2. It worked out of the box, but failed to be recognized by every computer to which it was connected one week later.
The manual that comes with the enclosure must depict an older version, where the drive mount slides from the rear once the rear screws are removed; on the one I received, the drive mount slid out the front. The enclosure comes with four screws in a small ziplock bag, so two are spares since the mount only has two holes for mounting the drive from the bottom.
The enclosure is attractively packaged and looks great, so I am very disappointed that it failed to work more than once — a fact I verified by removing the 2.5 inch SATA drive and installing it in ME-601SD-SBK Predictor SATA Hard Drive USB 2.0 Docking Station for 2.5 Inch & 3.5 Inch SATA II/3G with S.M.A.R.T. (Serial ATA) HDD Hot-Swap: ME-601SD-SBK where it worked perfectly.
I would have also preferred that the enclosure had included a carry case to protect the attractive finish.
Just bought this. It looks good, it is easy to install a notebook drive inside, and it runs quiet. So why only two stars?
Because you can’t mount the drive on your PC or Mac using a single cable, be it USB or Firewire. My first clue that this was going to be a problem was when the short manual included with the case noted that to mount “some drives” one would need to use the included Y-USB cable to plug the case into two USB ports to provide the extra power needed. Or one could plug the case into the computer using both USB (for power) and Firewire 400 (for data).
I tried this with two different 2.5 inch notebook drives: a 400 GB Western Digital Scorpio Blue that I bought from Amazon at the same time, and a 160 GB Fujitsu that was a pull from a MacBook. I installed each in turn into the Acomdata case (easy, no problem), but neither would mount on my Mac without use of a second connection. I ended up using both Firewire and USB. The Y-USB cable also works but again, now one needs two USB connections.
So just two stars: it works, but the hassle of making a second USB connection (or doing both Firewire and USB) really takes away from its use. It’s supposed to plug-and-go.
Rating: 2 / 5
This product came and one of the screws was in so tight I could not remove it. I think it was cross threaded. I had to drill it out. I put it together with a 160G drive and was going to use it with my macBook. After a while of using it the indicator light stayed purple, showing that the drive was in access mode. When this happened I could not access the drive. I could not unmount the drive. I had to power down the mac and power it back up. This happened about 10 minutes after booting. I did not try it with USB because I already had a nicer enclosure that is USB only. I ended up putting the drive back in the USB enclosure I originally had. I really could not tell if it was the mac or the enclosure that did not want to play nice with firewire. I guess I will just trash it because I dont want to mess with sending it back.
I used this enclosure to recover files from a friend’s seriously fragged HD. I already had Data Rescue 3 from when I had to recover files from my drive, so all I needed was a way to interface with their drive. This little gem was exactly what I needed: a fast, bus-powered connection at an relatively low price point.
To install a SATA drive, there are two screws in back to take out, and then a slim sled pulls out of the enclosure. The product comes with four screws to affix your drive to sled, and slide it back in and attach the two outer screws. You may need a smaller set of phillips screw drivers, but you can pick those up at radio shack for less than $5.
As I said before, the drive was really messed up mechanically, so recovery of just personal files took days. However, the fact that the drive has USB2, FW400, AND FW800 was a total plus. I did my first work with it using FW800 looking for the fastest speed possible. However, after it became apparent that due to the drive transfers would be slow, no matter what transfer method I used, I switched to 400.
The only down side to the drive enclosure, I’ll say, is that it sucks a *lot* of power. The recovery process was only pulling 25% of my available CPU, so I tried do other tasks with FireWire peripherals at the same time. Well, my FW400 optical drive kept loosing power and spinning down after an hour or so of use when used concurrently with this drive doing data recovery. I never had any problems with my FW400 Audio & MIDI I/O box, but that probably didn’t require as much power. As a disclaimer, this may have been the function of my particular system setup.
If you’re looking for a cheap and effective SATA drive enclosure, specifically with FireWire connectivity, I’d recommend this to most anyone in a heartbeat.
Rating: 4 / 5
This is a very nice enclosure. I am using it along with a Western Digital Black 320 GB HD and my mac. I have tried both FireWire and USB and have not had any issues. The enclosure is strong an sturdy as well as sleek and classy. My only suggestion would be to have a power switch but it’s not that big of a deal. Great price. Really great enclosure.
Rating: 5 / 5
Two primary disappointments with this enclosure:
1. It requires two USB ports for power;
2. It worked out of the box, but failed to be recognized by every computer to which it was connected one week later.
The manual that comes with the enclosure must depict an older version, where the drive mount slides from the rear once the rear screws are removed; on the one I received, the drive mount slid out the front. The enclosure comes with four screws in a small ziplock bag, so two are spares since the mount only has two holes for mounting the drive from the bottom.
The enclosure is attractively packaged and looks great, so I am very disappointed that it failed to work more than once — a fact I verified by removing the 2.5 inch SATA drive and installing it in ME-601SD-SBK Predictor SATA Hard Drive USB 2.0 Docking Station for 2.5 Inch & 3.5 Inch SATA II/3G with S.M.A.R.T. (Serial ATA) HDD Hot-Swap: ME-601SD-SBK where it worked perfectly.
I would have also preferred that the enclosure had included a carry case to protect the attractive finish.
I returned the enclosure.
Rating: 1 / 5
Just bought this. It looks good, it is easy to install a notebook drive inside, and it runs quiet. So why only two stars?
Because you can’t mount the drive on your PC or Mac using a single cable, be it USB or Firewire. My first clue that this was going to be a problem was when the short manual included with the case noted that to mount “some drives” one would need to use the included Y-USB cable to plug the case into two USB ports to provide the extra power needed. Or one could plug the case into the computer using both USB (for power) and Firewire 400 (for data).
I tried this with two different 2.5 inch notebook drives: a 400 GB Western Digital Scorpio Blue that I bought from Amazon at the same time, and a 160 GB Fujitsu that was a pull from a MacBook. I installed each in turn into the Acomdata case (easy, no problem), but neither would mount on my Mac without use of a second connection. I ended up using both Firewire and USB. The Y-USB cable also works but again, now one needs two USB connections.
So just two stars: it works, but the hassle of making a second USB connection (or doing both Firewire and USB) really takes away from its use. It’s supposed to plug-and-go.
Rating: 2 / 5
This product came and one of the screws was in so tight I could not remove it. I think it was cross threaded. I had to drill it out. I put it together with a 160G drive and was going to use it with my macBook. After a while of using it the indicator light stayed purple, showing that the drive was in access mode. When this happened I could not access the drive. I could not unmount the drive. I had to power down the mac and power it back up. This happened about 10 minutes after booting. I did not try it with USB because I already had a nicer enclosure that is USB only. I ended up putting the drive back in the USB enclosure I originally had. I really could not tell if it was the mac or the enclosure that did not want to play nice with firewire. I guess I will just trash it because I dont want to mess with sending it back.
Rating: 1 / 5
I used this enclosure to recover files from a friend’s seriously fragged HD. I already had Data Rescue 3 from when I had to recover files from my drive, so all I needed was a way to interface with their drive. This little gem was exactly what I needed: a fast, bus-powered connection at an relatively low price point.
To install a SATA drive, there are two screws in back to take out, and then a slim sled pulls out of the enclosure. The product comes with four screws to affix your drive to sled, and slide it back in and attach the two outer screws. You may need a smaller set of phillips screw drivers, but you can pick those up at radio shack for less than $5.
As I said before, the drive was really messed up mechanically, so recovery of just personal files took days. However, the fact that the drive has USB2, FW400, AND FW800 was a total plus. I did my first work with it using FW800 looking for the fastest speed possible. However, after it became apparent that due to the drive transfers would be slow, no matter what transfer method I used, I switched to 400.
The only down side to the drive enclosure, I’ll say, is that it sucks a *lot* of power. The recovery process was only pulling 25% of my available CPU, so I tried do other tasks with FireWire peripherals at the same time. Well, my FW400 optical drive kept loosing power and spinning down after an hour or so of use when used concurrently with this drive doing data recovery. I never had any problems with my FW400 Audio & MIDI I/O box, but that probably didn’t require as much power. As a disclaimer, this may have been the function of my particular system setup.
If you’re looking for a cheap and effective SATA drive enclosure, specifically with FireWire connectivity, I’d recommend this to most anyone in a heartbeat.
Rating: 4 / 5
This is a very nice enclosure. I am using it along with a Western Digital Black 320 GB HD and my mac. I have tried both FireWire and USB and have not had any issues. The enclosure is strong an sturdy as well as sleek and classy. My only suggestion would be to have a power switch but it’s not that big of a deal. Great price. Really great enclosure.
Rating: 5 / 5