While Android phones come with expandable storage, iPhones do not have the facility to expand storage using memory cards. Apple charges heftily for more than 16 GB storage on its devices. Sandisk iXpand comes in handy as a life saver to expand the memory of iPhones and iPads.
The first gen Sandisk iXpand was huge in size and clumsily designed. But the new iXpand device is smaller and efficient than the predecessor. The data stick can be used both on a PC by connecting it to a regular USB port or on an Apple device’s lightning port. Once connected to an iPhone, an app called iXpand Drive can be used to explore the contents of the drive. You can use the drive to play audio or video files in the drive or to back up your iPhone’s contents.
The iXpand did really well in terms of copy speed compared to the previous version of the drive. The copy speed of the drive was around 50MB/s for writing and 90MB/s for reading. The iXpand Drive app also did the job well for backing up the data and for audio and video playback.
There are also a few flaws in the flash drive. The iXpand drains the battery of the iPhone much faster while backing media on the drive. Another major drawback is that the iXpand Drive app supports only a few file formats. Sound encodings like the DTS or AC3 cannot be played using the iXpand drive. The iXpand works with the mobile app only when it is formatted in FAT32 file system. Otherwise, it can work only as a regular pen drive. FAT32 file format can only store single files of maximum 4GB or less. So it is not possible to play movies which are more than 4GB using the iXpand drive.
Price
$49.99(16GB); $69.99(32GB); $89.99(64GB); $129.99(128GB)
Pros
- Small, fast and efficient
- Direct media playback
- Automatic backup
Cons
- Does not support few sound formats
- Drains mobile device’s battery
- Cannot hold files bigger than 4GB
