CineRAID CR-H212 (Dual Bay USB 3.0 SuperSpeed SSD Enclosure)

Quickly listing some +/- of my new CineRAID.• With two Western Digital 1 TB WD Red SATA III 5400 RPM 16 MB Cache installed, the single USB port on my AirportExtreme (5th gen? dual N) DOES NOT provide enough power to the unit to mount. Blinks a few times, but won't mount.• A single USB port on my more recent aluminum Mac mini powers that same configuration just fine.• The plastic parts seem exceptionally brittle. I would not expect to dis/re assemble too often.• The bright blue activity LED - ahhh - make it stop. My peripheral kept blinking in my peripheral vision... until I taped over it.• Otherwise, fine. Fan-less, so it's very quiet. All-in-all, OK for the money so far. More like 3 1/2 stars.

It seems to be limited to 2Tb and was not totally happy with one of the SATA III Hard Drives I purchased from B&H... either ways I kind of give up on it cause I need at least 4Tb capacity!!

I bought this for my MacBook Pro to initially use in a RAID1 but then just decided to run it in Normal Mode so the drives were independent. I have it setup so that a backup job runs automatically to backup my internal MacBook Pro SSD to Drive_1 in the enclosure, when the job is complete another job runs a TimeMachine backup to Drive_2 in the enclosure. Its awesome.I highly recommend this enclosure. Built well, performs well with USB3, compact and feature rich. I did a lot of research for enclosures and this is by far the best for the price. Must have for anyone.My favorite part about the enclosure is that it has screwless access to the HDDs themselves, don't mistake this for HDDs NOT being able to be screwed in, because they can.PROS- Bus Powered - No AC Adapter needed- SuperSpeed USB 3.0 (Backwards Compatible to USB 2.0/1.0)- Optimized for Audio/Video Applications- Built-In RAID - support RAID 0, 1, JBOD and Normal Mode- Storage capacities up to 2TB*- Industrial aluminum design- Cool Blue Individual Drive Activity indicator LED- Mac® OS X, Linux and Windows® compatible- Standard One year factory warrantyEasy RAID SetupThe CineRAID Home CR-H212 features three RAID modes with an easy dip-switch RAID setup for customizable speed and protection levels. RAID 0 offers large capacity and highest speeds by stripping both drives together, but no protection. RAID 1 offers full data protection by mirroring both hot-swappable disks for non stop data access or to use a mirrored drive as a backup. JBOD offers one large capacity of both drives. Normal mode is also an option for individual drive (pass-through) detection.Specifications:Host Interface:- USB 3.0 (Backwards Compatible to USB 2.0)Drive Supported / Interface:- 2.5" SATA - HDD/SSD with a maximum drive thickness of 9.5 mm- 6Gb/s (Backwards Compatible to 3Gb/s)Capacity: Up to 2 TBDimensions:-- Height: 1 1/8 inches- Width: 3 3/8 inches- Length: 6 inchesWeight:- Enclosure Only: 8 Ounces (excluding hard drives)- Full Package (with Cable): 1lbRAID Function:- Supports RAID 0, 1, JBOD and Normal- Automatic disk failure detection- Hot swappable disksSupporting OS:The H212 is OS independent and will work with any OS that supports USB host devices.Power Supply Specifications:- Bus Powered via USBPackage Contents:- 1X H212 Enclosure- 1X USB 3.0 Cable- 1X USB Power cable- 1X User manual- 8x HDD ScrewsWarranty:- 1 Year Warranty

This product has so much potential, but sadly it is of very poor quality. The connector on the unit and its mating cable connector do no mate solidly, requiring fidgeting to have the PC recognize the drives. I configured it with 2 256GB Sandisk SSDs which are each rated at about 500MBytes/sec writes. In RAID0, the device yielded 260MB/sec for writes (from internal RAM Disk and from internal SSD). Unfortunately, other times the unit would provide only 25-30MBytes/sec. Results were unpredictable.Also, the DIP switches inside the device were of questionable reliability...several attempts required for each RAID mode change/test.Again, it's so nice an compact, comes with extra USB power-only cable along with USB data/power cable, and really could be a winner if it didn't have so many fit/finish issues.

I needed a reliable, compact storage device to take with me on a supported bike camping vacation, and I couldn't afford solid state storage with the capacity that I needed for my video and photos. The CineRAID device was the best device I could find for my needs. I installed two WD Red drives, and got a Litop Carrying Hard Case to hold the drive and cables, and packed the drive in clothes to protect it during the trip. The switch latch for the device seems a little odd - I'd rather screw the case shut to keep it secure - but it worked. I'd rather not have the two cables, one for data and one for power, but it was a reasonable compromise. All in all, for such a compact device with RAID functionality, this is a great device at this price point.

This item came well packaged and was shipped to me quickly, but upon its first use proved to be unusable.I couldn't get the second of the two drives that I installed to work.I replaced the drive with another that was identical to the first two and still no LED for the second drive.Upon further inspection, I noticed that the connector for the second drive was not soldered properly to the circuit-board.The connector was at an angle, so about half of the contacts were not even making it to the circuit-board.I am in the process of dealing with Amazon and/or the manufacturer to see if I can get a working replacement.I'll update after I see if things work out or not.

Not the greatest build quality, a few plastic parts and an underwhelming lock mechanism have led me to pre-emptively secure the ends with gaffers tape, but since then I've had no complaints and you really can't beat the price! I also like that this can be BUS powered, although it can kill other devices if you plug it into a USB hub that doesn't have a big enough juice source.