Performance
How well does it work? The obvious question comes with a relatively obvious answer; it works well. For documents and smaller files, they open very quickly on my iPhone without any noticeable delay.
Using Handbrake, I transcoded a 1080p episode of Top Gear to the preset iPhone 4 setting. 30 minutes later I copied the file to the Kingston Wi-Drive, and connected the iPhone. It streams beautifully. There is a small delay when first starting the file, which can be attributed to buffering, and there is a small buffering delay if you seek forwards or backwards in the file, but the file definitely plays without any noticeable hiccups.
I do not (unfortunately) have access to 3 iOS devices readily, but I do have access to two. I connected both my iPhone and a second-generation iPad to the Wi-Drive, and then loaded the exact same television episode. Again, it worked flawlessly, with the same delay time for buffering but nothing that was too unexpected.
Obviously, the exceptional performance of the device is due in part to the solid-state nature of the storage drive. Unlike the Western Digital drive that I will be reviewing shortly that uses a spinning mobile drive, the Kingston has no moving parts and can access data quickly.
If we are going to pick nits, I would like to complain that the transfer to the Wi-Drive is USB 2.0 only. USB 3.0 is still not "readily available" in my opinion, so I am not surprised that it is not included, but it would make transferring files and filling up the Wi-Drive last minute before a trip even better.
There is a nice feature though included in the software. From the iOS/Android/Kindle device, files can be copied to the Wi-Drive from the iOS/Android/Kindle device, and vice-versa, which would make sharing files a boon with this. Also, files can be deleted via the software from the device on the Wi-Drive. It is nice to see that extra data management ability, considering the small storage capacity of the device.