LaCie released its Little Big Disk Thunderbolt series to Apple retailers today, meaning that speedy Thunderbolt port on recent Macintoshes are finally starting to be used for something other than connecting monitors. Available in 1TB and 2TB configurations, the aluminum enclosure with a glowing blue LED eye houses a pair of 2.5" drives striped as RAID 0. It also sports a pair of 10 GB/s Thunderbolt ports, allowing the unit to be used as part of a daisy chain with up to five additional devices. While the unit ships with RAID 0, it is possible to reconfigure the drives to RAID 1 or JBOD via the Mac’s software RAID controller.
LaCie released its Little Big Disk Thunderbolt series to Apple retailers today, meaning that speedy Thunderbolt port on recent Macintoshes are finally starting to be used for something other than connecting monitors. Available in 1TB and 2TB configurations, the aluminum enclosure with a glowing blue LED eye houses a pair of 2.5" drives striped as RAID 0. It also sports a pair of 10 GB/s Thunderbolt ports, allowing the unit to be used as part of a daisy chain with up to five additional devices. While the unit ships with RAID 0, it is possible to reconfigure the drives to RAID 1 or JBOD via the Mac’s software RAID controller.
The unit is aimed directly at the photography and video production market. The 1TB model features two 7200RPM drives while the 2TB model features 5400RPM drives. LaCie claims the 1TB model has read/write transfer speeds of 180MB/s, while the 2TB model is slightly faster at 190MB/s. The company also claims 60% better cooling via a maglev fan assembly.
The LaCie Little Big Disk Thunderbolt list for $399.95 for the 1TB model and $499.95 for its larger sibling. Make sure to figure in the price of a Thunderbolt cable, because it’s not included. The company plans to release a 240GB SSD version in October. While you can order a unit today, the Apple Store online is showing 1-2 weeks before the items ships.
