Yeah, good luck inserting an m.2 drive, with a thermal pad on it, into these tubular enclosures, while also maintaining good contact with the outer case.
For the intended use-case (data backup / restore and dealing with multiple systems on a one-off basis), that is a minor price to pay for the advantage of not having to deal with different cables. I just looked up the FIDECO user reviews on Amazon, and it looks like there are plenty of computer technicians appreciating this aspect.
The Sabrent EC-SNVE also uses the Realtek RTL9210B for NVMe and SATA compatibility, but with a Type-C female port (single Type-C to Type-C cable provided). It features a sandwich design, which should provide a good contact between the thermal pad and aluminum casing and prevent throttling (haven't yet tested mine to verify the result). It is also tool free for quick installation or drive swap.
Is my impression of Akasa out-of-date or do they still make products end up in the trash shortly after purchase? Interesting to see them feature on anandtech again so soon.
The Turing fanless case we reviewed last year is still doing great in deployment, and I don't think we have reviewed any Akasa gear after that. The storage bridges we reviewed in this article came in early last year, and the multi-protocol unit has been 'abused' greatly across multiple systems - has been working great for the last couple of months. The other two bridges were subject to only our evaluation process with a single host port, and that in itself is quite rigorous (multiple portable SSDs / storage bridges have experiences dropouts under heavy traffic, but no such issues with the Akasa bridges).
Thankfully I’ve successfully avoided buying any SATA m.2 drives. There must be people out there who were forced by circumstances into buying them, but I haven’t met any. Are there AnandTech readers out there who had to buy them?
Does any of these work with the Plextor m6e AHCI PCIe m.2 SSD? It's one of the weirdest SSDs out there, which came out before NVMe became popular. And for the life of me, I can't find an enclosure that will work with it. SATA m.2 enclosures don't seem to be compatible.
I think you want an AHCI adaptor. It’s a little dongle about an inch wide that goes between the SSD and the m.2 socket. I’m not sure if we’re talking about the same thing here, but Apple used a weird type of SSD for several years 2013-2015ish. So there’s a bit of a market for adaptors to retrofit the Mac laptops so that they can use modern NVMe drives. I have 2 of these adaptors in my Mac laptops.
The problem is the adaptors that are available are intended to let a modern nvme ssd fit into Apple’s weird socket (it was designed before the nvme standard was nailed down). What you’re after is an adaptor to let your weird drive fit into a modern socket. Good luck searching. I haven’t had much luck finding adaptors to let me re-use my surplus Apple OEM m.2(ish) drives as a portable ssd.
(Don’t want to sell my Apple OEM drives as some OS bootrom upgrades prefer the original drive in place.). TBH at this point in time I regard any non-NVMe ssd as a lost cause and effectively worthless, at least in the smaller sizes.
The adaptor was a good idea, but it turns out that it's only for macbooks, which use a 12+16 pin notch. So when I put the Plextor SSD on one side, the other side of the adaptor will not go into a standard m.2 slot which has a notch after 5 pins.
There's a USB3.0 enclosure on ebay that claims it's AHCI NGFF compatible. But it costs $70!! Not sure if it's worth the risk to find out of it works with the Plextor....
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meacupla - Wednesday, September 22, 2021 - link
Yeah, good luck inserting an m.2 drive, with a thermal pad on it, into these tubular enclosures, while also maintaining good contact with the outer case.The_Assimilator - Saturday, September 25, 2021 - link
Almost like using high-end drives with these enclosures isn't the intended use-case (hint: it's not).dicobalt - Sunday, October 3, 2021 - link
Sabrent makes an enclosure with a removeable body that serves as a heatsink with fins. It also uses the Realtek controller.timbotim - Wednesday, September 22, 2021 - link
It's not too difficult, it just needs a bit of care and patience. Some enclosures work better than others in my experience.Oxford Guy - Wednesday, September 22, 2021 - link
It sounds like a basic design failure.Press down makes a lot more sense than slide, unless breaking the pad into chunks is supposed to improve its performance.
ballsystemlord - Wednesday, September 22, 2021 - link
The use of male ports will make it hard or impossible to use on the back of motherboards due to the cases size.ganeshts - Wednesday, September 22, 2021 - link
For the intended use-case (data backup / restore and dealing with multiple systems on a one-off basis), that is a minor price to pay for the advantage of not having to deal with different cables. I just looked up the FIDECO user reviews on Amazon, and it looks like there are plenty of computer technicians appreciating this aspect.Foufi - Thursday, September 23, 2021 - link
The Sabrent EC-SNVE also uses the Realtek RTL9210B for NVMe and SATA compatibility, but with a Type-C female port (single Type-C to Type-C cable provided). It features a sandwich design, which should provide a good contact between the thermal pad and aluminum casing and prevent throttling (haven't yet tested mine to verify the result). It is also tool free for quick installation or drive swap.The_Assimilator - Saturday, September 25, 2021 - link
So buy a female to C male USB extension cable - they're cheap as chips.BushLin - Wednesday, September 22, 2021 - link
Is my impression of Akasa out-of-date or do they still make products end up in the trash shortly after purchase?Interesting to see them feature on anandtech again so soon.
ganeshts - Wednesday, September 22, 2021 - link
The Turing fanless case we reviewed last year is still doing great in deployment, and I don't think we have reviewed any Akasa gear after that. The storage bridges we reviewed in this article came in early last year, and the multi-protocol unit has been 'abused' greatly across multiple systems - has been working great for the last couple of months. The other two bridges were subject to only our evaluation process with a single host port, and that in itself is quite rigorous (multiple portable SSDs / storage bridges have experiences dropouts under heavy traffic, but no such issues with the Akasa bridges).Tomatotech - Thursday, September 23, 2021 - link
Thankfully I’ve successfully avoided buying any SATA m.2 drives. There must be people out there who were forced by circumstances into buying them, but I haven’t met any. Are there AnandTech readers out there who had to buy them?anad0commenter - Friday, September 24, 2021 - link
Does any of these work with the Plextor m6e AHCI PCIe m.2 SSD? It's one of the weirdest SSDs out there, which came out before NVMe became popular. And for the life of me, I can't find an enclosure that will work with it. SATA m.2 enclosures don't seem to be compatible.Tomatotech - Sunday, September 26, 2021 - link
I think you want an AHCI adaptor. It’s a little dongle about an inch wide that goes between the SSD and the m.2 socket. I’m not sure if we’re talking about the same thing here, but Apple used a weird type of SSD for several years 2013-2015ish. So there’s a bit of a market for adaptors to retrofit the Mac laptops so that they can use modern NVMe drives. I have 2 of these adaptors in my Mac laptops.The problem is the adaptors that are available are intended to let a modern nvme ssd fit into Apple’s weird socket (it was designed before the nvme standard was nailed down). What you’re after is an adaptor to let your weird drive fit into a modern socket. Good luck searching. I haven’t had much luck finding adaptors to let me re-use my surplus Apple OEM m.2(ish) drives as a portable ssd.
(Don’t want to sell my Apple OEM drives as some OS bootrom upgrades prefer the original drive in place.). TBH at this point in time I regard any non-NVMe ssd as a lost cause and effectively worthless, at least in the smaller sizes.
anad0commenter - Tuesday, September 28, 2021 - link
The adaptor was a good idea, but it turns out that it's only for macbooks, which use a 12+16 pin notch. So when I put the Plextor SSD on one side, the other side of the adaptor will not go into a standard m.2 slot which has a notch after 5 pins.There's a USB3.0 enclosure on ebay that claims it's AHCI NGFF compatible. But it costs $70!! Not sure if it's worth the risk to find out of it works with the Plextor....