| ICY BOX IB-351StUS-B USB & eSATA 3.5" Enclosure |
| Reviews - Featured Reviews: Storage | |
| Written by Thompson "Chip" Terrell IV - Edited by Olin Coles | |
| Monday, 08 October 2007 | |
IntroductionAs with many of the products in the accessories category, such as external enclosures, ill designed and cheap are far more prevalent attributes than well designed and quality made! Here at Benchmark Reviews we've seen our share of accessory components that weren't up to snuff, so we decided to take a closer look at what appears to be an intelligently designed and quality offering from the German company RaidSonic Technology; the ICY BOX IB-351StUS-B USB & eSATA external enclosure for 3.5" hard drives. The Icy Box enclosure is a simple yet practical design made of durable aluminum with solid corner hand screws, and the sides are made of firm metal mesh because the unit is designed to be quietly fanless. Icy Box supports all 3.5" SATA hard drives and can interface with any desktop system via USB 2.0 or eSATA. The latter is rapidly becoming the standard in the computer industry for external component interface because of it's vastly superior speed. Here at Benchmark Review we question all new case designs that omit this interface feature because it represents the current top end design trend in the industry today.
Icy Box is portable, hot swappable, and can be assembled and utilized in virtually minutes, as long as you have a spare SATA hard drive at your disposal!. It's powered by an external power source in the form of a typical AC adapter power brick. What is not so typical about the brick is how light and compact it is. The Icy Box comes with all the accessories you'll need to use it as soon as you can extract the sturdy enclosure from it's retail packaging. As you will see, the Icy Box is an attractively understated black design that is quite sleek, and were it not for the large white type on the side proclaiming it's name, would be almost business like in it's aesthetics.
RaidSonic chose to present the elegantly designed ICY BOX IB-351StUS-B in a rather upbeat new age type box. The marketing of the Icy Box is certainly international as there are no less than 5 different languages represented on the packaging! Obviously from the box design the manufacturer wanted to communicate the stylish, and most of all, portable attributes of the Icy Box. About the company: RaidSonic Technology GmbHThe German tech company RaidSonic was founded in 1999. In a dynamic growth process, the enterprise developed itself continuously in it's product range and in the number of employees. By May 2004, a permanent change of station was needed and new premises were adapted to meet rising requirements. After big success in Germany, a strong expansion into the European and US markets was in line. As a manufacturer, RaidSonic has direct influence on the product design, both in the quality and in the aesthetics of the design. By the consistent use of high-quality components and materials, their products take a firm position in the market segment elevated by RaidSonic. Features & SpecificationsFeatures:
Specifications:
ICY BOX: Closer Look
Lets take a closer look at the Icy Box HD enclosure and what comes with it. After that we'll install a hard drive and see how useful the product is and if it operates properly. We'll also check out how easy it is assemble and utilize.
The packaging of the ICY BOX IB-351StUS-B was more than adequate and certainly provided ample protection for the components and parts inside. The packing carton, like most things made in Germany, was well made and gave an overall good impression and a quality presentation of RaidSonics product. Though the box was undamaged, there was an obvious rub in the middle of the top of the enclosure, just above the B in Box. I suspect the marring of the top aluminum plate occurred before packaging.
Lots of goodies! Let's see, SATA to eSATA L-bracket, USB cable, CD, power brick and adapter plug, external eSATA cable, baggie with 8 rubber foot pads and 4 screws to secure a HD to the enclosure, a manual, and last but not least a simple plastic stand for vertical mounting of the enclosure.
Here is the ICY BOX unit with the top aluminum plate removed and the 4 corner thumb screws lying about. The design of the unit is very practical and actually quite simple. The four holes visible in the bottom plate are for the screws that secure an installed hard drive to the enclosure, allowing vertical positioning.
In this view, we can see the IO panel at the back of the Icy Box. On the left is the on/off switch, next to that is the input connector for the power supply, then the port for the USB 2.0, and the port for the eSATA connector on the far right...all very straight forward and with no surprises. ICY BOX: Detailed Features
Note the transparency of the side screens allowing the fanless unit to breathe. Also note, extruding from the interior upper edge of the units blue circuit board the SATA interface and SATA power connections. Lastly, in the foreground, is a good view of the superior solid metal thumb screws which secure the top aluminum plate to the enclosure.
Another excellent component, a Western Digital WD2500KS 250GB Caviar HD will grace the interior of the ICY BOX enclosure and serve as our external hard drive as we backup the test system's internal WD1500AHFD 150GB Raptor.
We simply set the WD2500KS in the enclosure and slid it back until it connected with the Icy Box's SATA interface connection and SATA power connector, both located on the interior edge of the enclosure's circuit board.
Here the top aluminum plate has been reattached via the 4 corner thumb screws after the insertion of the test hard drive. This is what the ICY BOX looks like in it's standard prone position. A very durable and stable enclosure in this position.
Flipped upside down, we install the 4 provided screws that secure the hard drive firmly to the enclosure, and we apply the provided rubber foot pads to the bottom recesses of the enclosures lower corner screws as well.
Here's our enclosure, hard drive installed and ready to perform. The entire operation took all of 4 minutes. All we need to do now is install the external eSATA to SATA L-bracket on the back of our system, connect the power adapter to our ICY BOX and we're ready to roll! Total set up time less than 10 minutes.
Testing & ResultsTesting MethodologyMost system enclosures and cases are designed to hold as many as six or eight hard drives for the purpose of setting up RAID arrays. I, personally, have found that aside from portability, the best use of a single external hard drive is either the complete or selective backup of the internal system hard drives. Therefore, since the external drive enclosure is truly a simple component, I chose a simple, real world test. Using Windows' OS Backup Utility and insuring both interfaces worked properly, I selectively backed up 42GBs first using the USB interface and then the eSATA interface. Windows' Backup Utility has a feature that confirms the successful transfer of data. Although using the Backup Utility increases the duration of the data transfer, the additional time is well worth it.
The Icy Box during testing, note the green power and red activity indicator lights. Test System
ResultsThe ICY BOX operated without flaw or incident during testing. Download of the 42GBs via the USB cable required a total of 58 minutes. Confirmation of the seamless data transfer was provided by the Windows' XP Backup Utility. eSATA accomplished the 42GB data transfer in a mere 21 minutes, and as expected, decreased the data transfer time of the USB 2.0 interface by 63.8%. Again, Windows' XP Backup Utility confirmed success of the data backup. Final ThoughtsThe ICY BOX performed flawlessly during testing and proved to me that from it's heavy aluminum plating, down to it's circuitry, it was manufactured with quality. I would have liked to have seen this design incorporate a fan and for the unit to power off/on in conjunction with the supported system, other than that, the ICY BOX met my expectations of what a fanless HD enclosure should be.
The overall presentation of the ICY BOX IB-351StUS-B was, in my opinion, the weakest aspect of RaidSonic's IB-351StUS-B enclosure. The packaging was colorful, modern, and well made, but I felt the manufacturer cut too many corners on actually informing the public what the specific features of the enclosure were, and at the same time the packaging was far too vague on exactly what was physically included with the product. I love manuals and accompanying software such as the driver CD, but again, not the same focus on quality as was the case with the actual external enclosure itself. The manual contained minimal information and was poorly printed (with type almost too small to read) and the driver CD was outdated and virtually worthless unless your OS was pre-Windows XP! The ICY BOX is attractively understated in it's appearance. The average youth certainly won't be "wowed" by it's appearance, but the more mature crowd is going to appreciate the refined and serious image ICY BOX portrays. As I stated earlier, the IB-351StUS-B would easily be at home in a business environment. It looks like you could hit it with a hammer and the hard drive within would survive. I like that. One of Icy Box's strongest suits was manufacturing quality. This isn't a disposable plastic component like so many other "accessory" items. This is a well made, solid metal external enclosure. During the review I described the top and bottom aluminum covers as metal plates because, that's what they are! Benchmark Reviews has seen system cases made of thinner and less durable material. I tried to bend the metal side mesh during my initial inspection, and it could be done, but not without some effort. During normal use any hard drive encompassed by ICY BOX would be well protected. On a side note, I did not care at all for the ill fitting plastic stand for use when the unit is in a vertical position. The stand was cheap, out of sync with the rest of the enclosure, and appeared because of it's awkward fit to be an after thought. The ICY BOX enclosure performed as advertised, no more no less. As an external home for a SATA hard drive the IB-351StUS-B did everything it was supposed to, was easy to assemble, and functioned simply and efficiently. The simple design and trouble free eSATA interface makes this external HD enclosure competitive with any other fanless offering on the market. When it came to judging the value of the ICY BOX, I was a little torn. The IB-351StUS-B is priced at $34.99 at Newegg.com which we all know is famous for it's competitive pricing. That price range is usually occupied by fan cooled external enclosures, so I really would have liked to have seen the ICY BOX a little more competitively priced or equipped with a fan. I'm also a big believer in warranties and companies standing behind their products, but sadly, the ICY BOX isn't covered by a warranty. ICY BOX is expensively priced, some quality was sacrificed pertaining to accessory items like the manual, driver CD and stand, and there is no warranty protection, but the overall product of the ICY BOX IB-351StUS-B external enclosure is a practical and well made product that does what it's supposed to do and is quite easily and quickly implemented. It is durable and stylish and well worth consumers taking a look at, especially if passive cooling and noise reduction are high on your system priority list. Pros:
+ Practical Design Cons:
- Price Ratings:
Final Score: 8.85 out of 10.Questions? Comments? Benchmark Reviews really wants your feedback. We invite you to leave your remarks in our Discussion Forum.
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