by Andrey Kuznetcov
08/29/2006 | 09:22 AM
We wrote this review to help you save some money on an external hard disk drive. Instead of purchasing an expensive ready-made solution, you can take any internal HDD and put it into a special enclosure like those that will be tested in this article.
We hope you will find an enclosure that suits you best among them.
So, we tested nine external enclosures for 3.5” hard disk drives. They support HDDs with PATA and SATA interfaces. Besides that, the enclosures differ in their external interface – SATA, eSATA (external SATA), FireWire and USB 2.0 – so there is a really wide choice for you.
The following table lists the enclosures about to be tested with the interface converter chip employed in each. This chip largely determines the performance of an enclosure:
As you can see, different manufacturers use different chips. This only makes our today’s test session the more exciting.
This enclosure is made of aluminum with black and orange plastic details. You can put 3.5” hard and optical drives with a Parallel ATA interface into it. The enclosure itself is equipped with FireWire and USB 2.0 interfaces. A fan and a power switch are located at the rear panel of the case. Besides the enclosure, the package contains a power adapter with power cables, a USB and a FireWire cable, screws, a device description, and a CD with drivers. The dimensions of the device are 173 x 60 x 255 millimeters.
Its average retail price is $36.
This enclosure resembles the previous model, but is designed differently. Its case is made of aluminum with black and orange plastic details. You can put 3.5” hard and optical drives with a Parallel ATA interface into it. The enclosure is equipped with FireWire and USB 2.0 interfaces. A fan and a power switch are located at the rear panel. There are two LED indicators of the operation mode on the case. The enclosure is supplied with a power adapter with power cords, a USB and a FireWire cable, a screwdriver with screws, a device description, and a CD with drivers. The dimensions of this enclosure are 165 x 49 x 242mm.
The average retail price of the enclosure is $36.
This is the most functional device in this review. It has an aluminum case with details of black plastic. This enclosure can accommodate 3.5” hard drives with PATA and SATA interfaces. The enclosure itself is equipped with as many as three interfaces: Serial ATA, FireWire and USB 2.0. LED indicators of the operation mode are located on the front panel. At the rear panel there is a fan and a power switch. The enclosure comes with a power adapter, interface cables (SATA, FireWire and USB), screws, a screwdriver, a device description, and a CD with drivers. The dimensions of the device are 215 x 55 x 125 millimeters.
The average retail price of this enclosure is $42.
The case of this enclosure has thick aluminum panels with vent holes in the sides. The device is ready to accommodate a hard drive with a Serial ATA interface. Good thermal conditions are ensured for the drive because it is fastened right to the case. The SATA cable isn’t very conveniently placed – you have to twist it when you are putting the drive in. The enclosure itself is equipped with a USB 2.0 interface. The power switch is located on the back panel. The enclosure comes with a power adapter, a USB cable, screws, a device description and a CD with drivers. The dimensions of the enclosure are 116 x 39 x 250 millimeters.
The average retail price of this device is $31.
This hard drive container is painted light colors and is made of aluminum with translucent plastic details. The enclosure is intended for PATA-interfaced hard drives and supports USB 2.0. The power switch is located on the device’s back panel. The package also contains a power adapter with cable, a USB cable, a device description, and a stand. The dimensions of the enclosure are 120 x 34 x 204 millimeters.
The average retail price of the device is $30.
The second Tsunami enclosure in this review has quite a lot in common with the previous model, but is made of black-painted aluminum. Moreover, it supports SATA as well as PATA drives. This connection universality isn’t very conveniently implemented, though. It is easy to install a PATA drive, but it was difficult to tuck away the IDE connector when you are trying to install a SATA drive. The power switch is located on the back panel of the case. The package also contains a power adapter with a cord, a USB cable, a device description and a stand. The dimensions of the enclosure are 120 x 34 x 204 millimeters.
The average retail price of the device is $38.
The memorable and elegant design distinguishes this enclosure from Vantec. The aluminum case is painted black. The enclosure is intended for SATA-interfaced hard drives and is itself equipped with USB 2.0 and eSATA interfaces. A LED indicator of the operation mode is on the case. The Power switch is on the back panel. The enclosure comes with a power adapter, USB and SATA cables, a device description, a bracket with an eSATA connector, a stand, screws, and a CD with drivers. The dimensions of the enclosure are 123 x 33 x 206 millimeters.
The average retail price of this device is $50.
The second enclosure from Vantec differs from the previous model with the bright red color of its aluminum case, but this is not the single point of difference between them. This model is intended for hard drives with the classic Parallel ATA interface. The enclosure itself supports USB 2.0. It has a LED indicator of the operation mode and a power switch (on the back panel). Besides the enclosure, the package contains a power adapter with cable, a USB cable, a device description, a bracket with an eSATA connector, a stand, screws, and a CD with drivers. The dimensions of the enclosure are 123 x 33 x 206 millimeters.
The average retail price of the device is $43.
The last enclosure in this review is made of aluminum, just like the rest. Here, the aluminum is painted black. The device is intended for Serial ATA hard drives. The enclosure is equipped with a USB 2.0 interface and has a LED indicator of the operation mode. A power switch and a fan are located on the back panel of the case. The enclosure features an integrated temperature controller. The package also contains a power adapter with cable, a USB cable, a description. The dimensions of this enclosure are 38 x 115 x 220 millimeters.
The average retail price of the device is $48.
We installed Hitachi HDS722525VLAT80 (with a PATA interface) and Hitachi HDS722525VLSA80 (with a SATA interface) hard drives into the enclosures to test them. These internal drives are fast enough to fully utilize the bandwidth of USB 2.0 and FireWire interfaces and have comparable performance.
We compared the enclosures by the speed of the drives installed in them. We installed only the Hitachi HDS722525VLSA80 into the AgeStar CFB3A1 enclosure.
We tested the enclosures with the following benchmarks:
Testbed configuration:
The enclosures were connected to a mainboard’s USB 2.0 port, to a FireWire interface of a VIA VT6307-based controller, and to a Promise controller.
Most of the enclosures were tested with all the interfaces they support. So, we are going to talk not about nine enclosures, but about thirteen external hard disk drives.
You can first take a look at data-transfer graphs. The lower and longer the straight section of the graph goes, the worse the enclosure’s controller efficiency is. The speed of the hard drive will be greatly limited in such an enclosure and it won’t be able to deliver its full performance.
As you can see from these graphs, the maximum read speed is achieved with SATA and eSATA interfaces that have the least limiting impact on the drive performance. The next most efficient interface is FireWire. USB 2.0 limits the data-transfer rate the most.
Then we tested the drives formatted in FAT32. All the results, except for the data-transfer speed and the access time, were achieved by testing a 32GB partition created on the drives. And a few more words about the abbreviations used: U2 stands for USB 2.0, FW for FireWire, SA for SATA, and ES for eSATA. Besides that, the letters P and S after “U2/” mean that the PATA or the SATA drive, respectively, was installed into the enclosure.
There are two enclosures that are head above their opponents in efficiency. The reason is obvious: these two make use of SATA and eSATA interfaces. The Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU is the more efficient of the two and is superior to the AgeStar CFB3A1 in both the scores. The two enclosures with a FireWire interface - AgeStar ICB5A and ICB5A1 – are their closest pursuers. Among the USB 2.0-using devices the ViPowER VPA-35018 and the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU are best. The AgeStar ICB5A is the slowest of all when connected via USB 2.0.
Now we format the drives in NTFS and run the test once again:
Quite expectedly we’ve got the same leaders, and the eSATA-connected Vantec NexStar3 NST360SU is again faster than its single worthy rival AgeStar CFB3A1 with a SATA interface. The AgeStar ICB5A1 proved superior between the two FireWire-interfaced devices, taking the third place as a result. The AgeStar ICB5A model, however, lost its ground working across its FireWire interface and turned to be slower than three enclosures that worked via USB 2.0, the best of which is the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU. The USB 2.0 version of the AgeStar ICB5A is again the slowest of all.
The diagram showing the read speed at the beginning and end of the disk allows to estimate the interface bandwidth. The leaders Vantec NexStar3 NST360SU and AgeStar CFB3A1, connected via eSATA and SATA interfaces, produce identical and fastest results. They are followed by AgeStar’s ICB5A and ICB5A1 enclosures, connected via FireWire. Among the USB 2.0-connected devices, the ViPowER VPA-35018 and the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU can be distinguished.
The last diagram shows the access time parameter. The two hard drives we use in this test session are in fact twin models and differ only in their interfaces, so the results are similar here. You can note, however, that it’s with the enclosures that work with SATA and eSATA interfaces that you can achieve the lowest access time.
Now we will check the enclosures in our own FC-Test utility which measures the time it takes to perform certain operations over a few file-sets which differ in the number and size of the files included, and then calculates the speed.
The Windows and Programs patterns consist of many small-size files, while the MP3, ISO and Install patterns include fewer files of a bigger size. Two 32GB partitions are created on the drives for the copy operations, and the file-sets are then copied within one partition (Copy Near) and from one partition to another (Copy Far).
The drives will be first tested with FAT32.
The enclosures working across SATA and eSATA interfaces – the AgeStar CFB3A1 and the Vantec NexStar3 NST360SU, respectively – enjoy an obvious and big advantage over the rest of the participating devices in the speed of creating (i.e. writing) the file-sets. The hard drives can show their best performance when installed into these enclosures.
The two FireWire-interfaced devices (AgeStar ICB5A and ICB5A1) and the USB-interfaced VPA-35018 and Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU stand out among the rest of the enclosures. The AgeStar ICB5A, connected across USB 2.0, has a very low write speed with small files.
The read speed diagram doesn’t reveal any surprises. The same two enclosures with SATA and eSATA interfaces are ahead of their competitors, the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU being the better of the two. The enclosures with a FireWire interface follow behind the leaders and are themselves followed by the ViPowER VPA-35018 and the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU which are the best among USB-connected enclosures. The remaining devices have similar read speeds.
Copying within one partition involves doing both reading and writing, so the results are a cross between the results of the previous two tests. The leaders are the same again – the two enclosures with SATA and eSATA interfaces have no real opponents. The Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU is again a little better than the other. The FireWire-connected enclosures AgeStar ICB5A and ICB5A1 are somewhat better than the devices connected via USB 2.0. Among the latter, the ViPowER VPA-35018 and the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU can be distinguished. The AgeStar ICB5A, connected via USB 2.0, is the worst enclosure in this test,
And the last diagram shows how fast the enclosures with the drives are at copying files from one partition to another. The general picture remains the same as in the other tests, with minor changes. The enclosures with SATA and eSATA interfaces are in the lead, the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU being the faster of the two. The pair of FireWire-interfaced enclosures has split up: the AgeStar ICB5A1 still looks superior to its opponents whereas the AgeStar ICB5A is noticeably slower and is also the slowest when attached via USB 2.0. The ViPowER VPA-35018 and the above-mentioned Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU can be singled out among the enclosures that work across a USB 2.0 interface.
Besides that, you can note that the Tsunami Speed 3500S has almost the same speed irrespective of the interface of the installed drive.
And now let’s check these external drives out in NTFS.
The two enclosures with SATA and eSATA interfaces prove their superiority over the rest of the participating devices in the file writing test. The two devices with a FireWire interface can also be marked out, along with the USB-connected ViPowER VPA-35018 and Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU that aren’t far slower than them. The AgeStar ICB5A is the slowest when connected via USB 2.0, but not far worse than its closest opponent.
The read speed diagram shows how much better the enclosures with SATA and eSATA interfaces are in comparison with the others. And the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU is the ultimate leader. These are followed by the two enclosures that work across a FireWire interface. The ViPowER VPA-35018 and the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU are considerably faster than the rest of USB-connected enclosures. The others show similar results.
The enclosures with SATA and eSATA interfaces are the fastest in this test, too. This time the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU enjoys an even bigger advantage over its rival. Besides them, the AgeStar ICB5A1 is good when working across a FireWire connection. Another FireWire-connected device – AgeStar ICB5A – is slower and roughly similar in performance to the USB-connected ViPowER VPA-35018 and Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU. The slowest enclosure is the AgeStar ICB5A connected to a USB 2.0 port.
The final diagram in this review shows the speed of copying files from one partition to another. It’s all the same as in the previous tests, with the enclosures connected via SATA and eSATA interfaces being the best of all. And the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU is the ultimate leader, again. Among the rest of devices we can single out the two FireWire-connected enclosures as well as the USB-connected ViPowER VPA-35018 and Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU. And once again we see that the AgeStar ICB5A is the slowest enclosure when connected across a USB 2.0 interface.
Note also that the Tsunami Speed 3500S delivers the same performance irrespective of the interface (SATA or PATA) of the installed hard drive.
It’s time to summarize a little. From the point of view of maximum performance, the AgeStar CFB3A1 and the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU enclosures proved to be the best with their SATA and eSATA interfaces, respectively. The bandwidth of these interfaces has a very small limiting effect on the performance of the installed hard disk drive. It is the Vantec NexStar3 NST-360SU that has won most of the tests, so it can be viewed as the ultimate leader, especially as it was the best among USB-connected enclosures when using its USB interface, too. On the other hand, the AgeStar CFB3A1 offers more interfaces: it has USB 2.0 and FireWire besides SATA.
It’s no wonder that the two leaders are followed by the two enclosures from AgeStar (the ICB5A and ICB5A1 models) that use a FireWire interface. This interface has repeatedly proved its superiority over USB 2.0 in practical applications despite its lower theoretical bandwidth. These devices offer a USB interface, too, to give you more connectivity freedom. It should also be mentioned that the AgeStar ICB5A1 has been better than the other model in most of the tests. So, if you need the fastest and highest-functionality HDD enclosure, choose among these devices.
The ViPowER VPA-35018 is the fastest among the enclosures that only have a USB 2.0 interface.
Of course you should not only consider the performance and functionality of a HDD enclosure, but also its design and price when you go shopping. Don’t forget that some of the tested enclosures support not one but two or more drive interfaces, which may came in handy sometimes.