PPA Int'l 1912 3.5-in Aluminum USB 2.0 / 1394 Combo External Case

by PPA

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds
• ASIN: B0007QQJ4I
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Date first available at Amazon.com: April 2, 2004

Product Description

The PPA 1912 is the new ultimate hard drive enclosure with Light Bar. The aluminum case is engineered to create a vibration-free and quiet operation. The mesh surface on the side enables optimal heat dissipation, which guarantees best performance. So whatever hard drive you choose, it always helps to keep it cool and noise to the minimal.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Stylish, well built, functional and easy to setup, January 26, 2006

By 

D. Wichmann (San Francisco, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: PPA Int'l 1912 3.5-in Aluminum USB 2.0 / 1394 Combo External Case (Electronics)

I'd been searching for an external HD to backup my PC data to so I could store it off someplace safe like a fire safe. My PC had firewire and USB 1.0 ports, so I had to go w/ firewire since USB 1.0 is dog-slow. Many of the complete external HD's that had these features were quite expensive. I had a free hookup to a 300 GB Maxtor, so I decided to go with an enclosure instead.

I read good reviews on this unit, so purchased it and am quite pleased. The noisy fan reviews on the units with fans scared me away from those. This aluminum unit that dissipates heat much like a heat sync seemed like a much better alternative.

The unit comes well packaged and includes simple and easy to follow instructions, a nice power cord that has a regular plug at the end (not one of those big power block jobbies), a USB cord, a firewire code, a little bracket so you can stand it upright and software (which I didn't have to use w/ XP SP2).

Simply unscrew the round thumbscrews on the top, connect the IDE and power cables, plop in your 3.5 HD, screw in two phillips counter-sunk screws from the bottom, re-attach the top cover, connect the cords and you're good to go. One minor complaint in this area; when you're screwing in the HD and you have the top cover off the meshed light bar pieces have a tendency to slip out of their slots so you have to be a little careful. Once you get the top cover on they are securely in place.

Once connected you have to go into computer manager where you can create a partition and format the drive (if it's a new one of course). It won't show up as a drive letter until you do this.

The unit has a power switch on the back that you need to flip on and off when you want the HD to be on or off. The blue light looks pretty slick. It stays on at full brightness when the HD is idle, then during activity it dims. The aluminum case gets warm, which leads me to believe it's doing a good job of dissipating the heat from the HD. A nice enhancement, which I'm not even sure if it's possible, would be for the unit to sense when the PC turns on and off, and then it would turn itself on and off accordingly. This way you wouldn't have to mess w/ the on/off switch on the back of it.

Overall I think it's an excellent unit. Well worth the money.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good Value, February 28, 2006

By 

E. Wilkinson (East Northport, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: PPA Int'l 1912 3.5-in Aluminum USB 2.0 / 1394 Combo External Case (Electronics)

I got a 200 Gig Maxtor Hard Drive on sale at Staples for $40 (after rebates) and found myself in the market for an enclosure. To use a second drive internally would place too much heat on my current drive (the expansion bay for the 2nd drive almost touches the primary drive) so I decided to go external.

I have read that Firewire is faster than USB 2.0 even though USB 2.0 has a faster max speed, so why not just get both? I tried both and can't tell a difference, I'm sure if you clock it there would be a winner, but there is no discernable difference to the average user.

Before ordering keep this in mind:

Pros:
- If you have any tech savvy you will have no problem setting this up in under 10 minutes
- It is a good deal at $40
- The bright blue lights kind of grow on you
- It comes with both USB and Firewire cables
- It's simple, well made and runs cool (No fan - plenty of venting and heat dissipating aluminum do the job.

Cons:
- The set-up disk does not work on Windows XP (use the set up disk that comes with the drive instead)
- The instructions that come with this are worthless
- The lights are bright and can be switched to be on either on the front or on the sides (But not both together and never all off)
- No software for auto back-up

Conclusion:
There is better out there for a lot more money, and there is worse for less. I'm happy with mine and have no regrets on selecting this from a field of so many.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Looks good, performs poorly, July 15, 2007

By 

Mike (Denver, CO USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: PPA Int'l 1912 3.5-in Aluminum USB 2.0 / 1394 Combo External Case (Electronics)

Pros:
- The blue-lighted display is attractive
- Easy to setup
- Cheap

Cons:
- The thumb screws break easily during assembly (I broke 2 of them)
- The power supply plugin to the circuit board broke
- Overall cheap componentry

I owned this unit for about 6 months before the power cord attachment to the circuit board would short out, and I'd have to twist the plug in order to get it to make contact and power the unit. Now it does not work at all and I'll try to get a refund and find something better.