Turn Your 2.5-inch HDD Into a USB 3.0 External Drive

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This enclosure from Super Talent will turn your 2.5-inch HDD into a USB-based external drive.

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Kevin Parrish
Kevin Parrish
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Kevin Parrish has over a decade of experience as a writer, editor, and product tester. His work focused on computer hardware, networking equipment, smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles, and other internet-connected devices. His work has appeared in Tom's Hardware, Tom's Guide, Maximum PC, Digital Trends, Android Authority, How-To Geek, Lifewire, and others.

19 Comments Comment from the forums
  • N.Broekhuijsen
    Erm, what??

    It's a USB 3.0 enclosure, why is this newsworthy? Seriously, these devices have been on the market for ages, by many different manufacturers, what makes this one special enough to be newsworthy?

    I sense advertising money...
    Reply
  • molo9000
    Either money or a hot blonde marketing representative.
    Hope it was worth it :)
    Reply
  • zybch
    Like xbeater says, this is a (very) simple (rather expensive) USB3 enclosure.

    I've been doing this with my old notebook and desktop drives since well before SATA existed and have a bunch of old 40 and 60 gig drives from dead notebooks in cases for those times when a flash drive isn't large enough.
    Reply
  • cookoy
    by this time i think all new laptops should have at least a usb 3.0 port but they don't
    Reply
  • N.Broekhuijsen
    cookoyby this time i think all new laptops should have at least a usb 3.0 port but they don'tYh, well, at least we have backward compatibility.
    Besides, I just boughta 1TB 2.5 inch USB3 Drive yesterday, from WD, nifty little thing, goes fast on the USB3 (~ 100 read / ~ 80 write ) from what I see. Cost me just 75 Euro new, so I fail to see the point of these enclosures. Few years ago it was cheaper, but now, not so much.
    Reply
  • Filiprino
    I prefer eSATA.
    Reply
  • N.Broekhuijsen
    9313879 said:
    laptop sucks... 3 usb, power-up 2 cables usb and get one port for something.

    i dont get a motherboard with support usb3 our pcie. 3.0 either i dont have the money for that.

    usb 3.0 have a greater improviments over the usb 2.0 but for now is really expansive.
    Not really, A USB3 adapter is pretty standard in motherboards these days, and if you don't have it yet, its like 20 bucks, still nothing:
    http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815124102

    And the external drives themselves are adopting the USB 3.0 standard as well, finally, and they pretty much come at the same price point as the older USB 2.0 drives.

    So stop your whining if you haven't got your facts straight
    Reply
  • reggieray
    Bah, $29, your being ripped off. Go to Newegg or Tiger Direct, they have tons of 2.5" and 3.5" enclosures to choose from.
    Reply
  • ravewulf
    I wouldn't mind these so much if it was openly and honestly stated it was an advertising deal
    Reply
  • tachi1247
    The real question is does it support SATA 6 gb/s so I can hook up an SSD. Current SSD models can't saturate USB 3.0 so there is no performance loss.
    Reply