INTRODUCTION

   Whether you're a professional looking to expand your available storage space/pool or if you're just a consumer looking to put all your old hard disk drives to use there's but one easy way for that to happen and that's getting a multi-bay external enclosure. According to the type of user you are there are many external enclosures in the market to choose from some even with room for up to 8 drives (up to 40 if we also take into account rackmount models) and of course with various connectivity options not only including the most popular USB 3.0/3.1 Type-C but also eSATA and Thunderbolt. After having reviewed the quite unique looking Black Vortex Quad Bay HDD Enclosure (MB174U3S-4SB) by ICY DOCK today we decided to test the ICYCube Quad Bay 2.5" & 3.5" SATA External HDD Enclosure (MB561U3S-4S R1) which follows a more "established" design we've seen quite a few times in the past.

   ICY DOCK is a privately held company with more than 15 years of experience in design, manufacturing, branding and distribution of Storage enclosure peripherals. By constantly improving upon its own new product release strategy, ICY DOCK has formed a standard, yet efficient, new product development procedure to ensure timely product delivery to the market. At ICY DOCK, we constantly offer state-of-the-art hard disk enclosures and removable storage kits which feature removable drive & hot swap capabilities and eSATA / SATA connectivity. We also specialize in BTO (Built to Order) branded products, OEM-branded and non-branded products for our “Tier 1” customers. Headquartered in City of Industry, California, ICY DOCK became a global peripheral enclosure provider with utilizing their manufacturing facility located in Zhang-Zang, China since 1997. Adhering to strict ISO9001 manufacturing guidelines, ICY DOCK delivers high quality standard products at a competitive price which provides our customers with an excellent opportunity to be successful in the competitive US marketplace. As one of the leading peripheral enclosure solution providers, we will continue to commit ourselves to supplying our customers with the best performance per dollar products. “Your demand is our command” is the key to ensure our success in the business world.

   The ICYCube MB561U3S-4S R1 by ICY DOCK is a quad-bay external hard disk drive enclosure (made out of plastic and aluminum and available in white/silver and black colors) which fully supports both 2.5" (of all heights) and 3.5" SATA I/II/III drives and features both eSATA and USB 3.0 with UASP connectivity. It's also equipped with a detachable 80mm exhaust ball-bearing fan (allows for easier/faster cleaning), 3-speed fan controller (low/auto/high), 4 plastic/aluminum EZ-trays for quick swapping of the drives (unfortunately not based on a tool-less design) and white activity LEDs for each of them. Sure it may not look as unique as the Black Vortex and the 80mm fan will most likely fall short compared to the 120mm one of the first but performance is the thing people care most when out to get a multi-drive enclosure so it's time for us to check exactly that.