Question 1

Does this cable support 5.25" SATA HDD with a powered eSATA port on a laptop?
I have a DEll Inspiron which has a powered eSATA+USD2.0 port on it.

Thanks

Accepted Answer

Your question asks about a 5.25" HDD. I am not familiar with such, however, I am familiar with 3.5" and 2.5" HDD. So please know that the 3.5" HDD will not work because they all require 12 volts power (USB2.0 port are only 5 volts). If you have a 2.5HDD which is what is used inside laptops then you can use this device (EC-ST001) with your laptop and a 2.5" HDD. All 2.5" HDD's are 5 volt power.  Weather your eSATA port is powered or not does not matter because this device does not power the HDD with the eSATA cable.

Question 2

Does the EC ST001 have an eSATAp (eSATA USB hybrid) connector, which can serve as a power source for the SATA drive? Or is the USB connector the only power source?

Most 2.5" HDDs require more than the 500 mA which a single USB 2.0 port can supply. Some require as much as 1000 mA.  So if the USB connector is the sole power source, then some HDDs won't work with this cable unless it's plugged into a USB 3.0 port.

Accepted Answer

The EC ST001 has an eSATAp connector to supply +12volts from your computer. The USB connector only supplies +5volts from your computer and you additionally need the +12volts to power 3.5" external drives. A 2.5" drive only needs +5volts, but may not supply enough current for some drives.

Question 3

Does this work with an Optical drive? All the specifications only mention HDD & SSDs. The physical layout looks like it would match, so is there a software or protocol reason it might not work?
I've got a small case that doesn't have room for an optical drive (which I've got plenty of spare drives) and this is WAY cheaper than an external drive. 
My motherboard has 2x eSata ports on it & plenty of spare USB for power.

Accepted Answer

Cant say for sure about this one, I have one that is 2 usb that will power and read a dvd rw drive. Neither will power a full size hard drive, only a laptop size drive, as the bigger drives use more power.

Question 4

Can this cable be used to Migrate my existing SSD drive to my new SSD?  I am upgrading my SSD to a larger capacity and need a cable connection to use the software provided.

Any help is appreciated!

Thanks!

Accepted Answer

It should work well for imaging your drive to a new SSD drive.

Question 5

will this cable work with an Samsung evo 840 SSD?

Accepted Answer

I've not tried it, but it should (at USB2 speeds).
I bought mine to use with CDROM drives, and it worked perfectly.

Questions & Answers