Eagle Tech ET-CS2MU2-BK 2.5¿ IDE to USB Mesh Enclosure

5 comments

1. 

   W.H. on January 29, 2010 at 4:53 pm

   absolutely loved mine. purchbought this over 1 year ago for my HP notebook old IDE drive.
   
   swapped it out, put it into this enclosure and just worked. great mesh design.

2. 

   Bdubslawman on January 29, 2010 at 6:32 pm

   I shopped around for a budget solution since I don’t / didn’t anticpate having to use this more than a few times or from time to time.
   
   It seems to work just fine though. I’ve used it on two different Desktop PC’s. I had to use both usb ports (if you read the info often times front bay usb ports do not get full power so they recommend using both.
   
   It’s been over a month since I set this up and i’ve forgotten now whether the chip on this publishes the S.M.A.R.T. data. I used it with a systems that had HD Sentinel running but my memory is failing me.

   However, considering what this is and the price range it is not intended for extended use (though I dont’ see why you couldn’t) just the penaties for USB, 2.5 5400RPM can add up. I’ll have to pull it out again and verify that the chip doesn’t support or publish SMART data from the drives but I’ll have to verify that. (that’s another problem with long term use.

   On the positive sides, the mesh case is brilliant, I’d buy more of long term products from them if they sell 3.5 SATA / PATA external cases like this (as long as they use a chip that publishes the smart data. A simple eye on the temps and turning a fan on briefly if you do a lot of heavy transferring back & forth makes this a great design. Plus dust isn’t a major problem, a can of compressed air for average users or if you have an air compressor (like me) its a 30 second cleaning periodically.

   Anyway i’m babbling on, but this performed as well as I was hoping it would. Did the job, again i’d pay up to $10-15 more for this design in bigger cases provided again it detects drives smart info / temperature reallocated bad sectors etc. Otherwise for long term use its not practical.

3. 

   BobG on January 29, 2010 at 6:43 pm

   Great way to reuse an old IDE (Parallel ATA) laptop drive! There’s not much to it, but there doesn’t need to be… I chose this one due to its low price but it does also look good with a blue LED and screen-like black metal to keep the drive cool.

4. 

   Andrew Skow on January 29, 2010 at 8:24 pm

   You read the specs and description but you can’t believe it’s going to be good for only ten dollars. You’re worried that the “mesh” will resemble the material a screen door is made out of, that it’s covered with lead paint, and held together by a half hearted wish.

   Well, in all honesty, I don’t know what the paint is made out of but damn this thing is everything I’d hoped it would be. It feels good in your hand, solid. It does not feel like it’s going to fall apart too soon. Some of its rigidity is provided by the hard drive you must install in it but once it’s all put together it is exactly what you hoped.

   I have a 100GB, 5400rpm drive in it and the electronics of the enclosure do not impact the sustained transfer rates the drive was capable of when it was directly installed in my old laptop. I can get read speeds in excess of 30 Mebibytes per second. I’m sure the USB interface limits I/O’s per second but that’s just the nature of the beast.

   It’s a great buy. I don’t regret it in the slightest.
   

5. 

   Kaio on January 29, 2010 at 9:20 pm

   I’ve have several 2.5″ USB enclosures and this one is by far my favorite. At the end of the day, they’re all the same in the sense that you just put a drive in them and use it. But I really love the design of this one. The casing itself is mesh metal on both sides so the drive is somewhat visible inside the case. Needless to say, heat dissipation isn’t an issue. There’s 2 little LEDs you can see through the mesh too — red and blue. One indicating the drive is powered up and the other that it’s in use.

   The USB cable itself is a mini port on the drive’s end and 2 USB connectors on the other. The good thing over other enclosures I’ve used is, of the 2 USB connectors that plug into your computer, one is primary and one is secondary. Meaning, the primary one is needed to power the drive and the secondary is optional. You can either use it or not. This is cool because sometimes, I use computers that don’t have 2 USB ports free, or 2 ports near each other, so the option to just use one is good. I have other enclosures that require you to use BOTH USB connectors or the drive wont work, which can be a hassle. Using both USB connectors is a good idea for power stability, but it isn’t necessary. So I’m glad to have the either/or option.

   Compared to the other enclosures I have, installing the hard drive was easier with this Eagle Tech. The screws are small, yes. But believe it or not, these are the biggest screws of all the laptop drive enclosures I have! I had to duct tape one shut because the screws were so minuscule I couldn’t get them back in! And the kicker to boot, is the Eagle Tec gives 2 extra screws! Not expensive to do and a very nice touch. This is the only drive enclosure I have that was nice enough to do that so bonus points there!

   Aside from installing the drive, there are no drivers or anything to install. Just plug it in and go. I use these laptop drives in place of flash drives since they have so much larger capacity and speed. And I love the look and feel of this Eagle Tech which makes it nicer to carry around.

   For the money, you won’t find a better enclosure. I have both the IDE and SATA versions. I’m impressed and quite happy with them both!