Hard drive enclosures are now beginning to adopt the USB 3.0 interface which is supposed to blow USB 2.0 and any other interface out of the water. Today we are testing the Sunbeam Tech Airbox USB 3.0 Enclosure to see how much faster it really is.

The Airbox can handle 3.5" or 2.5" (won't be secure) drives. We will test it with our Samsung HD501IJ 500GB SATA 3.0GBps hard drive. Unlike other compact enclosure this one has a cooling fan with LED, so it cools while looking cool at the same time. It can support drives up to 2TB (terabytes) so you have a lot of room to expand. Let's see how fast it really is.

DESIGN, CONTROLS AND PACKAGING

The Airbox is packaged in a very easy on the eyes box. Lots of pictures on the front of some of the major features like USB 3.0, 5GBps, Windows 7 compatibility and more. The back lists some more features such as the fact that it supports Windows 2000 SP4, Linux 2.4.1.0 and Mac OS 8.6 (or anything later than these). The back also has some test results and other minor features like LED and up to 2TB support. One of the sides lists the package contents and the other lists the specifications. Inside the box you will find the Airbox itself, a mounting stand, a USB 3.0 cable, an AC power adapter, accessory pack (screw driver and screws) and of course the user manual. The other two sides have the Sunbeam Tech logo and the product name.

The overall exterior of the Airbox is clean looking and solid. While I don't really care how it looks as long as it does what it says, but doesn't hurt to look good while you are at it. The front of the enclosure has a vertical blue LED that indicates the status. Steady light means power is on and drive is idle. Flashing light the drive is currently being accessed. The left side has the cooling fan grill and the right side is just plain. The back has the power button, DC in, USB 3.0 port and the FAN LED on/off switch. One thing I noticed is that your fingerprints tend to easily stick on the outside.

There are two small screws on the back that you will need to remove to slide the drive tray out. The tray has the PCB on the back where the hard drive will connect to the SATA II connector. You can also see the 80mm fan on the other end. The fan is plugged in to the PCB on the front.

(click image to enlarge)

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