CES 2020: Samsung Announces Fingerprint-Secured T7 Touch SSD
Samsung this week announced the latest update to its well-reviewed T-series of portable external SSDs. The Samsung T7 Touch is a USB 3.2-based portable SSD offering capacities up to 2TB and speeds of up to 1,050 MB/s in a form factor about the size of a business card.
The Touch designation refers to the device’s built-in fingerprint reader for unlocking the drive’s AES 256-bit hardware encryption. Like previous T-series drives, the T7 Touch uses a USB-C interface but includes a USB-C to USB-A cable for support with older devices. The drive is also cross-platform compatible, with native support for Windows, macOS, and Android.
With advertised read and write speeds of 1,050 MB/s and 1,000 MB/s, respectively, the Samsung T7 is about twice as fast as its predecessor, the T5, which won our Editor’s Choice award upon its release in 2017. Samsung also touts the T7’s usefulness in a multi-user, collaborative environment thanks to the fingerprint sensor’s ability to store up to four fingerprints.
Samsung T7 Specifications
The T7 Touch will be available this month in either a black or silver aluminum casing with MSRPs of $129.99 (500GB), $229.99 (1TB), and $399.99 (2TB). A model without the fingerprint sensor will be available in Q2 2020, although prices and color options for this non-Touch variant have yet to be announced.
