TrulyObscure - article - gadgeteer - trulyrandom - The Tornado Sweeps Data Off Its Feet

Our technical experts (who also happen to be our writers, editors, and graphic designers) are always on the lookout for new ways to move copious amounts of data easily and quickly.

Of course, an ethernet connection- either through a hub or router or with a crossover cable- is the best way for most purposes. But often it won’t be possible to do this, either because of missing drivers, lack of a part or cable, or maybe spyware blocking network traffic. Or maybe one PC is missing a monitor.

That’s where the Tornado comes in- it skips the ethernet connection, and uses USB on both ends. It is USB 2.0 compliant, meaning that it will be quite fast (if both computers have USB 2.0 ports, as most do). And it’s simple to use- no software necessary, and nothing to get blocked by the spyware. Bi-directional, it simply makes each system show up as an extra hard drive available to the other, and works for any PC (but unfortunately, not for Macs, yet).

Best of all, the Tornado is fairly small (about the size of a hard drive) and the cables have plenty of length but retract inside the protective casing. Our main issue was getting the cables out- they fit snugly inside the casing, and can require some ingenuity to get out if you have removed the (easily removed) plastic tabs. The Tornado is $60, which is a more than a couple of spare ethernet cards and patch cables. But it is much easier and faster to get working than any other file transfer option we’ve seen or tried before.