Antec - Veris USB 2.0/eSATA Hard Drive Enclosure for 3.5" SATA Hard Drives

I was pleased with the product - I purchased this to be an occasional backup of my Network Attached Home Media Server Storage unit. The design of the case is solid-- and it was easy for me to follow the pictorial instructions to add a hard drive (I went with a 1TB WD Caviar SATA drive). There aren't many steps required. A minor concern- It was somewhat difficult to remove the two connectors as the instructions indicate when sliding out the chassis for mounting the drive. This step could actually be skipped. Other than that the installation went smoothly -- and having nice nylon washers made it easy to tighten the hard drive mounting screws. The unit's fan runs very quietly and there is good airflow around the drive. The air comes out reasonably cool indicating that the airflow is sufficient to keep the drive close to room temperature. I agee that the blue LED is not easy to see at the front of the enclosure-- it projects the light down from under the top lip of the cover. For me this was not a showstopper issue and can be easily worked around by putting a small index card or other reflective material under the front of the enclosure. The instructions that come with the enclosure don't cover the formatting of the hard drive once you hook the unit up with either USB or eSATA-- for a Windows type setup you need to make sure after attaching the drive to use the Windows Computer Management/ Disk management utility to partition and format the hard drive. This took a few minutes to track down. The formatting takes about 8 hours to complete for a 1TB drive. Several of the reviewers have noted a fan bearing/reliability issue that sounds like a bearing wearout/lubricant drying problem. The fan looks like it can be replaced although I don't know how available a replacement part might be. I'm in a dry and high altitude climate which usually accentuates this type of an issue. I just purchased my unit today and will check back with more info later.

I picked this up to facilitate copying and backup jobs, along with hard drive diagnostics. The beauty of SATA is that the hookups for a 2.5" hard drive (such as from a laptop) are the same as those of a 3.5" desktop drive. This chassis is well built. Materials are solid, and of good design. The cooling is quiet, but pushes enough air to keep your hard drives very cool while inside. You may or may not hear it, as some hard disks are noisier than others. Setup was easy: remove one screw and slide off the lid, then slide in your drive while simultaneously connecting it to the headers. It's quite simple. Plug in the power adapter (a tad bulky if you ask me), plug in the I/O cable, flip the switch, and you're good to go. This unit features high speed USB 2.0 support, as well as e-SATA support. In testing the e-SATA performance is very good, but USB performance lags a little below spec. e-SATA is the way to go, however. Lots of computers are shipping nowadays with external SATA ports. This is a good trend, and I hope it keeps up. SATA drives are fast, but the USB is quite a bottleneck. The one con of the unit is the price. It is a tad expensive for a hard drive chassis, but considering its compatibility, active cooling solution, and solid build quality/looks, it's worth the investment. This will be a part of my computer repair and data backup arsenal for a long time to come.

This enclosure is intelligently constructed and impressively full-featured. It came with every cable/adapter you could need to use an SATA drive outside of an SATA capable PC. It even comes with an eSATA PCI slot backplane if your PC has no eSATA ports but does have a free SATA port on the motherboard. It supports USB connectivity, but I had no reason to test that aspect of this enclosure. The case's modular design makes for a solid finish and easy mounting of the drive of your choice. I used the enclosure with a Seagate 500g SATA drive and it fit well. The only gripes I have are that the power/usage led is very difficult to see from above the drive and the power switch is rather small and rocks to the opposite position with the slightest touch - neither of which affect the usability of this enclosure for my purposes. I am using a pair of these cases with the eSATA connection on a machine running linux with software raid and have had no problems at all.

Its a bit pricey, i like the idea of having air cooled unit to cool the HD . It gives me a peace of mind knowing the HD is cooling off. The neat feature about this unit is the eSata, just install the bracket into the computer and plug into the HD connector located on the motherboard. It doesn't need a expansion slot, others does. The fan is so quiet. One will be saving money by purchasing this unit, rather than purchasing a eSata expansion card.

I purchased this enclosure to install a 750GB Seagate drive in turn to connect to a Series 3 TiVo. Installation was quite easy no thanks to the useless instructions. The unit is a bit on the big side but was forgivable for the extra cooling it was supposed to give. The noise from the fan was acceptable and the drive was minimal. Everything was OK for about 5 months when the fan started making a grinding sound. I blew the unit out after disconnecting it which worked for a few hours then started again. I contacted Antec support who stated that they don't cover failure of the fan (WTH!). I told them that I only had the unit for 5 months but they reiterated their statement again. I took the unit apart and found the fan spindle was badly worn so I called Antec again and asked to speak to a supervisor. They put me on hold for over an hour then hung up on me. So for me, that's it, no more Antec. Today the fan failed completely after 7 months.

the Veris MX-1 is a great enclosure. Installing my Western Digital WD5000AAKS was a breeze, but you ave to watch out for the LED cable, it could possibly get snagged on the drive sled rails. The LED is a bit dim for normal use, but otherwise the enclosure functions fine. Haven't gotten to use it on eSATA yet however. The power switch seems like it could be a bit fragile but so far I haven't had much of a problem with it. referencing other users issues with the USB and Power cord sockets, they seem fine on my unit. The USB cable is held in the drive very tightly, and its almost worrying how much force I have to use to disconnect it. The power socket seems tight enough to use on a daily basis, but we will see with continued usage how it fairs. also, the fan is fairly quiet, and I can only hear it running under the quietest conditions. The silicone pad the sits under the hard drive does a wonderful job of quieting any drive noise that might be produced, even though the AAKS is already a very quiet drive. Overall a very well built unit worthy of the Antec name and also a smart purchase.

I bought this product because I already had 2 external drives that I wasn't using, and needed an external drive for my laptop. The installation instructions are all but wrothless; luckily you don't need them. You will need a Phillips head screwdriver, but that is it. Once installed, the enclosure does a good job of holding your drive in there securely. There are 2 options for connecting to your PC: USB and eSATA. Unfortunately I don't have eSATA on my laptop, however the USB is plenty fast. There is an on/off switch in addition to the external power plug, which is a very nice add on. The best part of this product is its ability to keep cool. It is almost like a mini refridgerator. It stays much cooler than any electronic product that I have ever encountered, and I have been working with PC's and Computer equipment for years. One bad point to mention is that the LED light is very dim, and only shines down from the front of the enclosure, and even in pitch dark, it is difficult to see, however an LED light is not really important.

I've got three of these enclosures. Two were purchased to replace WD external HD enclosures that went bad. The third I use with a 2TB HD to connect to a DirecTV DVR for tons more storage than the internal drive. In my experience, external HDs (especially WD) often go bad, but all of mine have been from failure of the cheap enclosure board or connectors and not the drive itself. These enclosures let me save those drives and my data, and they have been very dependable. The eSata option allows connection to the DirecTV box or to newer motherboards with eSata connectors for better performance. (They also include an eSata adapter if you don't have eSata on your motherboard but have an extra Sata port inside.) I will buy this product again and recommend it highly.