Recommend Hard Drive Hot Swap Adapter

[It's Not Lupus]

I'm looking for recommendations for a hot swap adapter for a 3.5" hard drive for one 5.25 drive bay.

I'm unfamiliar with a lot of the brands that come up. Looking for something reliable.

 

[corkyg]

I use these - they work great!

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817986001

I have them set up with discreet OS boot drives - current norm is 8.1.

 

[It's Not Lupus]

Is the fan noisy? Is the lowest setting quiet?

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Is the fan noisy? Is the lowest setting quiet?

I've never had devices of this type with noisy fans.

I won't discount in any way the Vantec recommendation of corkyg, and I'm curious enough to track it down so I can scrutinize it more carefully.

Instead, I'd used these units (if-I-can-find-them-still--lemme-see . . ) in all my systems, in both IDE and SATA flavors. The SATA units are SATA-III or 6 Gbs ready:

http://www.startech.com/HDD/Mobile-Racks/Black-Aluminum-Serial-ATA-Drive-Drawer~DRW150SATBK

I bought several caddys after fitting all our computers with these units:

http://www.startech.com/HDD/Mobile-Racks/Extra-Black-Hard-Drive-Caddy-for-DRW150SATBK~150CADSBK

And again -- SATA-III-ready. Never had any problem with them, and almost feel grateful every time I need to use them, or even for routine backup chores.

 

[Elixer]

I bought several caddys after fitting all our computers with these units:

http://www.startech.com/HDD/Mobile-Racks/Extra-Black-Hard-Drive-Caddy-for-DRW150SATBK~150CADSBK

Huh, I got this, at least, it looks EXACTLY like this, but it isn't from startech.
It does the jobs, but, the fan got noisy on it recently (after 3 years).

 

[code65536]

It also depends on how often you swap. I personally have and use this:
http://kingwin.com/products/cate/mobile/racks/kf_252_bk.asp
(Many retailers carry it--Amazon, Newegg, Microcenter, etc.)

It's basically a dock, but, for my typical use cases, I very much prefer it over the door-and-tray solutions because it works for both 3.5" and 2.5" and swapping in and out is much easier and quicker. It's more suited for situations where I'm changing drives frequently, and not so much for situations where I'd want a drive to sit there for a few weeks.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I never had any problem with the fans on the Startech units.

I also have a pile of older IDE-to-USB external drive boxes -- of course, with the older IDE drives in them. They, too, have fans. They were Thermaltake units -- all aluminum and big enough to allow installing an IDE full-size optical drive. Can't get those anymore. Anyway, never had a problem with those fans, either, but they were the Thermaltake LED 40mm units, and I never thought that highly of TT's fans.

So the question might be: What causes the fans to become troublesome? Dust accumulation? Wear?

Even if that were true -- that the fans "go bad" after some period of time, you could replace the fans, maybe with some Sunon Mag-Lev units of the proper size, or something just as good.

Frankly, I don't ever remember even noticing that the StarTech drive bays were fitted with fans. I'd have to poke around inside my computer case to see. It's not as though I frequently remove or replace the drive-bays. I stuck them in there and paid them no more mind, so to speak.

It may be that any of these units are fine. I can only say I've been satisfied with these, since I started investing in the bays and caddies some five years ago.

 

[corkyg]

I have never noticed any fan noise. I used to have models that used inserts or caddies - the nice thing here is caddyless. Here's a closeup of the front panel:

And, the data available on the LCD:

 

[Blain]

I've always been a Kingwin KF-1000 type person.
Simply and straight forward with no fans to go bad.