Feature Set and Test Results

The Odyssey backup solution is attached to the computer like any external hard drive and acts just like one as well. You can copy files to the cartridges, which are pre-formatted with NTFS, using the Explorer to drag & drop. The manual informs Mac OS users that they will need to manually format the cartridges using a Mac-compatible file system before they can be used. Once option is to use FAT32, which is compatible with both OS X and Windows. Due to the capacity of the cartridges, Windows users will not be able to format them using the Windows’ own tools, since the OS cannot create FAT32 partitions larger than 32 GB. Thus, you’ll need to find third-party tools if this is the file system you wish to use.

Our attempt to split the 80 GB cartridge into two partitions under Windows was not successful. The option to delete an existing partition was grey in the disk management interface and thus not usable. Thus the Iomega Odyssey represents a backup solution that operates strictly within the parameters defined by the manufacturer and whose data cannot be destroyed by a few heedless clicks by the user.

The EMC Retrospect backup software that comes bundled with the Odyssey creates secure and reliable backups. These can either be password-secured or encrypted using a 256 bit AES algorithm. This prevents access by unauthorized parties should the cartridges get stolen. Another highlight of this version of the EMC Retrospect software is that other computers on the network can be backed up over the LAN after a client has been installed on them, without the need for a complete backup solution on that PC.

Imation’s Odyssey backup drive connects to your computer via USB 2.0. Therefore, you shouldn’t expect amazingly high speeds. The median seek time as measured with HD Tach was 18.1ms, with an average read speed of 28.6 MB/s and a mean write speed of 22.2 MB/s. While these results are decent for a USB 2.0 connection, they’re not record-breaking either. When we used h2benchw to verify these scores, we came up with very similar results, namely 27.3 MB/s reading and 22.4 MB/s writing.