Price when reviewed
When used with the SanDisk Pro-Blade Mags and Pro-Blade Transport, the SanDisk Pro-Blade Station offers a flexible storage system. Although its maximum capacity of 16TB at any one time may limit it to being primarily used as a working drive rather than for long-term storage for some, its rapid data transfer is beneficial for both photographers and videographers.
The SanDisk Professional Pro-Blade Station complements the Pro-Blade Transport and Pro-Blade SSD Mags, forming a modular SSD system. Designed primarily for desktop use, the Station can hold up to four Pro-Blade SSD Mags, while the Transport is more portable, accommodating a single Mag.
The system is designed for easy swapping of Mags between the Station and Transport, eliminating the need for file transfers when moving location.
Read our buyer’s guide to the best portable SSD for photographers
The SanDisk Pro-Blade Station is often sold separately, along with power and USB-C cables, however, it’s also possible to buy it bundled with one or more SanDisk Pro-Blade SSD Mag. These Mags come with capacities of 1TB, 2TB, or 4TB. The Mags can also be purchased separately or with the SanDisk Pro-Blade Transport.
Combined with the NVMe technology in the SanDisk Pro-Blade SSD Mags and its own Thunderbolt 3 (40Gbps) connectivity, the Station offers impressive read and write speeds of up to 3000MB/s and 2600MB/s, respectively.
The Station can operate with one to four Mags inserted, with the flexibility to swap them as needed. More than four Mags can be used, but not simultaneously.
SanDisk provides a robust power adapter, a USB-C power cable, and a USB-C cable for computer connection.
An active cooling system ensures the SSDs remain cool during use.
Read our buyers guide to the best portable SSD for photographers
Measuring 180.4 x 133 x 77.6 mm and weighing 1.45 kg, the Pro-Blade Station is robust and sleek. Its weight, coupled with rubber pads on the base, ensures it stays put during one-handed Mag removal.
While the front of the Pro-Blade Station has four slots with self-closing flaps, the rear features three USB-C ports. One port is for power delivery and the other two are for device connections. There’s also a Kensington Security Slot for added security.
The Pro-Blade Mags slide smoothly into the slots until about 1cm is protruding. At this point, a little extra push is required to drive the Mag fully home and it locks into place with a click. A small ridge on the Mags gives some purchase and aids their removal from the Station.
When the SanDisk Pro-Blade Station is connected to a computer via the included USB-C cable, it recognises Mags quickly as they are inserted and a drive icon appears almost immediately on the computer. With multiple Mags, each appears as a separate drive on the computer and they require individual ejection.
By default, all the Mag drives are named ‘PRO-BLADE,’ so distinguishing between them can be challenging without renaming or physical labelling them – especially if the Mags have the same capacity.
Performance-wise, the Station excels with still images and 4K or 8K video editing. For example, transferring nearly 10GB of images (100 raw and 100 Jpeg) from the 45.7MP Nikon Z7 II took less than 5 seconds in either direction, showcasing its rapid pace.
While I couldn’t achieve the maximum claimed speeds in my tests using the Blackmagic Disk Speed software, the data transfer rates I recorded were still impressive, exceeding 2700 MB/s for reading and 2200MB/s for writing.
The SanDisk Pro-Blade Station is most effective when paired with the SanDisk Pro-Blade Transport and several Pro-Blade SSD Mags. While the Station is a desktop storage solution, the Pro-Blade SSD Mags can be extracted and slotted into a Pro-Blade Transport to create a portable SSD.
Although its maximum capacity of 16TB at any point in time may limit the Station’s appeal as a long-term storage device, it delivers fast file transfers and seamless image and video editing.
Its ability to swap SSD Mags on-the-fly makes the Station a central hub for SSD storage, simplifying connections to just one cable. Though each drive appears independently on the computer, a method for externally differentiating the Mags in the Station would be useful. This can be resolved with simple colour-coded stickers, but a slicker solution would be welcome.
