Cavalry 4-bay RAID Disk Array (RAID 5) eSATA 4TB (4x1TB) External Hard Drive -CADA004SA4

Pros: RAID 5
Includes the drives so price is pretty good

Cons: - No integrated RAID meaning that you need to use the included PCI-E RAID card or integrated RAID card on motherboard.
- Poor Packaging
- Absolutely no manual provided
- Drives are not hot-swappable

Other Thoughts: While I thought it'd be cheaply constructed, I never thought it'd be this cheaply constructed.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Valued Customer, We hold customer suggestions and/or comments with high regard. This product’s design, with an external RAID card, was designed to allow extra eSATA slots for customers that need to connect additional eSATA devices and do not have that support already. As for shipment, your drive should have been wrapped in a plastic bag to avoid water damage and suspended between foam support structures, then packaged in a white box with over-pack support. If your unit was not packed in this way by Newegg, please let us know. Your unit should also have the hot-swapping feature; should this not be the case with your unit, please contact us for a replacement unit. We have also attached supporting documentation to this response for your 4-bay. Please contact us for further support.

External Link(s):

Cavalry Contact|

Support Guide: Under Documents|

Pros: Good price
Functional
Sold and supported by Newegg!

Cons: No FAQ or other helpful info from company or manuals
Had to re-seat two of the drives to get the unit to work properly
Concerns over lifespan
Not packaged well

Other Thoughts: Had initial problems out of the gate in that it wouldn't boot. Finally re-seated two of the drives and it came up. After about 20 minutes it died. Pulled all of the drives out and re-seated them all. Has been running since then with zero issues. Agree with other posters that support is non-existant. Packaging of unit left alot to be desired. Screw packet had opened in transit and they were everywhere. Had to carefully comb thru unit to make sure none were inside ready to cause a short.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Rob, We are always endeavoring to improve our product line and would like you to know that we have updated our CADA-4bay units to address the types of concerns you expressed. 1) We now have a full FAQ on our website as well as downloadable manuals, tech guides, glossary and even a few videos. 2) The new CADA-4bay now has a software UI which guides you through the setup process and is nearly self-explanatory. 3) We now sell the empty CADA enclosure separately so that customers can select the drives that they are most confident in trusting their data with. 4) We have re-examined our packaging and shipping procedures with the customer-experience in mind and have increased the amount of cushioning in all of our shipping-containers.Please contact us and let us know your concerns or suggestions: www.CavalryStorage.com/contact.aspx

External Link(s):

Cavalry Manuals & Tech Guides|

Cavalry Contact|

Pros: Looks nice.
Appears to have a very good/quiet cooling setup.

Cons: Manuals and current instructions are lacking.
Customer service is non-existent.
Drives arrived with error showing in Sil RAID Management Utility. 35 hours to rebuild. Failed again within a few hours.
Newegg RMA saves the day.

Other Thoughts: I would have loved to keep this item, but there is only so much you can do with outdated manuals and non-existent customer service.

Manufacturer Response:

Customer service is top priority at Cavalry Storage. We have dedicated telephone and email tech support available during normal business hours at our home office in Simi Valley, California. We take pride in our ability to work with customers and achieve solutions to difficult computing challenges. The CADA-SA4 has undergone a makeover and we now include a full manual on our website with instructional videos in the works. We do everything in our power to help our customers get full-use from their products and would like to prove it. Please contact us and let us know your feelings, observations and suggestions. And, checkout our website which features up-to-date revisions of all of our current product manuals as well as tech guides, videos, drivers and support software.

External Link(s):

Tech Guides, Videos, & Drivers|

Cavalry Contact|

Pros: Good unit but if you have a large case, you can do the same thing with a raid card.

Cons: None noted

Other Thoughts: The product description says 4TB (1TB x 4). That's not correct. You will get a little less than 3TB of storage because, as everyone who understands striping with parity knows, one drive is eaten up by the parity information.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Valued Customer,

Thank you for informing customers that if they choose to use RAID 5 or similar RAID functions, it will be around 3TB of space. We have taken this opportunity to attach a link to this response on how RAID settings work. Due to the fact that there are four 1TB drives inside, our specs on Newegg will reflect this, as customers may choose to use this 4-bay in JBOD mode. Thanks again for your comment. Should you have further questions and/or comments, please do not hesitate to contact us.

External Link(s):

How RAID works|

Cavalry Contact|

Pros: The unit is very compact and very quiet, and I guess about $1/3GB is a pretty good value. It's about 1000 hours of DVD-quality video storage.

Once I get over being unhappy about the Cons below, I think I'll be very satisfied with the unit.

Cons: The installation instructions are non-existent, and documentation you can view online is not very specific either ... and it's out of date, for Vista at least. They don't mention the drive has to be formatted, but Quick Format does the trick. A Full Format would take forever.

One of the drives was not working out-of-the-box, and I got no meaningful help from newEgg chat. Just you can return it if you want. Calling Cavalry's Customer Service is a waste of time.

I did get good comments from Cavalry email support, after a while, and was able to fix the problem by simply loosening the problem drive and seating it properly.