The 1TB Akitio ThunderGo ($239.99) is a portable external hard drive with both Thunderbolt and USB 3.0 interfaces. It's a competent choice if you need to transfer your work between Apple and Windows PCs often, since most current Macs have a Thunderbolt interface, and almost every PC and Mac has USB 3.0. While you can certainly format any external drive to work with either a Mac or a Windows PC, the Akitio's Thunderbolt and USB 3.0 connectivity options give you more flexibility, for when, say, both USB ports are already occupied on your Apple MacBook Air, or if you have a Thunderbolt port on your PC. However, other portable drives are more attractive for their speed, more rugged exteriors, or better value. Our Editors' Choice for portable hard drives, the 4TB Seagate Backup Plus Portable Drive offers four times the capacity for $90 less.

Design and Features
The ThunderGo's matte-aluminum exterior measures 0.8 by 3.2 by 5.4 inches (HWD), so it will fit easily in most commuter bags. A protective sleeve made of white rubber surrounds the edges of the frame, with a set of white rubber straps crisscrossing the top panel. The straps are a little loose; the sleeve doesn't offer as much protection as the stiff rubber bumpers surrounding the 4TB LaCie Rugged RAID (4TB) and the 500GB LaCie Rugged Thunderbolt solid-state drive (SSD). On the other hand, the drive isn't officially rated for drops and spills like LaCie's rugged drives. The ThunderGo's metal body and protective sleeve seems more robust than the polycarbonate exterior of the Seagate Backup Plus Portable.