External hard drive docks are the perfect addition to the seasonal computer tech. Many people like me have several hard drives floating around, and every time one has to get data from a crashed computer (PC or laptop) it either has to install it inside their own computer (sometimes a hassle) or use an external hard drive enclosure.
With a hard drive docking station (like the Thermaltake BlacX) those problems are part of the past, you can now hook up a 2.5″ or 3.5″ hard drive with out having to open your computer case and without turning your computer off!!!
The Thermaltake BlacX docking station offers a slot that is compatible with internal SATA drives that are 2.5″ or 3.5″ it either uses USB 2.0 or eSATA connectivity (eSATA being the fastest).
Docking Station Uses:
To recover files from crashed computers
Use it for back-ups
Use it to boot into different operating systems
Or simply as extra storage
Thermaltake BlacX Specs:
Supports All 2.5″ and 3.5″ SATA Hard Disk Drives, up to 1.5TB
Hot-Swap Capability for Rapid Multi HDDs Access and Exchange
Supports eSATA Transfer Speed up to 3Gbps
Supports USB 2.0 Transfer Speed up to 480Mbps
Compact Docking Station Design Maximizes Heat Dissipation & Exhaust
Without any doubts, this option is a lot better than using an external enclosure.
I also found this interesting hard drive docking station from StarTech that has not 1 slot, but 2. Yes, you can have 2 hard drives connected at the same time! It seems to be the ideal solution for disk imaging or data recovery. It's a bit more expensive than the Thermaltake one but it may be a better buy for some of us.