Introduction

External drives are coming back around in popularity. This return to favor has been due to a reduction in price of high capacity disk drives, better power management for USB devices (needing only one USB port vs. two), the growing popularity of SSD and the move to mobile computing as an extension of the workplace/desktop. As SSDs become more popular, but remain expensive for high capacity models, the desire for extra storage will be high.

This is where the lower price of high-capacity HDDs comes in; this lowers the price of them for use in external devices. One of the more popular ones is Seagate's FreeAgent Go series. These drives now run all the way up to 1TB but remain small in size, while the software they run allows you easily backup, sync and encrypt your files. Seagate also offers a nice line of accessories to compliment these drives. One of the most common was the FreeAgent Go Dock. This put your drive into a nice cradle that positions it upright at a slight angle.

There was a down side to them, though, they used up two USB ports and offered nothing in return. Seagate changed all of that with the new FreeAgent Go Dock+. This combines the usefulness of the original dock with a powered USB Hub. Today we take a look at one and see how well it works.