SANS DIGITAL MS2UT RAID 0, 1 2 3.5" Drive Bays USB 2.0 & eSATA External RAID Subsystem

Pros: Solid construction, fast when it works, good value in theory.

Cons: The unit randomly reports failed drives, but the drives always check out. I sent it in last year after it reached a point where any drive I put it would fail to run. I sent it in under warranty. It came back and worked great for another year. Then the same thing started happening. If I put heavy read/write load on it, the drives disappear and the screen (which has a disconcerting flicker now) says one or both failed.

Other Thoughts: This is now the most unreliable drive enclosure I've ever owned.

Manufacturer Response:

The unit is covered by 1 year part and labor. We also support out of warranty service. Please contact tech@sansdigital.com or call 1.800.980.1988 if you have problem with the unit.

Thanks,

Pros: Form factor, straight-forward design, lack of power brick, LED for status. ESata connection to my computer creates an extremely fast and portable RAID 1. Good price/performance. I like this (older) design to the newer design with the slanted top panel. I found the stupid mini screw hole on the new "+" unit to blow chunks. So I bought a second one of this older model.

Cons: Problematic USB connection. Let's face it, this device to doing too much work for the loose nature of the USB physical connection. Or the internal USB hardware/software sucks? I don't know, as I do not use the USB connection after having a couple of spurious "rebuilds" using it on my laptop. My new laptop has an eSata port on the replicator - problem solved.

Other Thoughts: Suggest limiting this to eSata use only unless you have some means to really secure the USB cable. Using eSata, the device is extremely reliable. Using USB (like with a laptop) I got spurious rebuilds, etc. Fan noise is nominal - I prefer fan noise to toasted drives and running Sata drives without cooling fans is just stupid. I really like the square enclosure, so handy in a confined office space to have usable flat storage for small stuff.

Pros: It has done what it is supposed to for me. I have had it for about 2 years now with a pair of WD 320GB drives in a RAID 1 and have not had a single problem.

Cons: Noisy. The fans on this unit are LOUD.

Other Thoughts: It seems most of the bad reviews came from people using the USB 2.0 connection, I have only done that once or twice, it is connected to my machine with eSATA and powered through a UPS so it turns off/shuts off only a few times a year. Maybe I got lucky with mine.

An addition I would like to see is a network connection as well so I could access my data from my laptop with the desktop off.

Pros: Very good idea, Inexpensive ( At the time I bought it), Excellent customer service.

Cons: Frequently tries to repair the data, Frequent hard drive fails

Other Thoughts: In a matter of 11 months I had fomatted or replaced my hard drives 5 time, Some times it bad sectors , Some times it tells you that a harddrive has failed , when you check it , there is nothing wrong with the drive.

Manufacturer Response:

If the unit is reporting a bad drive, please use the hard drive manufacture drive utilities to confirm if there is any errors. Drive can be read and write but only manufacture testing tools can confirm if the hard drive need to be replace.

Please contact tech@sansdigital.com or call 1.800.980.1988 if you have problem with the unit.

Thanks,

Pros: Good customer service.

Cons: Dangerous device. The device started showing problems just after 1 year of use. Luckily I got my data off before it destroyed both drives.

Other Thoughts: I would not suggest buying this. The case is built well, but the electronics are bottom of the barrel.

Pros: - Small form factor
- USB and eSATA
- No power brick
- Straightforward menus

Cons: - Only RAID 0/1 (no JBOD, RAID 3/5)
- Must limit Seagate drives to 1.5 Gb/s operation (jumper)
- Doesn't seem to like 1.5 TB Seagate drives

Other Thoughts: I've only used Seagate drives in this unit (750 GB, 1TB and 1.5 TB pairs). I discovered that drives regularly failed if I removed the jumper (on the drives) to enable 3.0 Gb/s operation. If I put the jumper back on, no problems. Except that I can't get 1.5 TB drives to work at all. I spoke with Sans Digital and they are currently testing 1.5 TB drives.

Pros: I installed two empty drives, switched the unit on, and it immediately began to build a RAID 1 (mirror) array. After that I connected it to one of the SATA slots in my computer and it was immediately alive. Partitioned it with Partition Magic and copied files over to it. With two ordinary WD drives I got 80MBps-40MBps with HD Tach, the fastest of any of my drives. Haven't bothered to connect RS232 or install any control software, the thing just worked right out of the box. I am amazed, and am going to purchase another one

Cons: The manufacturers website is down, they may be having troubles, so I am getting a second unit, which I can press into service should I later get a hardware failure and need to recover disks...

Pros: solid construction best external raid system out there for the money. fast transfer speeds, easy to work with, great customer support.

Cons: its loud but why wouldn't it be, its trying to cool a power supply and raid controller, plus 2 hard drives and we all know new fast hard drives don't run cool. oh ya and its heavy but personally i like that because i know its well built.

Other Thoughts: look no further if ur looking for a great raid external trust me u wont be disappointed

Pros: It is a nice small setup for external RAID

Cons: I am so sick and tired of this thing "Failing" and rebuilding the second hard drive. It does not matter if you use the "xp" USB disconnect utility or not. If you reboot your PC with this connected to the USB on the PC your secondary HDD will fail! It takes over 2 hours for my 500 gigers to CLONE. I am so fearful that I will lose all my data I dread when I have to reboot my PC.

Other Thoughts: I sent it in to SANS for a swap. Reason I had to send it in was because the 1st enclosure I purchased DESTROYED the 2 x brand new RETAIL 5 year warranty 500gb drives that were installed. Constant read/write errors. I lost ALL MY DATA!!!! The exact reason I purchased the external RAID 1 array, DATA STORAGE / DATA INTEGRITY!... SANS sent me a new case; I had to send both HDD's back to Seagate for warranty swap (even though SEAGATE did not make faulty drives, this case made them faulty.

I am still looking for a replacement external RAID array.. DO NOT BUY THIS RAID CASE !

Pros: Construction is top notch - aluminum body & back-plate with plastic faceplate. The drive trays work well. Automatic RAID 1 config went well with two 1 TB WD drives.

Cons: LOUD is an understatement for this thing. It has TWO high speed fans - one in and one out to keep it and the drives cool - and they do their job well. HOWEVER - I purchased this for my home theater DVR and suffice it to say - it is unacceptably noisy. It is BY FAR the loudest computing device I have ever owned - including laser-jet printers. It will now be used as a USB connected backup for my Buffalo TeraStation - in the basement (and I will probably still be able to hear the fans from my office).

The drive mounting screws supplied are low-quality - you might want to use others.

Other Thoughts: Documentation is somewhat limited and cryptic. It walks you through the display menus but fails to mention you can only go through the menus while the drive is not connected to any computer or device - seems that would be an important note to make.

AVERAGE rating based on noise issue.