The latest version of Iomega’s hard drive for the Mac mini, the MiniMax, packs a 500GB, 7200rpm hard drive into its mini-sized enclosure. The MiniMax is designed to sit underneath the Mac mini, and so has the same footprint. It shares the mini’s silver and white colour scheme and the two look like they were made for each other when stacked.

In addition to the capacious hard drive, the MiniMax provides additional USB 2 and FireWire ports, making it a powered hub as well as a hard drive. There are three FireWire 400 ports in total, leaving two available when connected to your Mac. And there are three downstream USB 2 ports in addition to the upstream socket. It also has its

Aside from the obviously gorgeous shape and small footprint, there are a few other plusses. You get three FireWire 400 ports and three USB 2.0 ports, which means that you can double up the drive as a hub for peripherals.

It’s also speedy, with a 7200rpm disk whirring inside it, compared to the standard 5400rpm drive that comes in the mini. In our test we duplicated a 1GB file on the drive 21 seconds faster than we could on a Core Duo Mac mini.

Also in the package is Dantz Retrospect, a data backup and recovery software package from EMC that’s quite commonly bundled on external drives from a variety of manufacturers. We’ve reviewed the software as a standalone product in the past; it’s basic but effective at automating data backup, and though not exclusive to this drive, it’s a welcome bonus.