Universal HDD Adapter USB To 2.5IN & 3.5IN Sata & Pata Hdd Reviews

• Universal DriveWire is a very handy toolbox item

  
  By A20YO4O2VE2MV0 on 2008-01-09
  This is very cool. I frequently need access to hard drives that for whatever reason need to be removed from a computer. Usually, the computer has died and data needs to be retrieved from the hard drive.
  
  This universal DriveWire allows nearly any hard drive to be plugged into a USB port.
  
  Features:
  - It's Small - it'll easily fit in a briefcase or toolbox.
  - It has a power supply to power-up the hard drive.
  - No software required - it's as easy to use as a flash drive or thumb drive. It comes with a CD but I didn't really need it.
  - Flexible - can support almost any drive: 2.5" laptop drives, IDE drives or SATA drives.
  
  
  
  

• Used to Verty Good Effect--For Laptop and Desktop Drives

  
  By A2TRIDWZZRBHGH on 2008-02-09
  In reading the review where the drives appeared to have been 'killed' by this product, I was thinking of how opposite my experiences have been with this product.
  
  I have used the adapter and the 'EZ-Gig' software to upgrade my Dell laptop 2.5" drive. I have used the same arrangement for three 3.5" desktop drives. The Dell and one of the 3.5" drives is a SATA. The other two 3.5" drives were not.
  In all of the above cases, the issue and goal was to increase the space available without performing a 'clean install' of Windows--and the requisite re-install of all of the programs/settings--etc.
  
  In another case, I used the adapter to read a very old 10 gig drive and retrieve information.
  
  As noted in the other review, the USB connection to the adapter and my PCs (the Dell laptop (E1705) and desktop (no 'brand' per se [PC800-E Deluxe montherboard] has worked very well indeed.
  
  
  There was no trouble using the adapter and the accompanying 'EZ-Gig' software.
  Though I dare not recount the steps taken for the upgraded(I should have documented them), the process for all of the upgrades was quite easy and saved a great deal of time.
  I do agree that 'anything is possible'---I also, do agree that that type of answer is not conducive to good customer relations.
  
  The five 'stars' are for the operation of the product only--Not an endorsement of the answer you got from Apricorn.
  
  I hope that others will share their experiences with the product. That will give a better view of what is happening [good and bad] in the 'field.'
  
  

• Killed 2 drives at once..you decide

  
  By AOGX0IVG6AMM1 on 2008-02-06
  I had 2 perfectly working drives that I was cloning.. a Hitachi 80gb IDE 2.5 inch with a brand new expensive Seagate Momentus 160gb 7200 rpm 2.5 inch drive. Both worked fine in seperate enclosures with the 80gb holding my precious backup data. Hooked em up as described in the instructions, began the cloning process...and then nothing. The cloning program hung, the power supply light for the Apricorn began pulsing and the drives died. After that they did not work in my other enclosures either. Called Apricorn, knowing in advance they weren't going to know or do anything about my 2 trashed drives and was told that thier product would not cause that basically. Coincidence? I doubt it. What happened? I don't know. Both drives dead at the same time while hooked up to thier device..hmmmmm I wonder?? Anyways the very expensive NEW Seagate Momentus 160gb is warrantied..thank you very much Seagate ( although I feel guilty having them replace it now ) but the 80gb Hitachi is not.. AND it's to small for a doorstop too. Apricorn is going to replace thier product which will promptly find it's way onto THAT auction site...now how do I get my data back Apricorn? hmmmm? By the way I bought 2 of Apricorns Universal Adapter devices, I gave 1 as a gift to a friend...I called him and warned him..his is on THAT auction site already. The "upside" it did not wipe out the laptop I was using WITH Apricorns device. You decide if it's worth the gamble if it is use new warrantied drives, make backups of your backups and pray your computer does not get shorted out in the process...as Apricorns tech person said..."anything's possible" Always makes me feel better to hear that...how about you ?
  
  

• Apricorn Drivewire - Universal HDD Adapter USB To 2.5IN & 3.5IN Sata & Pata

  
  By A27LSXZ5QMEFEG on 2008-03-10
  Had a laptop that went south a couple of months ago. Bought this device to recover old data. The hardest part of the entire job was getting the HD out of the laptop. Connecting to the device, and getting the data off was a breeze. I used the EZ_GIG_II software to create an image of the device. I have not yet restored the image, so I can't vouch for the full backup and restore process yet.
  
  

• IT WORKS!!

  
  By A2M6Z1T2MLSDIO on 2008-04-28
  ADAPTER WORKS AS DESCRIBED, SOFTWARE DOES AN EXCELLENT JOB, PERFECTLY CLONED MY 80 GB HARD DRIVE ONTO A NEW 250 GB DRIVE. WOULD RECOMMEND IT TO ANYONE. BUT, PLEASE READ THE INSTRUCTIONS. YOU CANNOT CONNECT TWO LOOSE DRIVES TO THIS UNIT, CONNECT IT TO YOUR COMPUTER AND THEN CLONE ONE LOOSE DRIVE TO ANOTHER!. IT CANNOT DO THAT; DESPITE THE NUMBER OF PORTS WHICH ALLOW YOU TO CONNECT MORE THAN ONE DRIVE. IT IS FOR CLONING THE DRIVE IN YOUR COMPUTER ONTO A LOOSE DRIVE. PERIOD. DOCUMENTATION MAKES THAT PRETTY CLEAR BUT THE PACKAGING DOESN'T. OTHER THAN THAT IT IS A GREAT PRODUCT.
  
  
  
  
• Apricorn HDD to USB adapter
  By ACNL5VFDY0J6X on 2008-05-27
  I have been using this adapter for some time now, and it has performed flawlessly with 2.5" PATA drives, and 3.5" PATA and SATA drives. The software is also excellent, and the fellow who reported losing two drives probably killed the drives himself by misuse. It sounds like he hooked up both drives to the single adapter, which of course is not the way the product works. I would not recommend using this adapter though unless you have a fairly good working knowledge of computer hardware and software since it is easy for newbies to make mistakes, and then wrongly blame the product for their own shortcomings!!!!
  
  
  
  
• Excellent Device & Software
  By A1UENX703YWGD5 on 2008-06-22
  The purpose for which I bought this device and software is to use it in backing up my laptops and desktop pcs through cloning. This perfectly satisfies that purpose. I have trusted this product since I was fully satistied with the very first product that I bought from Apricorn so many years ago, the EZ Upgrade Kit which included the software EZ Gig II. I rate this product with 5 stars as I would the previous product I had. And that includes Apricorn's excellent customer service.
  
  
• Great little device and software
  By A3G2NNXY1EKCEY on 2008-07-04
  Just plug it in and install the software; away you go!
  
  I've already used this device to easily and successfully clone and resize several sata and ide/pata disks.
  
  
  
  
• more versatile than the manual implies
  By A14JO8L9JQBP1N on 2008-08-20
  This little device is elegantly general in its possibilities. Indeed, it has more possibilities than those described in its manual.
  
  The "EZ Gig II Backup & Disaster Recovery Software" that comes bundled with it is very powerful, and I say more about that in the next paragraph. Even without using that program, the hardware itself enables one to peer from any USB-equipped computer into the directories and files of a disk drive that is mounted on the adapter. Just as one can browse through file-containing directories (folders) on a USB flash drive, one can do the same with the contents of an intact disk drive attached to this adapter. When my daughter's laptop quit working for reasons unrelated to its disk drive, I removed the laptop's disk drive (a simple process requiring only a Size #0 Phillips screwdriver), connected the disk drive to the Apricorn DriveWire, plugged the DriveWire's USB cable into my desktop computer, and easily retrieved the document files that she needed.
  
  Now to the "EZ Gig II Backup & Disaster Recovery Software." The happy ending to this story is that a potentially disastrous loss turned into no loss whatsoever and a painless disk-drive upgrade from 100GB to 160GB. Here's the problem I faced. Knowing that the shop which was going to perform an extended-warranty repair was likely to wipe the laptop's hard drive of its contents and reinstall Windows, I wanted to preserve all of the installed software and Windows customization to which my daughter was accustomed. To accomplish this, I needed to clone the laptop's disk drive and keep the clone when sending the laptop in for repair. If the laptop had still been working, this would have been easy to do with the EZ Gig II software: install the software on the laptop, attach a new drive to the Apricorn DriveWire, plug the DriveWire's USB cable into the laptop, and run the program. Unfortunately, I couldn't do that because the laptop was dead. Here's how I solved the problem. I bought two Apricorn DriveWires--one for me and one for my daughter. I installed my copy of the EZ Gig II software on my desktop computer. I mounted the laptop's original, 100GB disk drive on one DriveWire adapter, and I mounted a new, 160GB disk drive on the other DriveWire adapter. Plugging both USB cables into the desktop computer and running EZ Gig II, I was able to clone the contents of the 100GB original onto the 160GB replacement.
  
  When the repair shop fixed the laptop, it did as I had feared: It wiped the laptop's hard drive of its contents and reinstalled Windows. No problem. My daughter replaced the Windows-only 100GB disk drive with the 160GB clone, and she was completely back in business. The only change was a 60GB increase in storage capacity!
  
  
  
• USELESS DEVICE WITH RANDOM DISCONNECTS
  By A1VJ0V58N0698J on 2008-08-22
  I really wanted this Apricorn Adapter to work, what could be nicer than having SATA and PATA choices at any given time. But as soon as I hooked my SATA drive to my USB on the back of the computer and I tried to do a Back-Up the drive started disconnecting in the middle of the Back-Up. The thing is, I wasn't watching this process all the time so I fear some of the data may have been corrupted. To make matters worse, I can not play Movies from the same external drive, the disk gets ejected constantly in the middle of playback, basically, the Apricorn adapter is useless. It is too late for me to get my money back but maybe I can save someone else from making the same mistake I did.
  
  (Before someone from Apricorn comes here to blame me for not knowing how to use the device properly, I want everyone to know I am computer savvy and I followed their instruction faithfully. Even if some people have had no problems it does not mean their device works all the time. If you do a search on the Internet for this device you will find others with similar stories. I think it is possible they manufactured a bunch of defective units and dumped them in the market rather than recall them. They should have an official recall advertised on their website.)
  
  

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