2x2.5" Drive caddy options

[thecounthahaha]

Hi,

I've been searching for a bus powered 2.5" caddy, but with 2 bays, not 1.

My current laptop is an old unibody macbook pro which I have removed the optical drive for a second SSD. I then also plug in a bus powered travel drive for work as and when I need it which I can use whilst on the road.

My predicament is that the new retina laptops don't have an optical drive to replace... That and they only have 2 usb3 ports meaning that if I was to plug in both of these drives as separate usb3 drives I wouldn't have anywhere to plug in other usb devices (iLok, etc). There also don't seem to be any bus powered thunderbolt caddies, where as I can get SATA3 usb ones for £15...

As I'm needing about 2tb of eternal storage, I'm not even able to just buy a bigger SSD. If there were 3 usb ports, with 2 next to each other I wouldn't worry as I'd just plug 2 usb3 drives in, with the third for everything else. :-/

Are there any thunderbolt/usb3 2x2.5" drive caddies which might be what I'm after? (I guess 3x or 4x might also be good, but I expect power might be an issue alongside size and portability) Or perhaps I've missed something that might be a solution?

Thanks!

 

[smellalot]

Western Digital My Passport Pro 4TB

Seagate Backup Plus Fast 4TB -> I'm not sure this can run from a single USB port since it comes with a USB 3.0 Y-cable.

 

[thecounthahaha]

Western Digital My Passport Pro 4TB

Seagate Backup Plus Fast 4TB -> I'm not sure this can run from a single USB port since it comes with a USB 3.0 Y-cable.

Nice, thanks!

The WD 4tb looks promising. My hesitations are the combination of the inbuilt thunderbolt cable and the drives not being user replaceable. If it were just the drives, then replacing them myself would be fine. But if the cable breaks then I'd doubt WD would honour their warranty if I've opened it up.

The seagate looks good, as it appears to be user replaceable but requires a second usb for power which is a bummer. Might as well use 2 separate drives, especially with the usb ports being either side of the mac...

Are there any user replaceable thunderbolt bus powered caddies with 2 thunderbolt for passthrough that you know of?

Thanks again.

 

[Fishrrman]

Are you looking for something like this?
http://plugable.com/products/pss-dd1

This will handle 2 2.5" "bare drives".
(note: illustration shows drives with "slip-on covers" added, but bare drives will work fine).

There are numerous other "dual docks" out there, including those that can support both 2.5" and 3.5" drives.
Check somewhere like amazon...

 

[ColdCase]

There are numerous other "dual docks" out there, including those that can support both 2.5" and 3.5" drives.
Check somewhere like amazon...

Don't see any bus powered docks, but I could be missing something. AC powered has a wide variety, including portable type enclosures; the TB akio 4bay even has a nice carrying handle.

I suppose if you find an enclosure or dock that can use both AC and Bus power, the low power of SSDs may allow the pair to be powered by the bus.

 

[thecounthahaha]

Are you looking for something like this?
http://plugable.com/products/pss-dd1

This will handle 2 2.5" "bare drives".
(note: illustration shows drives with "slip-on covers" added, but bare drives will work fine).

There are numerous other "dual docks" out there, including those that can support both 2.5" and 3.5" drives.
Check somewhere like amazon...

Not really, but kind of. I want to be able to have 2 SSDs (that I own already) plugged into a retina MBP without using up both the usb ports - and ideally without having to plug it in to power it too. If I wishlist on top of that it wouldn't be extortionate to buy and would be quite small and light.

I currently use this for my external SSD:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Optimized-I...ompatible/dp/B00FCLG65U/ref=pd_cp_computers_3

Which is plenty fast enough and under £20.

I guess I could always use this one and then a thunderbolt one too, but I was hopeful that there was another way?

 

[smellalot]

thunderbolt bus powered caddies with 2 thunderbolt for passthrough that you know of?

I don't think so. Found another RAID drive though:
https://www.lacie.com/de/products/product.htm?id=10646

Maybe disassembly is as 'easy' as described in this thread (post no 3):
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1507720/

 

[Fishrrman]

ColdCase wrote:
[[ Don't see any bus powered docks, ]]

That's because there won't be any.

I don't believe a single USB port -- or even two -- could provide enough "power through the bus" to spin up and operate two drives mounted in one dock, and provide enough extra power for the dock's circuitry, as well.

OP:
You're not going to find a dual dock that runs on bus power.
ALL of them will come with a power block that must plug into AC power.

There simply isn't enough power otherwise....

 

[ColdCase]

The USB3 bus probably could power two SSDs and hub, but I don't think there is anything like that.

So the McGiver solution would probably be to duct tape two SSD USB3 enclosures to a bus powered USB3 hub and see how it goes

 

[matreya]

The only Thunderbolt 2.5" caddies available are essentially ALL fitted with slow hard drives, and you need to pull the hard drive out and drop in an SSD...

e.g. http://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/MOTGTBH5T1.0/

I bought two of those along with 2 USB3 enclosures from OWC and swapped in SSDs myself and re-used the 1TB hard drives in the USB3 enclosures.

It's not a cheap solution, nothing about Thunderbolt is cheap.

 

[thecounthahaha]

The USB3 bus probably could power two SSDs and hub, but I don't think there is anything like that.

So the McGiver solution would probably be to duct tape two SSD USB3 enclosures to a bus powered USB3 hub and see how it goes

I think that'll be where I'm heading unfortunately...!

My only other thought was something like the Drobo mini, but it's not *that* mini... but at least it has space for 4 drives rather than 2, but again it requires power and proprietary software.

Thanks guys!