Other World Computing quietly turned a few heads at CES by taking two wildly different approaches to the same problem: how to move huge amounts of data as fast as humanly possible. The announcements were pragmatic — a truly pocketable 8TB Thunderbolt 5 SSD — and a show-off: an external RAID box scaled up to a staggering 192TB. Oh, and there’s a long Thunderbolt 5 cable to actually reach your rig.
A pocket drive that thinks big
The headline grabber for mobile creators is the new 8TB Envoy Ultra Thunderbolt 5 portable SSD. It’s the first bus-powered, Thunderbolt 5 portable drive to ship at this capacity, and OWC kept the same rugged, heat-managing chassis design used in the 2TB and 4TB models: IP67-rated, crushproof, with a finless aluminum body and non-slip feet. The catch — or convenience, depending on how you feel about cables — is an integrated Thunderbolt 5 lead.
Specs OWC is shouting about are impressive on paper: an 80 Gb/s Thunderbolt 5 interface, backward compatibility with Thunderbolt 3/4 and USB4, and advertised real-world transfers over 6,000 MB/s. In practice, independent testing of the 4TB sibling didn’t quite hit the peak headline number every time, but reviewers found the Envoy Ultra to be one of the fastest portable SSDs available and remarkably consistent under sustained loads thanks to good thermal management.
Design choices matter here. Bus power and the integrated cable make the drive convenient on location — plug it into a laptop or an iPad Pro and keep shooting — but they also limit flexibility if you want to swap cables or use an aftermarket cord. Still, for editors who live out of backpacks, that compromise is a net win. OWC lists the 8TB Envoy Ultra at $1,699.99 (the 4TB model is $699.99 and the 2TB starts at $449.99), and the drives are shipping now.
When pocket storage isn't enough: 192TB in a desktop crate
If you thought 8TB was a lot, OWC’s ThunderBlade X12 answers with “bring the production with you” levels of capacity. The X12 has been expanded to accept twelve 16TB M.2 SSDs, doubling the previous top end to 192TB. That’s a number that matters for high-end, data-heavy workflows — think multi-camera 8K/12K RAW shoots, dailies for feature work, or entire production volumes that you want to move between sites without relying on network transfers.
Performance-wise, the ThunderBlade family is tuned for speed. OWC advertises read/write peaks up to about 6,600 MB/s and sustained write performance around 5,990 MB/s, driven by a Thunderbolt 5 controller and a RAID engine that supports multiple RAID levels from 0 through 10. The unit supports daisy-chaining, can drive multiple high-resolution displays, and ships with a hard travel case and a locking power connector for on-location reliability.
Pricing for the X12 scales steeply: the ThunderBlade X12 line ranges from $3,299 for the entry 12TB configuration up to $15,499.99 for the 96TB model; OWC has not published a street price for the 192TB configuration yet but expects availability in mid-2026. For crews that regularly produce terabytes per day, the math of carrying a production on a single portable RAID can be compelling.
The little cable that matters
Practical detail: OWC also introduced a fully certified 2-meter Thunderbolt 5 cable. It’s the longest Thunderbolt 5 cable OWC has offered and supports the full TB5 spec: up to 80Gb/s bi-directional data, a 120Gb/s video bandwidth boost and up to 240W power delivery. At $80, it’s a short, cheap fix for those times when your drive or dock sits across the desk or in a rack and you don’t want to hunch over your machine to connect it.
Why creators should pay attention
The announcements aren’t just gadget theater. Cameras and codecs keep getting larger: new cinema and mirrorless bodies routinely produce massive RAW files that chew through storage. If you shoot high-frame-rate 8K or 12K RAW, or you’re managing multi-cam shoots with high-bitrate codecs, the ability to edit without proxying or to move entire projects in one go changes how you plan shoots and backups. That’s why tools like the Envoy Ultra appeal to solo shooters and on-the-go editors, while the ThunderBlade X12 targets DITs, editorial suites, and post houses.
If you’re weighing an investment here and you work on a Mac, remember Thunderbolt 5 adoption is still rolling into laptops and desktops — but connecting to the newest Macs will let you get the most out of these devices. (If you’re shopping for a new laptop anyway, OWC’s hardware pairs naturally with a modern MacBook.) For camera-centric context on why you might need this much throughput and capacity, recent pro-level bodies such as the EOS R6 series underscore how quickly storage needs scale with higher-resolution capture; Canon’s R6 Mark III push into 7K/RAW workflows is a good example of the kind of pressure these drives are built to relieve [/news/canon-eos-r6-mark-iii-debuts].
And if you’re wondering whether to future-proof your studio laptop, Apple’s ongoing lineup shifts are worth watching: the rumored, more affordable MacBook that’s expected to land soon might change the calculus for pros who need more portable Thunderbolt performance [/news/apple-budget-macbook-j700].
Not everything is for everybody
High capacity and blistering throughput come at a price. The integrated cable on the Envoy Ultra is excellent for mobility but less flexible than a removable solution; the ThunderBlade X12’s sticker puts it firmly in professional budgets. And like any early generation or top-end Thunderbolt device, real-world performance depends on the host, the controller, and the workload — don’t assume peak specs translate directly to every editing timeline.
If you’re a lone photographer or a casual videographer, these products are overkill. But for DITs, post teams, and field editors who must move and edit mountains of pixels without compromise, OWC’s CES refresh is a practical — and occasionally flamboyant — step toward making that workflow possible.