Mac os sierra download. With more and more laptops and devices being equipped with flash memory, that often means it becomes too expensive to get a good amount of storage built-in. And, with so many more of us travelling around for work, working from home or needing to use more than one machine, it's more important than ever to have an external drive of sorts. Thankfully, there's a lot of them around. And most of the portable options are small enough to go in a pocket. There's both SSD (solid state) and HDD (more traditional style hard-drive), with the former being a bit more expensive, but also faster, smaller and more portable.

They're also more likely to last you a long time because there are no moving parts. For editing movies and photos on an external drive, nothing really gets the job done like an SSD. SSDs - Small and speedy We've tested each of the following of the previous few months, using each of them to edit 4K video footage in Final Cut Pro, keeping the original files on the external drive, and each of them performed really well, with no real frame-drop issues, slow export or render times.

So, regardless of which of the following you get, you'll enjoy the speediness and efficiency. Judging them based on portability, design, performance and value for money, here are our top picks. Our top recommendation: Pocket-lint Samsung T5 • 57.3 x 74 mm (only 51 grams) • V-NAND flash memory • Up to 540MB/s transfer speeds • Compatible with USB 3.1, 3.0 and 2.0 • Type-C and Type A cables included • Works with Android phones too • 250GB/500GB/1TB/2TB storage options Samsung's T-series external SSDs have become a firm favourite in the world of portable drives, and it's easy to see why with the latest version: the T5. It's sleek and super portable thanks to its small size. It's just 57.3mm wide and 74mm long and weighs only 51 grams. What's more, it's got a stylish aluminium case that's rounded at the edges, and can survive drops up to 2 meters.

If all that fails Google for your model Samsung and type in SAMSUNG EXTERNAL SLIMLINE DRIVERS FOR MAC. Then hit enter. Many times you can find opensource drivers there that are better than factory drivers. Check as well and make sure there isn't a recall or a fix from Apples Site for your Internal Optical drive.

It has a USB-C port, and comes with both Type-C to Type-C and Type-A to Type-C USB 3.1 cables, so it'll work with any modern MacBook or PC. What's more, you can even plug it into the Type-C port of your Android phone, and the phone recognises it as external storage, with the ability to read/write to the drive straight away. It's incredibly versatile. It's speedy too, we put together a batch of video files totalling almost 10GB (9.93GB), and timed how long it took to get from the MacBook Pro desktop onto the T5 SSD. We stopped the timer at 20.58 seconds. So it's fast, durable, portable, good looking and incredibly versatile. It has no real flaws and is the easiest SSD to recommend.

Price wise, you can get the lowest capacity 250GB model for around £75, with the prices effectively doubling as you double the storage. The best buy is probably the 500GB model, which has an average price of around £120, but has been seen as low as £95 during special discount periods on Amazon. There's very little difference, frankly, in terms of performance for a lot of these drives, and while they might not be the versatile all-rounder that the T5 is, they're very close and each offer something unique that swings them more in favour depending on which elements are most important to you. Pocket-lint Sandisk Extreme Portable SSD - for ultra portability • 49.6 x 96.2 mm (38.9 grams) • IP55 rating water/dust resistance • Up to 550MB/s transfers • USB 3.1 - Type-C • 250GB/500GB/1TB/2TB storage options Testing the transfer speeds from our MacBook Pro desktop to the Sandisk Extreme Portable SSD, we got virtually identical results to the Samsung.

The same 9.3GB collection of files was transferred in 20.66 seconds, and the discrepancy easily ignorable, and probably explained by the pace of human reaction, rather than the speed of the transfer itself. So performance is essentially as good, but there's one real reason you might want this over the Samsung: design. Not only is the Sandisk (somehow) considerably smaller and lighter than the T5, but it's also got some water and dust resistance. You can't submerge it, but it'll survive the odd accidental splash.

As a bonus, it also has a handy little cutout in the corner to feed a carabiner through so you can attach it to your keys if you want to. Pricing is slightly higher than Samsung's offering, with the 250GB model starting at around £96. Again, as will be the case for most of these drives, the best bet is the 500GB model which has been as low as £99, but averages around £137 on Amazon. Pocket-lint Gtech G-Drive Mobile SSD - rugged and reliable • 50 x 95mm (86 grams) • IP67 water/dust resistance • 3M drop tested, 5 year warranty • Up to 560MB/s transfers • USB 3.1 gen 2 - Type-C • Shock and vibration resistant design • 500GB/1TB/2TB storage options The G-Drive Mobile SSD is taller and thicker than either the Samsung T5 or Sandisk Extreme SSDs, but what it lacks (slightly) in portability, it more than makes up for in durability. Its external surfaces are covered in a shock-absorbing plastic/rubber material, ensuring that it can survive falls up to three metres. What's more, it has IP67 rated water and dust resistance, which means it can survive in up to one metre of water for up to 30 minutes.