Review: OWC Slim ExpressCard to eSATA Adapter

Product Reviewed: Slim ExpressCard/34 to eSATA Adapter
Retail price: $34
Vendor: Other World Computing
Warranty: 1 year OWC warranty

Why SATA?

While USB2 and Firewire-based external drives have been popular in the consumer space, professionals have long embraced SATA-based storage solutions because of their higher performance (up to 3Gbps).

Because of its popularity, many drive manufacturers now include eSATA (which stands for external Serial Advanced Technology Attachment) ports on their external drive enclosures.

So how do you take advantage of these external SATA-based storage solutions if you’re on a laptop?

Enter the Slim

If you happen to have a laptop with an ExpressCard/34 slot, you’re in luck. The OWC Slim ExpressCard to eSATA adapter (referred henceforth as OWC Slim for brevity) lets you add an eSATA port to your ExpressCard/34 equipped laptop.

Unlike other eSATA adapter solutions, the OWC Slim sits perfectly flush with your laptop.

What comes in the package?

Included in the package is one ExpressCard Adapter and a disc which contains drivers for both Windows and Linux. (Mac drivers are not necessary, as the OS recognizes the card automatically.) The package also includes a 4 page instruction manual, with a brief Mac install guide and driver installation instructions for Windows and Linux. I did not investigate the contents of the included disc.

For the purposes of this review, I tested the OWC Slim on an early 2008 model Macbook Pro running Snow Leopard (10.6.3), with 4GB of RAM.

I’ve been using the OWC Slim for approximately two weeks, in conjunction an OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro mini 500GB drive (review to follow).

Installation

The hardest part about installing the OWC Slim was opening the plastic package. The actual installation of the card was a breeze. The device is hot-swappable, meaning you can insert it into your computer after it’s powered on. Being somewhat “old school”, I powered down my Macbook Pro for my initial install.

Simply slide the OWC Slim into the ExpressCard slot, until you hear a click and voila – the card’s in place. Removing the OWC Slim was just as easy. Gently push the card inward and it will pop out.

The card lays flush against the Macbook Pro case.

Upon booting the Mac, I noticed that a new menulet was on my Menubar. The menulet lets you safely power down the OWC Slim before ejecting it.

Plugging a SATA cable into the unit required just a tiny bit more force than plugging in a typical USB or Firewire cable. Fortunately, the OWC SATA cable (not included with the card) was labeled to make orientation a breeze.

Removing the cable was a bit more challenging. I found myself unwittingly ejecting the card when trying to remove the cable. The solution to prevent that from happening was to prop one of my fingers to hold the card in place while using my other hand to remove the cable. Not a biggie, by any means, but something to be aware of when you’re using it.

Benchmarks

Why go for an eSATA adapter solution in the first place? Because it’s faster. For this test, I connected my Macbook Pro to an OWC Mercury Elite AL-Pro 500GB 7200 RPM drive via the OWC Slim.

Now compare the results taken from using the same drive with the Macbook Pro’s Firewire 800 interface:

In every test, the OWC Slim is faster by a significant margin. Looking at the extended test averages for both drives, we see that the OWC Slim has an average read speed of 107.9 MB/Sec, while the FW800 interface averages 81.6 MB/Sec. For writes, the OWC Slim can manage 105.9 MB/Sec while the FW800 interface averages 59.6 MB/Sec.

Translation: The OWC Slim is almost 1.4 times as fast for reading data and almost 1.8 times as fast for writing data. That’s a significant speed increase, especially for anyone who works with reading and writing large data files.

Conclusion

The OWC Slim ExpressCard to eSATA adapter works as advertised. If you’re looking to add a performance SATA based storage solution to your laptop and need an eSATA adapter, for $34, the OWC slim can’t be beat.

The card receives 4.5/5 Bob Weiners:

Krishna June 8, 2010 eSATA adapter, OWC, SATA, storage solution