[ILUG] Re: Suggested USB(?) PATA external HDD drive enclosures/docking and Irish(? French? EU?) vendors?

[Brian Foster]

> I got a nice unit at Maplin here in Limerick.
>
> Basically just a USB cable with an adapter head which can go SATA/
> PATA/(2.5" and 3.5") [IDE] with power supply.
>
> Not the prettiest (just a bunch of cabels all seperable) - but does
> a proper job.  Great for testing drives without having to remove
> them from the enclosure.
>
> The official stock name is: 'USB 2.0 to SATA/IDE Combo Adapter'
>
> The name is misleading - it has the PATA connections as well.

 Thanks for the tip!  That looks like it will do the job.
 I've used BlackBox kit before and liked the build quality
 and doc; checking around, this unit is well-built and the
 manual seems Ok.  Hence, I've just ordered one.

 As an aside, this unit apparently uses the JMicron 20337
 chip, which has a bug that can cause data corruption on
 some reads.  HOWEVER, Linux v2.6.28 and later has a
 work-around for the problem (commit 3030ca4cf4abbdd2dd8,
 “USB: storage: Avoid I/O errors when issuing SCSI ioctls
 to JMicron USB/ATA bridge”).

cheers!
	-blf-

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