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Ultra Stackables: Your Every External Solution
The Hardware - Details
Stackable 180W Power Center
Starting with the power supply, which generally will be the base of your little tower of external goodness. The Power Center provides enough power and enough slots to power any practical combination of the Stackable series and allows more freedom of your power strip or wall outlets. The unit comes with all the power cords (in three different lengths) that you will need to connect it to all of the other peripherals in the set. It also comes with foot brackets to keep it strong and stable on the bottom of your tower. Sporting a brushed steal exterior, the power supply promises strength and good looks. Along with its short circuit protection, over voltage protection, and over power protection, it also promises security to all your external drives or usb devices or memory card sticks.
On the front, 6 blue Power LEDs let you know you have something plugged in and getting power. Handy when trying to trouble shoot why your hard drive isn't turning on, as this reviewer found out during testing. With a front grill to allow air flow and a back on/off switch, and even the switch to flip from from USA (115V) to European (230V) power standards, the Power Center remains smart and functional.
Stackable 3.5in External Drive Enclosure (USB/Firewire & USB/eSATA)
Next comes the hard drive enclosures. Both the USB/Firewire option and the USB/eSATA option house 3.5 inch hard drives, all the cables to house said hard drive, and give it power if you chose to bypass the power supply previously mentioned. Also included are USB cables, FireWire cables, and even eSATA cables. What surprised this reviewer most was the included internal to external SATA converter for your PC. Simply taking up an expansion slot in the back of your computer, you can extend the SATA port from your motherboard right to the back of your PC, effectively giving you an eSATA port for which to use the speedy 3000Mbps data transfer.
NOTE: Your motherboard must include support for eSATA or you need an expansion card that supports esata to take advantage of this ability.
Unlike the power supply, the rest of the stackable enclosures are made of plastic with a soft rubber coating. Sporting large, easy to see HDD indicator and power LEDs (red and blue respectively), along with front vents for air flow,and powered by a 30mm blowing out the back of the device. With its own on/off switch on the back, along with the USB 2.0 port, either one SATA or two FireWire ports, and the power port. Mounting options include either the provided plastic feet for vertical, non-stacking use, or small rubber feet to provide stable horizontal stacking options.
Stackable All-In-1 Card Reader/USB 2.0 Hub
After the hard drives come the lightest addition to the Stackable family. On one side you will find 4 card reader ports, each with its own blue LED indicator. I will not go into detail again on exactly what formats are supported, as there is a table on the previous page, but the slots are made for SD/MMC, SM, CF/MD, and MS card types. On the other side of the brick is 6 USB 2.0 ports. Also the USB device port to plug into your computer. And of course, the power port to power all of your goodies. This also means that the 6 USB ports are powered which can really come in handy for those USB devices that require more juice than a standard USB port can deliver.
Just like the Hard Drive enclosures, the Card reader/usb hub is enclosed in that same plastic with rubber coating that is very nice to touch and grip other items to ensure stable stacking. Again it comes with the plastic feet for vertical stacking and the rubber boots for gripping the product below it in the tower.
You do have the option of purchasing a 7 port USB hub, where the ports are on the front if you do not like to reach behind the card reader for your USB ports, but it seems impractical to purchase the 5th piece in this family when you have 6 perfectly usable ports on a different product. The option is there
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