A Closer Look

Upon first viewing the unit, nothing has really changed in terms of design. You will still get the rounded corners, circular power button and wide, blue power/access LED on the very bottom. Nevertheless, it looks great and refreshingly different than most other hard drive docks out there.


That said, the power button is very responsive and easily pressed, without actually pushing the unit away from you in the process. Turning it around we find just the power connector and USB 3.0 plug. Taking a look from the top, you may still use a single 2.5 or 3.5 inch drive with SATA interface and the eject button to the right has remained unchanged as well.


Throwing caution to the wind, I opened the unit by removing four screws. Wanting to know what makes the unit tick, I was greeted by a two part PCB. The major one holds all the connectors along with the IC. This chip is made by JMicron and carries the model number JMS539. You can find more information about it here (PDF).


As mentioned before you can use both 2.5 and 3.5 inch SATA storage devices. This also includes 2.5 inch SSDs, but such a usage scenario does not make much sense. Nobody would use an expensive SSD just to slap it into a dock from time to time. Once connected to the PSU and turned on, the ring around the power button and the strip on the bottom light up with a fancy blue color. While this is cool, there is no way to toggle these on or off - which would have been a nice touch.