StarTech.com 3.5" External SATA Hard Drive Enclosure - Trayless - eSATA / USB 3.0 (USB 3.1 Gen 1) Hard Drive Enclosure w/ UASP , TAA (S351BMU33ET)

High quality product.

Very good design and it works very well as with other products of this company. The only problem that it is not designed to support HDDs over 4Tb, which is a bit "outdated" by today's standards. Otherwise, it is perfectly OK.

I had researched enclosures for my data backup drive. I had looked several varieties read reviews and such. While this enclosure did not have a lot of reviews, I had owned several other Startech products from seven foot network racks, to wall mounted racks, cloners and other items. So I decided this would be a great new item to try out. Packaged well, had both an esata cable and 3.0 usb cable in the box. I coupled the enclosure with a WD Blue 4 tb drive and the drive and enclosure worked well together. I have completed my much needed always on local backup- instead of the once a week backup on a portable drive. I feel this will get the job done until I can put in a NAS and I am using Blazebackup as my offsite backup solution. So in short, this enclosure helps bridge the data backup for local storage and will work well for most people. I did not test this with a 2.5 SSD, as that was not an option until the price of SSDs over 4tbs comes down.

A year ago, I bought a couple Startech S351BMU33ET enclosures to replace older SanDisk enclosures. I switched to the Startech brand because it was the only enclosure I found with both eSata and USB ports. After a year's use, I believe I can give the enclosure an accurate review.The general appearance and build quality of the enclosure is pretty good. Features wise, it can pass on SMART hard drive data and the connections are stable. It's plug and play, silent and reliable.On the down side:1) For the price, why doesn't this thing come with feet? I had to add my own rubber nubbins.2) THIS ENCLOSURE OVERHEATS DRIVES. I hope I yelled that loud enough. Many people give these enclosures good reviews and have no idea their drives are being degraded. Normal operating temperatures are 40F to 95F with a maximum of 130F. My drives were running 125F during minimal use. The same drives in the SanDisk enclosures (also fanless) were in the low 90's and are always less than 105F. I had to set the Startech enclosures on their sides and point a desk fan at them to stay less than 130F. So much for silent operation. When I find time, I plan to drill holes in the enclosures and attach small fans blowing directly on the drives... or simply buy better enclosures.I wouldn't get these enclosures again. If you already own one, I strongly suggest monitoring the hard drive temperatures. Crystal Disc Info and many other freeware programs are user friendly and can monitor all of the hard drive data.

Technically seems not bad. But the non-technical quality is terrible. There is disgusting smell upon opening the enclosure: toxic VOC there.

I've learned a lot recently about what chipsets actually offer low level access and it seems only the Asmedia chipsets do, and this is one of them. Startech actually listed which chipsets are on which product, and I decided to test my new knowledge, and sure enough, this product offers low level direct block access. Awesome! I'm literally hooked and loyal forever now. Thank you

I have been running three of these for many years. There was a bad power glitch and one died (along with some other equipment.) The other two are still going strong. I was able to buy the exact same unit as a replacement and it's now running happily alongside the others. The blue lights are a slightly different color is all.

This external drive enclosure is well designed. The front access door allows easy removal of a 3.5" SATA drive. The blue thin LEDs on the front face are very helpful to show when the drive is powered up and whenever data is being accessed. However, the one big flaw is that 2.5" drives will not work in this enclosure. I had to buy a 2.5"-to-3.5" converter tray in order to use my 2.5" SSD. It would be nice if they included this type of tray for free so that you can use either your 2.5" or 3.5" SATA drives with this enclosure.