Rosewill RDDO-12002 Rigid aluminum casing and internal plastic shield 2.5" & 3.5" USB2.0 & eSATA Docking Station

Pros: Nice Aluminum casing, high quality, fit nicely.

Cons: I bought this for fast eSATA connectivity feature but it did not work with two drives because my host PC does not have the port multiplier function. I discovered this from the manual after installation. I have to downgrade to USB 2.0 (I wish it has 3.0). Both drives work flawlessly however.

Other Thoughts: The spec. needs to state more specifically. I was lured by the Newegg discount and did not pay attention. This was my first dual-dock.

Pros: almost works.

Cons: will not work on 3 tb drives as described at newegg.
But does work on 2 tb and below as the manual described.

Pros: Build quality, reliability, eSATA & USB 2.0

Cons: No USB 3.0

Other Thoughts: I have tested this drive with both Ubuntu linux and OS X. Via eSATA I got ~75MB/s write speed to an old 7200rpm drive. Going drive to drive with two old 7200rpm drives I got ~50MB/s. Not bad considering it's sharing an esata line and the drives were pretty old.

When you turn the dock on with two drives it spins up and addresses one and then the next. At first I thought it wasn't recognizing the 2nd one. Just give it a second and it will pick it up.

The construction is very nice. The silver part is solid metal like a MacPro case.

I wasn't sure if my motherboard's onboard esata connector supported a port mulitiplier. I was pleased to find out my 785GM-E51 with SB710 southbridge supports exactly one extra drive across the 4 internal, 1 external connectors.

Very happy with this dock.

Pros: 2 drive slots is convenient

Cons: I previously had an single external dock from Rosewill, it just died... do I bought this double ... Now when it was working the single worked great.. it would take a few seconds to spin up but then would work great.

This double however is somehow corrupting the file system. The first file I try to access when it start to spin up will become inaccessible. I can then access the other files on the drive except the file which I tried to access. To get access I have to run chkdsk and it will repair the filesystem. I should probably just disconnect it now in case I cause permanent damage.

Other Thoughts: With my tower having like 6 drive slots, time to stop being lazy and move these things internal.

I also wonder if storing drives in a vertical position the way these docking stations are designed will cause asymmetric wear causing the drive to fail early.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Valued Customer,

Thank you very much for purchasing this unit. We strive to provide the most reliable and highest quality products to our customers.
We have tested many Hard Drives with the RDDO-12002 Docking Station and the vertical mounting of the HDDs will not affect the HDD's performance or life span.

Please check the following:
1. Run the HDD Manufacturer's Disk Diagnostic on the drive to scan for any potential failures or bad clusters.

When done accessing docked HDD in RDDO-12002:
1. Safely disconnect it from the OS
2. Turn off the power to the RDDO-12002 dock by flipping the rocker switch on the rear of the unit
3. Wait 10-15 seconds for the mounted HDD to spin and shut down
4. Press the Eject button to disconnect the mounted HDD
5. Safely physically remove the HDD from the RDDO-12002 docking slot.
If you are still having file corruptions with the RDDO-12002 dock, test it with another HDD. You can also test the HDD with the file corruptions by installing it directly into your computer's motherboard to see if the file corruptions are still occurring.

Feel free to contact the Rosewill Customer Support team for further assistance at 1-800-575-9885 Monday - Friday 8AM - 5PM PST or via email at techsupport@rosewill.com