KINGWIN KF-811-BK SATA Aluminum Mobile Rack

Pros: has nice construction heavy duty

Cons: the connectors are real cheap the data connector broke off inside cable. I returned it and the second one was all ready broke off. that makes 2 bad ones--- I brought icy dock mb122 and have had no problems. Newegg sent the second one over night so I got it fast but it was bad also. I going to wait and see if I can get my money back

Other Thoughts: spend a little more and get a better case

Pros: Straightforward, easy to use, trays fully enclose drive so that once a drive is in a tray (note - the tray is the thing inside the rack that holds the drive; this item is one rack with one tray), installing or removing the drive from the system does not involve disconnecting any wires from the drive itself, thus reducing the risk of busting the pins in the back of the drive. I've owned a bunch of these, and most of them work fine for quite a while, but note the cons below.

Cons: The fans can get really loud. Especially the ones in the tray (the 811 series has no fans in the trays, the 812 has one fan in the tray, and the 813 has two fans in the tray.) on the upside, the fans can be disconnected easily without too much trouble, and the airflow still seems good. I also managed to break the SATA connectors on 2 racks in my most recent build! Bad batch of racks? I'm not usually that bad with connectors; so maybe they are a little fragile, or maybe not, but may I suggest being especially careful when attaching the SATA cables to the trays (which ideally only needs doing once, ever. Unless you get a DOA mobo, and yes, there is a first time for everything.)

Other Thoughts: Also, these are very long. While this hasn't been a problem for me in prior builds (ATX board in an ATX mid-tower case), my most recent build micro-ATX board in an ATX mid-tower case) they don't fit so well - I think the problem is that the case is a little narrow side to side, so the back of the rack would bash into the mobo if it was installed all the way.

This is the third or fourth build I've used these on; in my opinion, they are pretty darn good, and about the lowest price for the feature set.

Pros: 1) Simple removable tray
2) The Connector is a 64 pin din and not the naked SATA data & power connectors (yikes!!)
3) The full kit comes with a basic security key etc

Cons: The insulator at the back of the inner tray will peel off pretty quickly and it degrades the look & feel of the product. Also I quickly discovered a while back that the RED LED light is not for hard drive activity as I had gotten used to in another mfgr model but it indicates HARD DRIVE FAILURE!

Other Thoughts: Overall these meet my basic needs for SATA hard drive enclosure trays and I have a number of them to keep my data & configuration in storage.

I would have liked for them to have another color besides basic black so that would help me get a visual clue as to the type of data drive, but that is my preference.

Pros: worked for 1 week

Cons: Does not always work. Causes boot failures. Don't waste your money. I bought this for system backups so I can grab it and go in case of emergency. Purchased a calvary dual hard drive dock(usb 3.0) to replace this piece of junk.

Pros: I originally specified this unit for purchase with several custom-built PCs, based upon an expectation that for a PC where drive swaps would be frequent, the more robust 60-pin connector would be advantageous over a direct SATA connector. While the connection seems sturdy enough, the quality of both the tray and the drawer is lacking. The only real pros on this item are the lower price and reasonable build quality for light use.

Cons: First: Noisy fans, mounted cheaply. Discovering most of the noise to be rattles due to loosely tightened screws, tightening one further only broke the plastic mounting post, which apparently wasn't threaded deep enough . As the result, that fan (on the carrier) was removed. The drawer fans may be prone to rattles also, or chirps from brushing the cheap aluminum shroud they face against. Some of this can be corrected with a bit of effort, but I'd rather pay double the price for higher-quality Startech carriers as we later changed over to. There were also times that the drive performance seemed questionable, yet I couldn't really isolate the carrier electronics as the problem although they remain suspect. The sliding lid on the drawer only secures by a small plastic latch which easily fatigues and breaks off after multiple removals/attachments of the lid...not a big deal if you don't have much reason for swapping drives out, but still something to be aware of.

Other Thoughts: The drawers do not cleanly mate flush with carrier and only feel secure if the lock pin is used to ensure they cannot slip loose. The handle serves as the drawer locking mechanism (apart from the keylock) and just seems manufactured to poor tolerances to serve its purpose. It works OK but again is obviously not a quality assembly as found with higher-priced carriers.

Pros: Basically does its job, never had a problem with my drives working. I also like that they are locked in and the drives can easily be removed when needed.

Cons: This is the loudest component on my tower by a significant margin. I have to turn off the drives and pull them out a little but to shut down all the fans. Also, one of the fans stopped working on one of the three drives I purchased and I've been cannibalizing it to keep the others going. Also tried to swap out the fans with new ones but for some reason the error light comes on, so the enclosures won't recognize a working fan unless its the original.

Pros: It looked like it would be a good unit.

Cons: Never could get a drive to work. I thought I had put a defective drive in, but connecting the drive to motherboard proved that theory wrong.

The fan was extremely noisy from day 1. It failed a short time later.

Other Thoughts: Unfortunately, I kept this unit for too long a time after buying it before ever trying to use it. By then, it was too late to return it.

Considering the bad rack and the extra tray I purchased, I figure I'm out $38.00.

Pros: Easy installation; feels solid (see cons)

Cons: Be careful. When I just touched the SATA connector, the black plastic guide piece fell off.

Pros: This is the fifth or six of these units I've bought over the past 3 years for various builds. I went with this model primarily because of the 60-pin connector; it spares the more delicate SATA connector the wear and tear of multiple insertion / removal cycles. (There would theoretically be a performance hit with this, but it's got to be infinitesimal).

The aluminum chassis is solid and well built. It does its job too -- gets warm, which means it's pulling heat from the drive.

Cons: The fans are a little loud. After my first one, I just buy the one-fan version; the rear fan is barely audible, if at all (and it's a few bucks cheaper). And if you're using an SSD, just disconnect the fans entirely.

Other Thoughts: The all-black bezel is priceless if you're building an all-black system. This is the only mobile rack I've found that doesn't have a gaudy brand logo emblazoned across the front. It's just smooth, simple black.

The LEDs are the common rectangular variety too, so they're easily replaceable if you want to customize the colors.

Pros: Very easy to swap drives. I use the rack to switch OS and for removable backup drives.

Key can be used to deactivate drive without having to remove the drive. Can also turn on a drive with the key to hot insert a drive.

Most of the unit is aluminum construction. Front and rear panels are plastic.

Good heat dissipation through the aluminum with just the one rack fan and no fans in the trays.

Easy to insert the drive, the only tool you need is a screwdriver to mount the drive to the tray.

Cons: The rack is much deeper than a normal 5 1/4 drive. It is about 8.5" deep. I have a 19" deep desktop case and I could just barely fit two of these racks in the case.

Other items are mostly minor items:
* No drive activity indication.
* Tray tends to bind lightly when it is inserted - aluminum on aluminum slide without any lubrication. This appears to improve with use.
* The Key cannot stay in the lock so don't loose it.
* Top cover of the tray easily slides on crooked. It is obvious it is crooked when you try to insert the tray and it will not fit in the rack.
* Sometimes the bottom of the handle sticks out a little after a tray is inserted. If I push the drive in by hand a little farther (without the handle) the handle will then lay flat.

Other Thoughts: The top of the tray has a small hook you push to the side to slide off the lid and open the tray .

Connecting drive: I just held the drive perpendicular to the tray and plugged the power and SATA connectors to the drive then laid the drive in the tray. This results in little stress on the cables or the drive connectors.

WD 500 GB Caviar Black runs at 37 degrees C in tray with only the one rack fan.

I ran HD Tune with drives in the rack and directly connected to the motherboard and there is no difference in the drive performance.

GIGABYTE GA-P55-UD4P
i5-750
Windows 7 64 bit, Windows XP 16 bit, FreeDOS
WD Caviar Black 500 GB, Caviar Green 1 GB, Caviar Blue 250 GB
G.SKILL Ripjaws 4 GB DDR3