Vantec’s NexStar Hard Drive Dock Bumps Your Smartphone & Tablet Storage Over Wi-Fi

There’s a problem I often run into with my mobile devices, and that’s not enough storage space. I insist on purchasing devices with just 16GB of memory, and then I have to find ways to manage that storage the best I can. Some devices will take microSD cards that will allow you to bump their storage as and when you need it, but others — like Apple’s iOS devices — don’t come with that luxury.

Vantec’s new NexStar WiFi hard drive dock lets you bump your smartphone, tablet, and even PC storage over Wi-Fi. You can use it to store your audio and video collections on your home network, then use Vantec’s dedicated apps to access them wirelessly when you need to.

The NexStar WiFi doesn’t actually hold anything itself; it’s a dock you can stick any 2.5- or 3.5-inch SATA hard drive into. So it’ll turn your existing desktop and notebook hard drives into Wi-Fi connected storage centers that you can access wirelessly on almost any device.

On your Mac or PC, you can connect to the drive using the SMB protocol, or plug in to its USB 3.0 port. And when you’re on your Android and iOS devices, you can use Vantec’s dedicated app to get connected. It’s AirPlay compatible and works with UPnP, so even media players connected to your home network can access the files stored on your drive.

Vantec hasn’t yet announced pricing for the NexStar WiFi, but you’ll be able to pick one up at the end of this month.