Maxtor Fusion 500GB Review

The Maxtor Fusion is a Personal Web Server that looks like an external hard drive connected directly to your Ethernet network. I said “looks like” because it’s not just a hard drive: it’s a little computer that acts as silent file/web server.

In the past, such devices where annoying to setup but Maxtor did a good job with the Fusion. The setup program detects the IP address of the unit and brings you to an administration page from which the user can set the IP address, port and even configure a dynamic DNS service, which is handy when the device is connected to the internet with a dynamic (changing) address.

Our 500GB unit can be connected to external USB drives for backup purposes – because it’s never safe enough (most people learn the hard way). I wish that the Maxtor Fusion cannot be accessed by a USB or Firewire connection, this would have been great for the administrator when copying hundreds of gigabytes to populate the drive. I suppose that most users could simply use a Gigabit Ethernet connection, even if it’s much slower *in practice* than Firewire.

The administrator can create individual accounts and let users upload and share their files. Each user has a private and a public area and it is even possible to create “micro-links” – a direct URL to a file hosted on the Maxtor Fusion. That’s nice if you want to share a single file or if you want to link to it from your web page.

The good news is that the Fusion has a graphics user interface (GUI). The bad news is that it needs some work. The GUI doesn’t resemble any well known user interface and most people that I’ve created accounts for did search for simple things like saving a file from the Fusion to their local hard disk. A customizable home page would also be great!

I find this device to be very convenient for the tech-savvy user and small-businesses that want to share files but don’t need enterprise-grade security. In my opinion, the Maxtor Fusion is not ready for the average consumer: some knowledge of TCP/IP (network protocol) is necessary to do the setup and this could be a problem for many users. Opening a port in the firewall or in the router could be challenging as well. I can’t blame Maxtor for this, because TCP/IP was simply not designed to be used by consumers. IPV6 might solve some of that by removing the need for routers and network address translation (NAT).

The Maxtor fusion is a good product that lets people share files without leaving their main computer on. The user interface could use some improvements, but it should not stop you from considering using it.

Maxtor fusion product page

Update 5/24/2007: I've hit the dozen or so user limit, and I still have a lot of space to spare... While it's probably OK for a personal usage (and even then I doubt it), it is certainly not good enough for a professional use. Having an unlimited number of accounts would be much more practical. I bet that this is some kind of (lame) segmentation decision.

Update 10/17/2007: the Maxtor Fusion died. The disk is making a "click" noise and can't start. I think that this is the end

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