VANTEC NEXSTAR3 NST-360U2-BL 3.5IN USB2.0 ALUMINUM IDE HARDDRIVE ENCLOSURE BLUE W/ POWER ADAPTER

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I had a couple of really old, and very broken, computers lying around. I was only keeping them because I didn't want to lose some of the data on the hard drives (I believed the hard drives still worked, and there were some files there that I didn't have saved anywhere else). I eventually decided to just pull out the hard drives, and try putting them in an HDE. The Vantec Nexstar 3 that I used worked perfectly. My old data has been saved, and my old computers (that I could no longer even turn on) have now been recycled.

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Bought one of these to house a 80Gig WD that I removed from my PC after adding two 500Gig drives. Using this as my backup drive and so far so good

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I've had this enclosure for half a year now and havent had a single problem with it whatsoever. Transfer rates are great and it doesnt make much noise at all.Has a great metallic finish that lets you display it proudly on your desk.The Nexstar 3 is an exceptional product from Vantec.

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I bought this drive enclosure on sale, it looks very nice. That is about the only thing that is good about it. It does not work for me. I formatted my WD 160GB HDD and tried several jumper settings with no luck. Everytime I turn it on, my computer restarts and it is not recognized. Very frustrating. So i sent it back (I had to pay shipping of course which was half the value of the enclosure) and recieved a replacment. This replacment did not work either. I would love to get my money back, except if I sent it back one more time, I've spent the cost of the enclosure already.

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I had an old 80 GB maxtor collecting dust so I decided to buy one of these and use it for backup purposes. So far it works great and would recommend it to anyone who is looking to put their old hard drives to good use.

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Extremely easy to install your existing HD to this product. Would recommend it to anyone wanting to make use of a spare hard drive you got lying around.

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I am very happy with this device, it work very well and easy to install. The power supply should be set in the box instead of an external one.

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Got this to house my secondary "backup" WD 80 gig drive. I was tired of listening to its high pitched whine everytime I started up my rig so I yanked it out of the case and installed it in this instead. Now I only have to listen to it when I want to back stuff up. Muuuuch better.The case is pretty easy to install, just slip in the drive, lighten a few screws, plug in a cable and you're good to go. XP recognized the drive right away (with the same drive letter it had while internal) and I coppied 5 gig of music accross in about 7 minutes while doing other work. Overall, pretty happy.

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Installed an old 40 gig hard drive I had laying around,decided too get some use out of it. Took about 5 minutesto install the hard drive in the nexstar3 (be carefull if you buy one of these it's a tight fit and the cables have to be folded, but if your carefull it's not a big deal.I hooked it up to my computer, it recognized it right away,I've copied one gigs worth of files to it, the speed isreally quite impressive.All in all very happy with it would recommend withouthesitation too others.

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I needed to hook a bigger (and faster) hard drive on my laptop so I bought this product and I must say that it works better than I have expected! ...I thought moving files around would be very slow because it was a USB device but it is not the case at all. I got a 7200 RPM hard drive in it and I can barely feel any slowdowns. USB2 is great and this device is USB2 compliant all the way. I definitively recommend this product!

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It works and it works well. It gets mildly warm, doubles as a gentle hand warmer in the winter. It looks very nice, which seems to set it apart from the rest. Installation was very easy and strait forward. Very pleased.

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Nice little unit. I put a 200GB Seagate 7200 into the enclosure and it been working great ever since.

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Attractive, sleek looking drive enclosure, bought it to use as portable storage as I travel a lot. So far has held up well for that purpose, very happy with my purchase, was well worth the price.

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Overall it's a great enclosure. It looks great. Fit and finish are excellent. It dissipates heat well due to the all metal construction. I've seen plastic enclosures heat up to disturbingly high levels. This enclosure gets nowhere close to those levels. Seems to be built well, not as well as a LaCie enclosure, but well enough to give you the sense that it won't break apart if you were to subject it to some reasonable abuse. I don't really perceive any weaknesses with the enclosure but if I were to change anything I would add a firewire connection for the extra performance. I bechmarked it and it tested at and average of 19.7 MB/s. Which is decent for a USB 2.0 connection. In comparison I have a LaCie external drive connected through firewire and I get and average of 26.8 MB/s. Keep in mind though if you plan to transport the enclosure around a USB connection is preferable since most computers have USB connections. Can't say the same for firewire (unless you work exclusively with macs. Overall I think this is a great enclosure. I've seen optins out there that are much worse than this. This review was modfied by poster @ 10-27-05 08:09 PM

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I've bought two of these, and put Seagate Barracuda 200GB drives in each, for backup purposes. (One on site, one off.) They're quiet (likely due moreso to the HD), and cool. My first backup of 120GB took 8 hours or so, and the enclosure was just comfortably warm for all that use.It's a great mobile HD option.

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hooked up 40gb seagate that was just laying around.works just fine.also satisfied with transfer speed.

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easy ot install and use, no problems, Would like to see the power module either built into the case or at the plug end instead of in the middle of the cord.

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I hooked up a 200GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 in this case and it works flawlessly. Gets quite warm after moving around large files continuously for several hours... which I take as a good sign that the aluminum case is effectively dispersing the heat. Very easy to set up, took less than 10 minutes to get the drive in.