A problem that has faced enthusiasts and others for some time is what to do with all the hard drives we have laying around. Hard drives of old, new, and future all end up in various areas. You don't want to mount them all to your hard drive and probably couldn't put them all in there, you don't want to go through process of assembling and disassembling an external enclosure every time, and while a USB-to-SATA with a power adapter is an option it isn't a very safe one. Anyone who leaves their hard drives out in the open knows at anytime all of that data can be lost, not to mention the cost of the disk. Just a bump of the table or the drop of something small onto a powered on, cycling hard drive can spell instant doom and loss of all data. Luckily there's a new solution to this common problem from Thermaltake, best known for their cases and PSUs, their Thermaltake BlacX N0028USU External Hard Drive SATA Enclosure Docking Station.

Simplicity is at the heart of the BlacX from Thermaltake making it very easy to setup and get going in a minute. The BlacX its self is rectangular black cube measuring 5.12x3.55x2.56 inches so it is fairly small and should fit on most desktops with ease. The unit is powered by an AC adapter in the back and connects to a computer via USB plug on the back. Thermaltake also offers an ESATA and USB version and a special edition which also doubles as a USB hub. No drivers are necessary and the device works exactly like an external USB enclosure.

Putting in the hard drive couldn't be easier either with the BlacX. The docking station supports both 3.5" and 2.5" drives which connect easily to the SATA adapter in the drive bay. A hard drive simply slides in through the docking station and clips into the SATA port inside, power on the device and you're ready to go. Additionally hot swapping of hard drives is also supported which makes this a must have for those in IT, though we recommend being careful and making sure the device is disabled first in Windows before removal and that the hard drive is completely powered down. We used in testing and repair of numerous PCs so far and have found no compatibility problems or other issues with the device at all. Thermaltake claims a transfer rate of 480MBps but as you'll see in our testing it came in significantly under that.

Let's move on to performance testing and technical specifications.