My primary forms of data backup and transfer consist of either a flash drive or extra hard drives and SSD’s I have on hand. When it comes to my short term data storage and transfers, I often use external SATA drive enclosures when there are large amounts of data involved, and flash drives or SD cards when the data is smaller or not intended as a long-term backup.
Over the years, I have used a lot of different external drive enclosures, docking stations, and adapters. Eventually, I decided I wanted to add a bit of "retro flare" to the mix by buying enclosures that fit that theme, and these are two of my favorites!
The first is sold on Amazon by a company called “Orico”, who are known for their USB storage and charging products, among other things. I have used other products of theirs in the past with generally good results, and never had any issues with malware/spyware like you run into with some devices coming from China. So, when I ran across their USB 3.0 to SATA 2.5” cassette themed drive enclosure, I decided to pick one up.
As you can see from the photos, the clear plastic enclosure is modeled after classic audio cassette tapes and features your standard USB to SATA adapter. It’s a tool-less design where you slide the case open and apart by pushing the two halves in opposite directions. While I prefer enclosures that use screws due to the fact many tool-less designs break much more easily than just using a few screws, I have swapped out 3 different drives and the latching is still as solid as the day I bought it.
The listing boasts support for up to
4TB drives, UASP (USB Attracted SCSI Protocol) and speeds “up to
5Gbps”, but that’s nowhere near reality. 5Gbps is simply the max
supported speed of the USB 3.0 standard. I am using this enclosure to host a Toshiba 1TB MQ01ABD SATA hard drive for semi-long term storage of commonly used files.
When you're writing large folders of varying file sizes, speeds can top 130MB/s. Not bad at all. Writing a single 64GB RetroPie image being pulled from my NVMe drive results in a solid 97MB/s sustained write speed.
FYI: This enclosure shows up as "NS1068". A semi-common USB-SATA Bridge Controller from a company called Norel Systems in Tianjin China. As of this article, the site does not want to load properly for me in FireFox, so I just linked the Google search.
So now my 1TB "cassette drive" stores most of my classic console and arcade
files, and backup RetroPie images. Something I update once or twice a
year. This really is a neat little retro
drive enclosure for the price. It does exactly what it’s supposed
to do, looks cool doing it, and seems to be made well enough to last.
For my more immediate storage and transfer needs, I decided to take it back to the 80’s one more time and invest in an awesome little NES cartridge themed drive enclosure from one of my favorite retro companies, RetroFlag! This one is designed to look like an NES cartridge in its sleeve and boasts the same basic specs and any other external enclosures, USB 3.0, UASP, etc. This was intended for use with the RetroFlag NESPi 4 Case, an NES inspired Raspberry Pi 4 case that has a working cartridge slot that allows you to insert and remove 2.5” drives via this enclosure.
Thankfully, RetroFlag also decided to sell the cartridge enclosures separately, where it fits into the included cartridge sleeve that acts as the drives dock and contains the USB to SATA adapter. The end result is this wicked little enclosure that fits perfectly in any retro enthusiast’s collection. It comes in two cosmetic variants, the “Zelda” gold style that I bought, and the standard “NES” grey. Both are identical in functionality.
This enclosure has a Kingston 120GB A400 SATA SSD and actually writes a bit slower than the Toshiba HDD does in the Orico cassette enclosure, about 90MB/s for a 64GB RetroPie image file, also being pulled from an NVMe drive. However, writing large folders of varying file sizes can top 300MB/s, go figure. There is a limiting factor here, most likely the SSD's lack of built-in DRAM. Still, plenty fast for my needs.
FYI: This enclosure shows up as "AS Media Storage Device". AS Media is a well known Asus owned semi-conductor company based in New Taipei Taiwan.
The cartridge is held together using two screws, as well as two tabs at the top of the cart similar to actual NES games. With the screws removed, you have to depress the tabs to open the enclosure. I suggest either a small flat-head screwdriver or a plastic pry tool that will fit if you have one on hand, taking care to not scratch the plastic. Again, I wish they had just went with screws instead of a hybrid “tool-less” and screw design. If you plan on doing a lot of drive swaps, the tabs on the top of the cartridge are eventually going to show signs of ware or break, so I suggest keeping the drive swaps to a minimum. Also, there are snaps on the middle right and left inside of the cartridge, so it actually holds together just fine without the two screws if you want to use it 100% tool-less.
This is by far the favorite drive enclosure I have ever owned! My next step will be to print up a nice Legend of Zelda label to replace the generic one it comes with! If you’re a retro gaming enthusiast like me, then this RetroFlag NES Drive Enclosure would make a great addition to your toolbox. It’s well built, performs as it’s intended, and looks absolutely fantastic! It makes a great addition to RetroFlag’s collection of classic console themed products.
Updated for test results: 8/10/2022
No comments:
Post a Comment