KINGWIN KF-252-BK 2.5" / 3.5" Internal Tray-Less Hot Swap Rack

Pros: Somewhat cheap

Cons: Rack's SATA Conector broke off inside my SATA cable during installation, ruining both of them. Also as mentioned be prepaired to drill your own holes to mount this in your computer case. Very flimsy construction.

Other Thoughts: I have seen these types of racks for less money but got this one because I did not want something cheap. But cheap and flimsy is what I got :-(

Pros: No problems with the fit, matches my orther rack on my Thermatake Chaser case, makes it so easy to clone drives now, works great!!!!!

Cons: none

Pros: - Price
- Hot Swappable with some effort (see other thoughts)
- Power button
- Accommodates both 3.5 and 2.5 SATA drives

Cons: - Flimsy plastic
- Only takes up half a 5.25 bay instead of utilizing the whole bay.
- Since it's so small you can only screw in the first row of screws closer to the opening to lock it in the bay. That also takes a bit of effort since the plastic is such poor quality and the screws don't fit very well into the slots.
- "Tool Less" bay lock-ins might have some difficulty securing it in place.
- Runs EXTREMELY HOT
- 3.5 Drives stick out half way instead of being fully enclosed by the device.
- There's an exhaust hole in the back cut out to look like a fan...they should have just left the back completely open for better air flow.
- No software/drivers included. A little utility would have been nice instead of scouring the internet for self trouble shooting.

-I would have to reset my computer for it to detect the drive which became more of a hassle and somewhat defeated the purpose of even having this device. I would also have to manually override from the BIOS (cont in other t

Other Thoughts: ...to get the C: drive to boot up because it would conflict with boot logs.

Depending on your OS, it may not recognize the drive when you insert and power it up. The stock Windows "safely-remove hardware" doesn't detect it.

After some headaches and trouble shooting I found a solution to remedy this.
There's a free program called "Hotswap!" (first Google result)

This program is exactly like the Windows safely remove feature except with many more options.

Using that program (pops up next to the clock tray after installation), put your drive into the Kingwin device and power the unit on. Right click on Hotswap! program in the tray and click "Scan for hardware changes"
After a moment you'll hear the drive start to be accessed and the auto start menu will pop up.

Be sure to sure click the icon for Hotswap to safely unswap the drive or it will be stuck in limbo status and possibly screw up your C: drive boot when you turn your computer on. Then power off and remove the drive

Pros: It works, has a power button, has both types of power feed, takes 2.5 and 3.5 inch drives

Cons: It's not a full length CD bay insert, so you may only get 1 or 2 screws in the thing.

It does not fit snuggly in the bay (which would be fine if i could get more screws in it

It runs a drive a little hot. It's got a fake fan hole and surrounds the drive in a plastic box (i wish it had metal rails or more holes in the plastic)

drive is not snug and sticks out more than i'd like

it says kingwin on it

Pros: It's simple, it does what it is supposed to do, and it does it well.

Power switch is handy to remove/install a drive from the system without actually unplugging it or taking it out.

I use it for backups on my server. I just shove a drive in there, leave it overnight for Backup Exec to do its thing, and then yank it out and throw it in the gun safe.

Cons: 3.5" drives hang out more than you might expect, but that doesn't bother me enough to yank an egg. The power light next to the switch is also supposed to blink to indicate data. Contrary to the spec's it doesn't. Who cares?

Other Thoughts: Depending on your chipset, driver version, and windows version, you may not get an option to safely remove your drive in the system tray (or you may erroneously get an unusable option to safely remove your Windows drive), but you should ALWAYS safely remove a drive in this device to ensure cached data writes have been completed or you may face data corruption.

This is a documented compatibility problem resulting from variations in the SATA/SATAII/SATAIII specifications and how manufacturers implement them and work around these variations.

If your drive is not appearing in the "safely remove" list there is some registry twiddling you can do to convince windows that the drive is removable. Google google google and you will figure it out.

The easier option in that case, though, is a tiny tray app called HotPlug! to replace the windows "safely remove". Hunt that down and install it and you will find it very cool.

Pros: A nice simple dock to bring a SATA connection outside the computer.
Power switch so the drive you insert is not always on.

Cons: Would be nice if KingWin had another SKU which included the low profile fan already installed. (But it is easy to add yourself.)
Flimsy, you do need a modicum of finesse.
Dock is not long enough to use the toolless installation in my case.

Other Thoughts: In my work I need to hot connect hard drives all the time. This dock is awesome, now I can put the side panel back on my PC.
It is not KingWin's fault that Microsoft does not provide "Safely Remove Hardware" functionality for SATA devices. Yes, you have to go into disk management and mark the drive offline - but that's on Windows, not the dock. If you want an eject button run Linux. The Nautilus desktop provides an eject button for ANY device it mounts after boot.

Pros: cheap and works with 2.5 and 3.5 drives

Cons: drive mounting holes are not properly spaced so i drilled new holes

Other Thoughts: with a little work it is fine

Pros: Perfect for swapping OS drives, OS images, Backups. Had no problem at all when I installed it out of box.

Cons: Some have complained that it is cheaply made but look at the price. Just take your time and carefully install. It is stable and solid when securely in place.

Pros: cheap, and does what it is supposed to.

Cons: hard drive hangs out 3 inches. has no real eject. does have a 40MM fan to annoy you with, not making noise yet, but it will. i am not really sure why but does not work with the windows eject system. i have to manually take the drive offline. perhaps in configuration. antec drive cage had the function. oh the cage is really small. i have quick release on my 5.25 drive bays. had to remove to screw in manually to secure.
one last con, the bay is enclosed, so no chance for free flowing air. not really sure the point in enclosing it then adding a fan, but they did.

Other Thoughts: i am not sure where i fall on the tech knowledge area. lets just say i get discouraged when talking to professionals who are unprofessional. if you can tell me the transistor count of your processor we could have a talk.

Pros: One of the few alternatives for both 2.5" and 3.5" case-mounted docking. Comes with non-locking straight SATA cable. Power switch with activity light (but see other thoughts). Vibration-isolating mounts, which is a useful feature. Offers both SATA and Molex power connector, a nice plus. The SATA connectors are reasonably well protected from dirt, but could have been better if the front flap covered the entire opening -- but then this would leave it partly open when a 2.5" drive was used. It's easy to insert and remove both sizes of drives. The front plate is a bit undersized, probably because of vibration-isolation and desire to avoid buzzing on the system case.

Overall, these are a pretty good value if you don't mind some of the "cheap" aspects of them. They're certainly much easier to deal with than any of the external docks that require cables and power supplies.

Cons: That stupid fake-fan. What were they thinking? Even without a fan, I haven't encountered any heat problems. Really really flimsy, so -1 egg. Probably strong enough if you don't bang it around. Insufficient mounting holes for most secure attachment -- look carefully at the side view and make sure that this will work in your application. This poor mounting arrangement was worth -1 egg. Vibration-isolators are a problem in channel/rail (i.e. front-removable with tabs) mounts because they allow flex the mounts so much that the rails easily fall out of the channels. I had to jam in some stiff foam between the plastic body and the mounting plate to force them outward, thereby defeating the intent of the vibration isolation.

Other Thoughts: Drives hang out the front to some degree -- see the pics on the Kingwin site. It's not a problem for me, but could be in some uses, especially with 3.5" drives. You have to be careful with those. The chassis itself is short making cable attachment on installation a little tricky in some applications.

While there's an on/off switch, you have to be aware of the hot-swap capability of the mobo and its configuration. If it doesn't have fully enabled AHCI, Windows will probably hang. I tried this a few times without any damage or corruption, but to be safe, non-AHCI should be shut-down for problem-free drive insertion/removal. All AHCI-capable systems I have tested (Win7 only) have worked okay, but it's still not as clean as a USB connection, and you have to be aware of buffer flushing. Of course, this is true of any external SATA.

I bought these to facilitate making weekly system images at minimal cost on bare drives, therefore avoiding the need for USB3. That was successful.