External SSDs and Backups for Designers: What to Buy and How to Set It Up

Most designers buy an external drive the day their laptop runs out of space, pick whatever has the biggest number on the box, and start keeping the only copy of client work on it. That setup works until the drive gets dropped, stolen or simply stops mounting, usually the week before a handoff.

This guide covers two separate decisions: which drive to buy for fast everyday work, and how to back everything up so that one failure costs you an afternoon instead of a client. Those are different jobs, and a single drive cannot do both.

Start with what your files need

Before comparing drives, look at how you work. Speed only matters when you are moving or opening large files, and many design jobs do not push a modern SSD very hard.

UI, web and Framer work: Figma and Framer files live in the cloud, so a drive mostly holds exports, source assets and archives. Almost any modern SSD is fast enough.
Brand and print work: layered Photoshop and Illustrator files benefit from a quicker drive, especially if you work directly from it.
Motion and video: this is where sustained speed matters, because you read and write large files for long stretches.

Capacity is the easier call. Add up your current project archive, then buy about twice that, so the drive still has room in two years.

Why the speed on the box may not apply to you

The rated speed assumes your computer supports the drive's fastest connection. On a Mac, that is often not the case. The Samsung T9 is rated at up to 2,000 MB/s over USB 3.2 Gen 2x2, a 20 Gbps standard. In Larry Jordan's tests, it reached just over 900 MB/s on an M2 Max Mac Studio and about 950 MB/s on an M4 Pro Mac mini.

The drive is not faulty. Macs generally do not support Gen 2x2, so it falls back to a 10 Gbps connection. If you work on a Mac, compare drives in three groups:

10 Gbps USB (including Gen 2x2 on a Mac): roughly 900 to 1,000 MB/s.
USB4 or Thunderbolt 4: around 3,000 MB/s on suitable drives.
Thunderbolt 5: over 6,000 MB/s, but only if your computer has a Thunderbolt 5 port.

On a Windows PC, check for a 20 Gbps USB-C port in your specs before paying for Gen 2x2. Without one, you will see the same 10 Gbps ceiling.

Three drives worth comparing

These cover the three speed groups above. Prices vary a lot by region and capacity, so compare them locally, and check that a model is still sold where you live.

Samsung T9, for general work. It comes in 1TB, 2TB and 4TB, weighs 122 g, has AES 256-bit encryption and a five-year warranty, and is rated for drops of up to 3 metres. The encryption and durability are useful for anyone carrying client files around.
Adata SE920, for heavier files on USB4. TechRadar tested reads of 3,100 to 3,200 MB/s and writes of up to 3,330 MB/s. It suits large Photoshop files and light video if your computer has a USB4 or Thunderbolt port.
OWC Envoy Ultra, for motion and video on Thunderbolt 5. OWC rates it at over 6,000 MB/s on Thunderbolt 5, about 2,800 to 3,800 MB/s on Thunderbolt 4, and over 3,800 MB/s on USB4. It is also IP67-rated and bus-powered, with a built-in cable.

Look past the headline number on any fast drive. OWC notes that the Envoy Ultra's sustained writes drop to 1,350 MB/s on the 2TB model and 1,700 MB/s on the 4TB model during long sessions. Reads stay fast, so it is great for editing footage, but a very large copy will finish slower than the peak figure suggests.

If you only send exports and open the occasional archive, a 10 Gbps drive is enough. Spend the difference on a second drive for backups.

A working drive is not a backup

If a file exists only on your external SSD, you have no backup, just a different single point of failure. The same goes for files moved off your laptop to free up space. The standard fix is the 3-2-1 rule: keep three copies of your data, on two different devices, with one copy in another location.

For a solo designer, that can be as simple as this:

Copy one: the working files on your laptop or working SSD.
Copy two: a separate backup drive at your desk, updated automatically.
Copy three: a cloud backup service, which covers theft, fire and water damage at your home or studio.

Cloud sync tools such as Dropbox or Google Drive are useful, but they are not the same thing. A deleted or overwritten file can sync across every device, so check how far back your plan lets you restore before you rely on one.

Set up the local backup

On a Mac, Time Machine is the simplest option. Apple recommends a backup drive with at least twice your Mac's storage capacity, so a 1TB Mac should ideally back up to 2TB or more. Time Machine keeps hourly backups for the past day, daily backups for the past month and weekly backups for earlier months, and removes the oldest ones when the drive fills up.

This drive does not need to be fast, since it runs in the background. A cheaper, larger drive is the better buy here. If you prefer a network setup, Apple says NAS devices must support Time Machine over SMB. It also notes that network backups over AFP are not supported in macOS 27 or later, so check any older NAS.

Keep the backup drive plugged in at your desk. A backup you have to remember to run will fall behind during your busiest weeks, which is when you can least afford to lose work.

Add an off-site copy

Backblaze Computer Backup is listed at $99 per year at the time of writing. The company says it backs up user data from your computer and connected external drives, which matters if your archive lives on an SSD. Before you commit, check how long deleted versions are kept and how often an external drive must be connected. Those terms decide whether older archives remain safe.

The first upload can take days on a typical home connection, so start it on a weekend and let it run. Once it finishes, later backups only send what has changed.

Test the restore before you need it

An untested backup is only a guess. Once a quarter, take ten minutes to run this check:

Restore one recent project file from your local backup and open it.
Download one older file from your cloud backup and open that too.
Confirm the backup date on each service, and look for any warnings about drives that have not connected lately.
Check how full each drive is, and plan an upgrade before it reaches the limit.

Also look at your contracts. If you promise to keep client source files for a set period, your archive and backup need to last at least that long.

Conclusion

Buy your working drive for the port your computer actually has, not the top speed on the box. Then buy a second, cheaper drive for automatic local backups, and add a cloud copy that lives somewhere else. Test a restore every few months, and a dead drive becomes a minor annoyance instead of a phone call you have to make to a client.