A very important question has come up with-in these couple of weeks that need to be addressed. It has been the case that some inquiring minds have asked about a single-bay internal enclosure compatible with the current 559 series. Here at ICYDOCK we ask ourselves,” why would anybody need an internal single bay solution that is interchangeable with the 559 series?” In comparing an internal and external single-bay solution it becomes abundantly clear that the eSATA transfer speed and internal SATA speed are the same. Both also support hot-swap capability.
What do you think? What is your take on an internal single bay solution that is compatible with our external MB559 series? It is very important that we at ICYDOCK start up a dialogue with our customers. We design through discussion. When we design new products our efforts are anchored on the complete user experience, from when you see the item in its packaging all the way until the item is fully operational.
An internal enclosure that allows you to insert a carrier for either SATA or PATA drives would be incredibly handy
ReplyDeleteFirst, I am not an ICYDOCK owner only because there isn’t/wasn’t and internal counterpart to the MB559 series external enclosure. I engaged you with the question about an internal counterpart to the MB559 series a while ago, as I had hoped it would be coming in the near future.
ReplyDeleteICYDOCK’s only product solutions that had the internal/external swappable capability also required that I put up with an external enclosure that contained a cooling fan. Well, I already have two external enclosures (non-ICYDOCK) that have internal fans, and I don’t ever intend to own another one! The fans are annoying and run constantly.
One reason I’d like to have the capability to swap a removable tray between an external and an internal version of the MB559 series is that I would use the external unit at the office and the internal with my home computer.
A second reason would be that without an e-sata connector on one machine, I don’t have an external connector for the external unit, but I could connect an internal unit to the motherboard via a regular sata connection point, so one machine would utilize the external enclosure with the e-sata connection and another would be connected internally with an internal enclosure.
Thanks for asking!
I have always wanted something like this to make it easy to install and test beta operating systems.
ReplyDeleteJust swap out your regular boot drive and swap in a blank one... no worries about trashing your existing config by messing with betas.
My first impression is that a single-bay hot-swap internal enclosure is unnecessary.
ReplyDeleteOne, as stated, there is no performance gain.
Two, you would need to transport the hard drive in the MB559 enclosure anyway (or) purchase a seperate protective cover.
Three, if I was only going to use one MB559 drive between two computers I would simply purchase another e-sata bracket cable for the second computer ($6 online).
A single bay internal option for the MB559 would be of some use to me as I already have 2 external MB559's and would prefer to continue expanding internally where appropriate.
ReplyDeleteYes, I would like to see a single-bay internal enclosure compatible with the MB559 Series. We currently build custom video editing workstations. We were using larger, removable drives with trays that are much larger physically than the MB559. I recently started using the MB559 eSATA series after purchasing some from D & H Distributing. The external eSATA MB559 is fine for some applications, but an internal unit would be prefered for many of our cases. We have adequate extra 5 1/4" bays (usually 1 or 2) that would accomodate an internal unit. Some of our systems are put in 19" 4U rack-mounts, so an internal would be great for these also.
ReplyDeleteI just want to commend you on the quality of your products. I have used many external cases for drives and yours are the best quality I have found. I also just purchased the external 4 bay enclosure and the 3 bay internal unit. D & H is a great distributor and I am glad they are carrying your products.
If you need any additional input, just let me know.
In response to Steve,
ReplyDeleteYou mentioned that one reason why you would prefer an external unit is because you do not have an e-SATA connector on your PC. The MB559 comes with a e-SATA Expansion card that takes your internal SATA port and converts it into e-SATA. Therefore, I do not see why it would not work well for a desktop PC.
In response to poddie,
You could always change your boot order to default to the external enclosure eSATA or internal SATA are no different to the computer in bios and in the O/S.
To me, it seems like there aren't that many compelling reasons for an internal solution because there will be no performance or feature gains. Convenience wise, I feel that external would be even better because you won't be tied to any single computer with an external enclosure. But on the other hand, I also see the point where it may look nicer and more complete for an internal solution.
So in the end, is it more a matter of preference?
I have just bought this external enclosure and was thinking of getting the 3-bay internal backplane with the compatible trays.
ReplyDeleteIn reality i would love a single tray version - I use a removable caddy to backup my data and when I'm away I can remove it and store it in a secure location.
to be able to take my back up drive with me and share it with other computers via the external enclosure, would be perfect for me (can't do with my current caddy).
This would help keep things off the desk.
ReplyDeleteI would like a single bay internal that connects to motherboard SATA and trays that accept BOTH IDE and SATA drives. I would also like these trays to work in an external bay that has both eSATA and 1394a/b.
This would be IDEAL. Many cases only have four 5 1/4 bays. So with two optical drives and a bay with audio breakouts only one bay is available for cartridge drives.
I would love an internal single rack solution for the 559. I'm a video editor so it be great if i could capture video at work on to the 559 external then come home and pop the tray into an internal rack. The advantage of the external is its firewire which means it can connect to almost any computer especially macs. However it be faster to work off an internal sata at home. I basically don't want two separate incompatible tray systems, so I'm not juggling between two systems every time I need use a different computer. Mac cases don't allow for internal rack/tray so you need to use firewire external.
ReplyDeleteIs an internal counterpart to the 559 available yet? I would love this, since it would keep down clutter on my desk. I would normally keep the drive in the desktop pc, but if I was on the road, I could pop it out and stick it in the enclosure for use withh the laptop. If you make a slide rack for my desktop that accepts the tray from the 559, I will buy one immediately.
ReplyDeleteVery cool that you have this blog by the way.