Pogoplug Series 4 review

The idea is right, but the software isn't fully baked. There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to which videos you can stream (though, here's a list of supported filetypes if you're interested). I had issues with AVIs, MP4s, WMVs, and MKVs, and at a certain point I just gave up on using the Pogoplug as a video-streaming device. Some videos played fine in the desktop app but refused to get going in the web browser or on my phone. In order to increase compatibility, the Series 4 offers to transcode video files into an "optimized" video format, but it takes hours for this process to complete and you'll have no idea when it's finished. If you plan on using the Series 4 to store videos, just know that you're probably going to need to download and save the files locally before playing them — you simply can't rely on streaming the files from Pogoplug apps.

This brings me to my next problem with the software: the lack of information when something goes wrong. Sometimes I'd try to open a folder or stream some media and I'd end up with a blank screen, leaving me guessing whether it was loading or if it was just broken. This was most often the case with the web app, which would intermittently fail to play media even when all of the native apps had no problem. Speaking of reliability, there was one time that I had to turn off the Pogoplug and remove the drive to get it working again — something that would've been really bad news if I were trying to access that drive while I was away from home. Anything that's holding your data really needs to be nearly 100 percent reliable — there's nothing worse than not being able to access your data when you know it should be available — and the Series 4 is not.

Even if I were confident that I'd always be able to access my data, I'd still be unhappy with the software. All of the functionality is there, but many things are finicky. On the Android app, for instance, there's no way to refresh your list of connected devices, so until you force close the app, it'll deceive you into thinking that you'll be able to access a drive that's unavailable. Since there are so few error dialogs, you'll be presented with a blank screen and have no idea what the problem is when you do try to access that drive. Also, thanks to a recent software update, the desktop software now has two options: "backup" and "restore." Despite the naming scheme, you'll actually have to go to "restore" if you want to stream any media, which really doesn't make any sense, and you'll have to tick a "enable file management" checkbox in the advanced settings menu to get the option to delete and share files. Even with that box checked, you won't be able to move files around, a feature that has inexplicably been relegated to the web app.

Mercifully, you can almost completely avoid using the software by setting up your Pogoplug as standard network-attached storage. This means that drives in your Pogoplug will show up in Finder or Explorer as if they were a hard drive plugged into your computer, and you can view, add, and manage files quickly and easily. Unfortunately, there's no way to have your Pogoplug act as a network device at startup — you'll still have to manually open the application every time you turn on your computer. Plus, even if you use the Series 4 solely as NAS, you'd still have to deal with the iPhone and Android apps when you're on your phone and you'd need to rely on that unreliable web app to share files with others.

Once a video starts playing, streaming performance is quite solid. I used the Series 4 on the Verge's 50Mbps / 50Mbps office connection as well as a 3Mbps / 0.5Mbps DSL connection, and streaming took about as long as I expected. I rarely had to wait more than five seconds for a video to start playing — if it was in a supported format — and music started almost instantly. Managing and exploring data on a drive is pretty quick, too — so long as the Pogoplug has had enough time to create previews of all your files before you start poking around. There's a big tradeoff here, however: files aren't viewed at anywhere near their full size, and whatever compression is being applied is very apparent — photos and videos looked nothing like their original files (yet another reason to avoid the Pogoplug software and use the Series 4 solely as network attached storage). It's also worth noting that performance was definitely improved when I connected my drive over SATA instead of USB 3.0. While your mileage may vary depending on your internet connection and the bitrate of your files, I only had a few issues with speed.