So, upon receiving this, I was thrilled at the capabilities it would provide me and my laptop. And for the price it was perfect.

Quality:
It's not made out of super cheap materials but not is it high quality either. It's somewhere in the middle. Unfortunately there are many little pieces to keep up with so you will need a bag or the box to keep track of it.

Performance:
It spun up my 3.5mm drives. I could easily erase or add files to them. But when I went to format my refurbished 2TB HD; it failed in the middle somewhere. I don't blame Vantec. The process was taking an extraordinarily long time (24 hrs) and it probably had a power surge or spike which jolted everything.

Am I glad I bought this, yes, it's ability to connect even IDE drives makes me drool.

Over the past month, I actually came to the point of ordering this Vantec CB-ISATAU2 SATA/IDE to USB 2.0 Adapter, then backed away, several times, before I went ahead and ordered this. Then I opened the package and found that the directions were very poor and the photos in the directions just as bad. However, once I got it working, it worked fantastically great. Much better than I thought it would before I bought it. I used this on three different hard drives that I was about to destroy and dispose of because I had no hope of getting them to work or retrieving important info from them. With this, each of the three old hard-drives opened easily, and I was able to save important irreplaceable info. In fact this Vantec CB-ISATAU2 SATA/IDE to USB 2.0 Adapter I would have easily given it a 5 for the performance of it's job! But the poor directions and photos in the directions were totally inexcusable.

This thing is great. You can basically connect every hard drive there is and access it without being throttled by a slow USB 2.0 connection. Fast IDE/PATA drives doing 60MB/s as well as SATA drives doing 150MB/s will work just fine at those speeds with it. All the drives I've tested were just as fast through USB 3.0 as they are connected internally to the PC.

The power adapter is necessary for 2.5" and 3.5" SATA drives, and 3.5" IDE/PATA drives. 2.5" IDE/PATA drives will be powered through the USB port. The pictures attached show every configuration possible.

The only negative point I have is that when you do safe remove in Windows, the hard drive still continues to spin. Some adapter chips spin down the hard drive when ejected, this one does not. Also the LEDs are on the bottom side in most configurations.

The power adapter that came with my drive puts out power that is well within specifications: 12V line has 12.25V, the 5V has 5.04V, measured with no hard drive connected.

I bought mine when Fry's had it on sale for 14.99$.

Picture 1: 2.5" IDE/PATA
Picture 2: 3.5" IDE/PATA
Picture 3: 2.5" SATA
Picture 4: 3.5" SATA

After having had a horrible experience with one of the cheaper versions of this type of gizmo, I was hesitant about purchasing another. Fortunately, this produce had better reviews, but cost about $8 more than the previous one. I must say, the price difference was definitely worth it.

I was in the process of scrapping an old computer that had a couple of 3.5" IDE drives in it (120 gb and 40 gb). I knew there were some old photos and whatnot on them, but wanted to make sure I could transfer everything possible. With the Vantec IDE to USB Adapter...everything was a breeze.

Connection was easy with instructions for EXTERNAL DRIVE use (see pg. 7 of manual). Immediately upon connection, the drive showed up in my COMPUTER list, clicked on it, and everything I needed was there. Simple drag-and-drop of the items I wanted into a created folder on my new computer made the process seamless and easy. Transfer rate was far faster than I would have expected, and without a single glitch/hitch.
Followed the same process for a couple of other drives. All went as planned and without issue.

What's also nice is the ability to use the same system to format and wipe the drive (if desired). Since I plan on selling the used drives, I wanted to make sure they were cleaned thoroughly. Drive-wipe software recognized the drive(s), and wiped drive clean. Once again, simply flawless.

I would definitely recommend this unit to anyone attempting to access an old IDE or SATA drive (3.5" or 2.5") in order to recover old files (documents, photos, etc.). Setup and connection is a breeze!

This should be a staple item owned by everyone with a laptop computer.

This allows you to keep old hard drives that you're replacing, format them, and use them as backup drives, saving you the cost of getting a traditional back up drive with an enclosure.

It works perfectly with my Apple Mac computers!

The only thing I don't like is that the bottom opening of the case is hinged with a small membrane of plastic and it remains to be seen if the plastic will become brittle, break, and allow the bottom cap to fall off. Time will tell... It of course depends on how often one is replacing drives in the enclosure.