Customer Reviews

Sabrent 2.5-Inch USB-SATA HDD Enclosure (EC-UST25)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This enclosure is not much more than an alloy sleeve for 2.5" hard drives but it works. A hard drive fits in very tight and is fixed with two screws. I used the enclosure with a 500 GB Western Digital Scorpio Blue WD5000BEVT without any problems. What's quite uncommon for a 2.5" enclosure is that it comes with a standard USB type A connector jack instead of mini USB. This means you have to use the included skinny 32" cable and can't take one of the common cables you may have collected from several other mobile USB devices like cameras and MP3 players.

What's in the box:
+ enclosure
+ mini screwdriver
+ 3 screws
+ USB A-A cable (32" long) with Y-plug on one side
+ protective sleeve
+ manual sheet
+ driver mini CD (not needed for XP, Vista, Linux)

All together its ok for the price but I wouldn't have bought it if I knew about the connector jack type in advance.

If you are planning to install and then later remove your hard drive to/from this enclosure, don't buy it. It's impossible to remove the drive without damaging the enclosure. Otherwise no problem with it.

I bought this to house the old hard drive from one of my laptops after I upgraded it. Easy to assemble, and a nice tight fit with no rattles. The only issue I had was that the hole through which you insert the USB cable into the enclosure was a little off-centered, and resulted in the cable being a little crooked after being plugged in. This put some stress on the connector, possibly shortening its lifespan. I disassembled the enclosure, and used an X-Acto knife to open up the hole in the plastic end cap to give it the required clearance. After that, it has worked perfectly.

I use these for Laptops that go bad with a functional hard drive. I place the drive in the housing and strip the files off them for clients. I give the client the housing and all so that they have the files to transfer to a new laptop or other PC when they replace it. Simple in design and use.

I used this to salvage data from a laptop SATA hard disk after the laptop that it was installed in died. It was a snap to install the hard disk and assemble it. While it does work, it is somewhat flimsy and the parts all fit together crooked. Further, the USB cable included with it is very strange, with three USB "A" connectors in a Y-configuration. My drive powered up but was not recognized by the computer at first, so I swapped to the other free USB connector and it worked. So, if your drive doesn't work at first, try swapping USB plugs around until it does. The instructions imply that the extra plug is for external power, even though that external power is unnecessary - the drive is powered by the USB port on the computer it is connected to.

But, since you get USB access to your hard drive for only $16, these flaws are forgiveable in my application. I am happy with this enclosure because I purchased it for limited use only. I would recommend spending a bit more for a better made enclosure if you plan to carry your HDD around in a briefcase or backpack, or if you plan to use it constantly, because I have no faith that this enclosure would take any such punishment.

Decided to pick this up and create an external HD out of the Playstation 3 hard drive, since I replaced it with a 120 GB hard drive. Works just fine, and pretty easy to install. Makes a fair bit of heat, but that is to be expected. Love the carrying sleeve though!!! Also, it arrived in god time!!!

I am quite pleased with the quality of this product, especially for the price. My drive fit snugly within the enclosure and at first I had a problem with the screws not going in all the way and at the proper angle. Luckily, it was the fault of the tiny screwdriver it is packaged with. It is too small to get a good grip on it. I happen to own precision screwdrivers and they allowed me to get the screws in all the way and flush with the enclosure. If you don't have a set, find a friend who works with electronics or someone who owns glasses since most glasses owners will have a precision screwdriver for their frame screws. I saw a review that was worried about the enclosure not having a vent on it. I plugged mine in and left it running for 5 hours and there was no problem. The case is made of aluminum so it doesn't hold heat very well.

The only thing better than this enclosure is its price.

I had to replace a laptop hard drive and ended up with an extra 320GB 2.5" SATA drive. I bought this enclosure so that I could use that drive for portable storage. For the price (around 10 bucks), it's hard to beat. Shipping was quick and it is very simple to setup. You just put the drive in the enclosure, push it into the connector, then close the enclosure and put the screws in both sides. It even comes with a tiny screwdriver to use! I like that there is no power adapter to plug in (you just use the included USB cable, it has an extra USB connector in case extra power is required to run the drive). The screws are very tiny and don't fit all that well into the screwholes, but they do the job and the drive works great. The enclosure is made out of aluminum and seems sturdy enough. It runs quietly and doesn't get hot at all (though that probably depends on the drive you use, so YMMV).

I was looking for an inexpensive SATA hard drive enclosure that I would only need for limited usage. This perfectly fits the bill. Installation was a breeze and everything worked as I expected it too. Plus, the price is right!

I replaced the 160gb internal drive in my Acer Netbook with a solid state drive, and decided it would be nice to still be able to use the old drive as an external USB drive.

The black aluminum case looks good, serves as a heat sink, and I had no problem installing/removing the HDD (even though I had taped a little bit of foam on the back end for cushioning). Only 2 screws hold the interface end to the case; I would have preferred a design that took advantage of the standard 4 mounting screws in the SATA drive design, and the blue indicator light is so bright that this drive could be used as a small flashlight, but for $10, I can't complain.

The drive is partitioned between Windows XP and Linux, and while Linux will boot the netbook through a USB connection, XP will not, which nullifies my primary reason for buying the enclosure. However, I'm almost certain this is a fault of Windows and not the SATA/USB interface of this product.