meets the Sandisk iXpand Base

Apple gives us two ways to back up our iOS devices: via a Mac via iTunes and a Lightning cable or via iCloud, without cables and using the internet connection. It’s more than enough, but there will always be those who want to protect your data with additional measures.

For those users, Sandisk has the iXpand Base. The idea that the well-known manufacturer has had is a kind of ‘stand’ in which you can charge your iPhone while you sleep, but with the added of being able to create a backup on a disc on that same base in case the flies.

That backup goes completely apart from the copy that iOS makes in iOS or via iTunes, so you would happen to have two backups of your phone. You may think it’s unnecessary, but for those who rely a lot on that phone, having a double copy can be interesting.

It’s not a disc, it’s a base with SD card reader

The overall appearance of the iXpand Base is that of a fairly accomplished stand to support and charge the phone. It doesn’t include any Lighning cable, but when you bring yours you can do it in a way that’s pretty hidden. The USB connection is in a hole at the bottom of the base, and everything left over from the cable you have can be rolled into the sides just under the non-slip rubber.

There is no disk or memory chips inside that base, the storage part is ordered an SD card that can be extracted. In some ways you can play against Sandisk: there are 32, 64, 128 or 256 GB models. They sell for 72.82, 80.04, 130.68 or 207.59 euros respectively on Amazon. What keeps me from buying the cheapest 32GB model (on the official website it’s even 49 dollars) and then I’m looking for a cheaper 256GB SD card to wear? Or even a 512GB one for a little more money.

Although not everything is bad: by changing SD cards we can even manage more than one backup, giving flexibility to the issue in case we don’t want to overwrite them.

Very basic but flexible backups

To make the backups you have to download the app from the iXpand Base from the App Store, completely free of charge. It instantly detects the charging dock as soon as we connect the iPhone to the Lightning cable that in turn is connected to the iXpand Base and asks for all the necessary permissions to make that copy.

What is saved in that copy are two things: the photographic reel and our contacts. Nothing more, I guess, because of iOS’s own limitations, although I have little doubt that backing up photos can be a lifeline for many people when iCloud runs out of space or iTunes gives problems.

Point in favor: the application detects if we have the photos stored in iCloud and warns us that a full copy may need several nights since you will have to download all the photos to original quality if we have enabled the option to optimize the Storage. And since the copy is not linked to any device profile, we can restore it to any other device without any problems.

The final touch gives it an option to be able to free up space on the iPhone, deleting the photos that we have stored in the backup. Something risky to do, but perfect for when we need to release GB anyway and have it all collapsed.

All in all, the iXpand Base is a charging base for those who need more backups of their photos or just a place where they can save more data. Its price for this can be somewhat high, but the flexibility with removable SD cards can give a lot of play.