Customer Reviews

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

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

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.

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.

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.

I bought it about a year ago. I used infrequently. After I connected it to Airport Extreme as a shared drive, it died. I believe it is the power supply that has gone bad. Unfortunately, it uses proprietary connector so there is no easy way to test or to replace. I have sitting on my desk as a nice shiny "gear box". If they had simply used more standard connector, I would have found a new power supply instead of writing this review.

The enclose is attractive, it is really well made and extremely easy to dissemble to insert new drive. Ventilation is good. I just wish it was more reliable.

I have 3 of these units. Within a short time, two of the power supplies have gone bad. The first symptom was that the drives were suddenly dismounting randomly. Finally the computer would not recognize the drives at all. Swapping the power cables with the remaining good one did make the drive function properly again. Unfortunately, having to constantly order replacement power cables (at around $20 each or so) was not part of the deal.

So avoid this product.