OWC Intros Express Hard Drive Enclosure

[admin]

OWC Intros Express Hard Drive Enclosure
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Posted by: Glenn

OWC today announced the release of their OWC Express USB 2.0 bus-powered enclosure for 2.5" SATA drives. This new 2-ounce ABS plastic enclosure is roughly the size of an iPhone and accepts a single 2.5" SATA I/II hard drive. It comes in Smooth White, Sleek Silver and Discreet Black colors and sports a rather cool looking blue status indicator LED and fanless design. It also includes a USB 2.0/1.1 Mini-B connecting cable, carrying sleeve and one-year warranty. The OWC Express is available now and priced at $19.99.



http://www.123macmini.com/news/story/1211.html

[Huff]

Firewire would have be nice, but it sounds like a decent enclosure for $20 bucks. I'm thinking the old 120GB drive from my Mac mini could find a home in one.

[scooper]

I wonder if this drive will spin down while connected to an AirPort Extreme for AirDisk? I tried it with my WD Passport and it always ran. Now, was that from it being bus powered or did it have something to do with the chipset?

[tundraSQ]

[Huff]

[devo]

Is that a new accessory in matte black? I certainly hope this is the beginning of a trend. I'm tired of seeing that glossy stuff that gets all fingerprinted up. It doesn't appear to be plastered with a logo or cost that much either. By George, they could have a winner here. It's a shame I don't need a 2.5" enclosure.

I actually have one of their USB On-The-Go enclosures. It's has held up pretty well over the years. They also have it in FW 800/400 flavors, but I couldn't justify the price. In fact, they were ridiculously priced in comparison.

[ESUNintel]

[Grasshopper]

The old matte black MacBook sure could get all smudged up. I think it sort of depends on the texture of the plastic. I do like it better than glossy though, at least when it's done right. I also find glossy plastic to be annoying when it goes around a TV or screen. It's getting harder to find one without it though.
_________________
2011 Mac mini with 8GB of RAM
2012 Mac mini Server with 16GB of RAM
46" Sony TV
24" HP LCD
Apple wireless keyboard and Magic Mouse
2 x 1TB MiniStacks

[FishKepr]

Since it's made of plastic, should we be concerned about it getting hot?

Also, is it possible to know in advance if you will need the 'Y' cable to supply extra power?

[scooper]

[xmen65]

Anyone get one yet? I was thinking about buying two in black, but wondered about the overall quality and innards. I have two old 80GB drives sitting around and doing nothing.

[YesHD]

I got one delivered in silver yesterday. The plastic top is a little flimsy until you get the hard drive in and things screwed down. That being said, it only connects to the bottom half with two screws in the back (where the USB connector is) and a single plastic tab with sticky tape on the front. That means you can pull the corners up a little on the front. I think it would have been better with screws on each corner, but it still does a decent job of holding everything together. It also performs well with the 120GB Hitachi I pulled from my Mac mini. I'm getting like an overall Disk Test score of 30 with Xbench. And it looks like the hard drive has plenty of breathing room with those holes going down each side. I copied over like 70GB worth of data and the thing barley warmed up. So overall, I'm pretty happy with this thing. I would probably buy another one if needed.