

I think you're absolutely right. I agree with you.




Fifa world coins

 

[ptb42]

So this means I could load Windows 7 (or 8) while OSX is running? Just like when using parallels?

Yes, that's correct. It runs in an OSX window.

I haven't used Parallels, so I can't compare or contrast them. But, I've used VirtualBox on Linux, Windows, and now OSX hosts -- running both Windows and Linux guests. I've had as many as 6 guests running at the same time on my laptop.

VirtualBox is also Open Source, and free to download.

 

[Kobayagi]

Yes, that's correct. It runs in an OSX window.

I haven't used Parallels, so I can't compare or contrast them. But, I've used VirtualBox on Linux, Windows, and now OSX hosts -- running both Windows and Linux guests. I've had as many as 6 guests running at the same time on my laptop.

VirtualBox is also Open Source, and free to download.

Alright sweet, didn't know about it. Thanks, I think I'll give it a drive. Kinda hard to make space on my 128 ssd for a Windows partition. Seems like installing various OSX updates is really taking up much storage space. Having Windows on a SD card could solve that problem.

 

[MikePembo951]

so it is possible to boot windows from the sd card?

Options:
-Get this card, hoping it'll boot windows
-Wait until 3rd party ssds come out so i can upgrade

 

[Mr. Amiga500]

I bought a JetDrive Lite 360 128Gb and I am disappointed. It is too slow to be used as a system backup, causes problems with shutdown so you can't leave it in permanently and it is difficult to remove, making it tedious to use as temporary storage.

 

[MikePembo951]

I bought a JetDrive Lite 360 128Gb and I am disappointed. It is too slow to be used as a system backup, causes problems with shutdown so you can't leave it in permanently and it is difficult to remove, making it tedious to use as temporary storage.

What mac are you using? MBA2013?
What problems are u having with shutdown?

 

[Mr. Amiga500]

What mac are you using? MBA2013?
What problems are u having with shutdown?

MacBook Pro late 2013 running 10.9.3. When shutting down, the screen goes blank light grey and stays that way. To shut off the MacBook, you have to hold down the power button for a hard shutdown. (not good)

 

[Asanga]

MacBook Pro late 2013 running 10.9.3. When shutting down, the screen goes blank light grey and stays that way. To shut off the MacBook, you have to hold down the power button for a hard shutdown. (not good)

Since I am also interested in this issue, I tried shutting down my mac while the JetDrive volume was mounted. Of course, my mac is a late 2010 MBA 13”, but running the same OS X (10.9.3) as yours. I did not have the problems you mentioned. I tried, with and without unmounting the JetDrive and also while a Terminal was working in a directory of the JetDrive. Still the shutdown worked. Booting up was also ok and I saw that the Terminal was pointing to the directory in JetDrive after booting.

- What happens if you unmount the volume (not eject) in the JetDrive before you shut down? Use the Disk Utility in Utilities to unmount.

- One other difference that I may have is that my JetDrive volume is now formatted with Mac OS Extended. If you still have the original ExFAT and if it is still possible, try with Mac OS Extended.

 

[MikePembo951]

a response from transcend on a review (amazon US):

"The MacBook will auto eject the JetDrive Lite in order to enter deep sleep mode when it is out of power. When power is restored, removable devices will not mount automatically and need to be reinserted. Disk Utility may be indicating the JetDrive Lite needs to be reformatted due to data transfers being interrupted as a result of the power loss. Our R&D teams are working on creating a software tool to automount the JetDrive Lite without reinserting it after power is restored.

If there's anything else I can help with, please don't hesitate to contact me at AmazonSupport-US@Transcend-Info.com ."

http://www.amazon.com/review/R1CO8J...sgNo=1&cdPage=1&cdSort=oldest#Mx39EDAA91MY5JX

 

[Cassady]

Nice! That could make a big difference. Now all we need is for Apple to support splitting the iTunes library across devices. That is audio(music) on one device video on another.

Tunespan will do that for you. Works well - have my library spread out over my MBP, and external drive connected to my modem.

 

[marivaux]

a response from transcend on a review (amazon US):

"The MacBook will auto eject the JetDrive Lite in order to enter deep sleep mode when it is out of power. When power is restored, removable devices will not mount automatically and need to be reinserted. Disk Utility may be indicating the JetDrive Lite needs to be reformatted due to data transfers being interrupted as a result of the power loss. Our R&D teams are working on creating a software tool to automount the JetDrive Lite without reinserting it after power is restored.

If there's anything else I can help with, please don't hesitate to contact me at AmazonSupport-US@Transcend-Info.com ."

http://www.amazon.com/review/R1CO8J...sgNo=1&cdPage=1&cdSort=oldest#Mx39EDAA91MY5JX

I believe that Jettison will remount SD cards, though they were still working out some bugs with auto-remount (at least with flash drives) the last time I emailed them. But it is designed precisely to deal with those sleep issues.

http://www.stclairsoft.com/Jettison/

 

[goy091]

Just got this piece of hardware in, and it has much faster read than my Nifty Drive with 64GB SanDisk micro sd card. Was getting about 10MB read and write with the nifty. Initial test with the JetDrive Lite was ~15MB read and ~50MB write.

Also I noticed there were no custom icons for the JetDrive Lite so I used Preview to edit one from a pic I found online (Note: I couldn't get the icon to change until I reformatted from exFat to Mac OS extended). Not too bad if you don't want to stare at the old generic SD card one. Hope it helps someone out.

EDIT

Pulled some more images from Transcend site to make the 130, 330, 350 and 360 icons. Hope someone can use them.