Customer Reviews

Sabrent SBT-EKU25 Ultra Slim USB 2.0 2.5-inch IDE/PATA Hard Drive Enclosure (Black)

5 star:		(34)
4 star:		(31)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(12)

 

 

This is a very small case (just as big as the 2.5" HDD it encloses) without any cooling fan or antishock protection that would make it for the long haul... it's not for any road warrior, it works best for technicians or someone who want to use an old spare HDD left out from a notebook or may need to fix a bad HDD from a crashed notebook. Don't take it along with your gear since it won't protect your HDD that much or use it for long periods of time since the HDD can get very hot and there's no ventilation or fan but the good part is that it does work as expected with stable USB 2.0 data speeds.

Sabrent has been good to me to date so far. I have had several products of theirs and each time I have been pleased, but the instructions for this product are seriously lacking. I believe they were written before Win XP ever came out and I have no clue if this will work with Vista, you'll have to read another review for that one.

It couldn't be any simpler of a device to put together though.
Open box, insert 2.5" laptop HDD and then slide together.
Insert holding screws (they give you a little screw driver for this as well)
connect the cable (double end goes to PC, you need 2 open USB ports on PC)
plug other cable end into unit and it'll power up and your PC will take a moment to recognize it then it's off to the races.

Transfer rates will be limited by the HDD that you place in the device.

I transferred over 12 gigs in like 25 minutes with a 5400rpm old as heck 20gig laptop HDD (yeah it's a 20gig, it's from like 2001 out of my old gateway laptop from when I was in the military).

The only thing I would like to see different with this device is a better set of instruction. If you are familiar with Sabrent though you will know that XP typically doesn't need a driver installed as they use standardized equipment and so on.


Basically this is the best bang for the buck.


Notes on the LED on the case:
green means it's ready and waiting (not in use/being read)
orange/redish light means it's either being read or written to.

Attractive little case, and since it was for the small 2.5 inch footprint, it was just the PATA-USB interface logic and small enough to carry in a pocket.

Note for users (maybe a tip, really): most of the time the drive spun up okay on the USB's limited power, but one time it wouldn't spin up and mount, so I held the drive horizontally and gave a minor twist in two directions. This moved the tiny stator just enough to allow the motor to spin up and properly mount to my laptop.

Check that the drive is not attached to the IDE connector upside down, since there is nothing that indicates which way is up until you attempt to slide on the enclosure. The enclosure won't fit if the drive has been plugged into the connector upside down.

If you test a drive without using the enclosure, as I did, and cannot read the disk, then the drive may be upside down (or set to be a slave, or a master with slave, or the drive or connector might be defective).

First check that the enclosure will slide on as designed. If it does slide on at least you know that it's connected correctly and you've got other problems.

Other than that, the unit is sturdy and once you get the tiny screws in the holes it is easy to assemble. I wouldn't recommend dropping a screw on a shag rug though.

I bought this enclosure for a 100gb 2.5" hard drive I had. Problem is, apparently the power supplied by the USB port is not always sufficient. I have several PCs at home, and the drive would not stay connected on any of them if I used a USB 2.0 port (drive would constantly disconnect). One of my PCs has only USB 1.0, and the drive did stay connected long enough for me to format the drive.

This enclosure seems to be more stable if you plug into USB 1 port, but that really defeats the advantage of having a USB 2.0 drive.

When reading the "troubleshooting" section of the manual, it states that drives over 30gb might not have sufficient power from the USB port. It also states that any drive that draws more than 500A cannot be powered by the USB port. You also can't use a hub, unless it is self powered, and the drive has a dedicated 5V 500A supplied to it. There is no way to supply external power to the enclosure except through the double USB cord that comes with the enclosure)

I'm here buying my second Sabrent Slim... so obviously I've had a pleasant experience with the drive... however with that being said.. it has worn out after a little less than 6 months (the cord came apart at the end and broke apart). I do use it very frequently. For $7 though I'm sure you cant expect too much more.

I had a laptop die on me, and I was easily able to pull the hard drive and put it in this enclosure to get back all of my files. Ideally, it could be tool-less, but it comes with the screwdriver you need and extra screws. Nice finish and appearance. Best cost/performance ratio out there.

Recently having had a laptop just blow up on me- left me with several internal components within the laptop.

Of which, being an 80 gig harddrive that had all of the previously completed work on it- so I needed that work.

After ordering and having read the reviews about how "cheap" this product is- I was a little skeptic.

But when it came in and I hooked everything up- it ran beautifully for the price at which I bought it for.

I did have to put a single index card wrapped around it, just to prevent the minor irritation of "some rattling" but of which was hardly any.

Connecting to the computer was a breeze, and I love carrying around my 10+ gigs of music anywhere I want with my laptop. :)

Enjoyable, and cost effective.

Thanks Amazon!

Works fine so far. Had it plugged in for an hour and had no heat issues. The only issue I had was that I needed to put a little spongy packing material in the case to prevent the drive from moving around inside.

The product does exactly what it is supposed to do! It is the easiest/quickest way to connect your laptop (2.5" IDE) hard drive to any computer that has a USB (works with USB1.1 and USB2.0) port. It even comes with a CD that contains driver for Windows 98.

The reason I bought this - my laptop started having video card problems within the warranty period and before I shipped the laptop off to the manufacturer I wanted to backup my data.