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Akasa Integral 2.5in External HDD Enclosure |
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Written by Mikhail Ivanenkov
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Saturday, 16 June 2007 |
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Page 1 of 3
Thanks to Akasa for the product sample.
With the advent of the USB2.0 spec, removable storage became a reality. All sizes and capacities of hard drives can now be used for backup and file storage. Flash drives are a great temporary solution and are a lot more portable than any hard drive (save the MicroDrive et al), but their capacity is still limited. Currently there are a few 4GB USB drives, but they cost hundreds. Furthermore, flash storage is not nearly as reliable as magnetic and is a lot more susceptible to corruption and static.
While the most typical route is one featuring a standard desktop 3.5" drive and a corresponding enclosure, smaller mobility-friendly 2.5" notebook drives are getting cheaper and cheaper. Akasa's Integral USB2.0 casing is one of the few available options. It ships in the retail package shown about and can be had in black anodized and standard aluminum (though the latter isn't listed on their website) and sports features not found in most other enclosures, namely power/activity LED strips and a lit USB cable.
The package contains the enclosure, a leathery velco carrying pouch with cloth interior, an installation guide in several languages, a driver CD (only necessary if using an operating system that doesn't natively support USB devices), a clear/silver braided USB data cable, and a USB power cord. It's a shame the enclosure can't be powered off the single USB data cable (the drive will attempt to spin up but it just doesn't get enough juice to do so) and therefore both cables are necessary. Fortunately the power cord is also a USB cable and not an AC plug (as is the case with most 3.5" enclosures). Make sure you have at least 2 empty USB ports before investing; this can be a minor annoyance for laptop users with limited ports who may be forced to swap out devices (like a mouse) just to access the drive.
The case itself is very sleek. The body is black anodized aluminum while the sides are acrylic. Akasa claims that you can install a drive in this enclosure without any screws. Well, you can, but it won't be very stable. To get inside, you need to remove the pair of screws in the front. Then depress the button on top of the front panel and remove it. Once that's out, the rear of the case slides outward to reveal the PCB and installation rack. If you look closely, you'll notice a pair of LEDs on opposite sides of the rear panel; these are used to display power and activity status.
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Last Updated ( Saturday, 16 June 2007 )
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