StarTech.com SATA to USB Cable - USB 3.0 to 2.5” SATA III Hard Drive Adapter - External Converter for SSD/HDD Data Transfer (USB3S2SAT3CB)

The factory original HDD on my Dell Inspiron 5559 laptop (circa 2017) was limping along with 3+ minute boot times and occasional error messages. The machine itself is fine (previously upgraded RAM from 8 to 16mb) so rather than drop a bunch of coin on a new machine, decided to try the upgrade route. Watched a thousand YouTube videos to get ready.Got a 960gb Kingston A400 SDD. Needed a way to connect it to the laptop to clone from the failing HDD. This StarTech cable did the job in a no nonsense, budget friendly way. Used the USB3.0 to 2.5 SATA cable (data + power). Both ends made solid, trouble free connections. The cable and connector moldings seem well made with no obvious flaws or defects.Used a free trial version of Macrium Reflect X software to perform the clone. Everything – including this cable – worked flawlessly.For less than $60 total (the SDD + this cable) was able to give my laptop a new lease on life. Saved hundreds over taking it to a shop or purchasing a new laptop. Will hold on to this cable for the next time.

As the headline suggests, the cable is fine, check elsewhere if you run into an issue. And please, folks, this connects to a single USB port. USB power is limited to 500mA (USB 2.0) and 900mA (USB 3.0). You can't power a 3.5" HDD or an older 2.5" HDD with this cable, it's not the cable it is your computer's USB port.I've purchased several Startech products over the past several years. I like the quality and no-nonsense presentation. This cable has the added benefit over an older USB-SATA cable setup I had, in that it has 2 little led's to indicate data access (like on your computer).I bought this cable at the same time I purchased a new Samsung 500Gb 860 EVO SSD. I've done the laptop HDD to SSD clone process 6+ times. In the past, I've used a different USB-SATA cable and Samsung SSD's without a hitch. I like the the Samsung's because they're good and the cloning software is rock solid and a no brainer.When I hooked things up and used the latest version of Samsung's software, I had an issue with the software not recognizing the new SSD. Hmm, bad cable? bad SSD? I tried a different older SSD I had pulled from an earlier laptop upgrade and I could see it no problem in Win 10 explorer. Still nothing with the new SSD.So in one of the reviews of this product I saw the Startech tech support phone line. Lo and behold it (the number) worked and I was talking to an actual human tech support person in less than 3 minutes. Folks this is an $11 cable, I am impressed with this level of tech support. The tech person suggested I try to format it with drive manager in windows, which I did, while he was on the phone no less, and yes, I could format it and I could then see it in file manager and read/write files to the new SSD, so it is really, really unlikely to be the cable or a dud SSD, that leaves the Samsung software.This one phone call was really helpful and saved me from sending back the cable and the SSD as it would have been difficult to tell which was the culprit (neither in this case). I then did the old Google search and found the Samsung Magician software has a reputation for not seeing some of the newer versions of their SSDs. Further reading suggested that their Data Migration tool (which you use for cloning) didn't have the problem. After downloading the Data Migration software, I was able to see the new Samsung SSD and do the cloning. I really can't stress how big a time saver the support I got from Startech was. It wasn't their knowledge of Samsung's issues, but at least how to get to that point where I could establish it wasn't the SSD or cable that was the issue. Kudos to Startech and their tech support!One issue that was mentioned in the various support posts on the Samsung site (but I suspect is relevant to other newer SSDs), is you may want to check your bios setting for the HDD controller (SATA), mine was set to RAID, but the preferred is AHCI. I can't say whether this was part of the issue or not, but something to keep in mind.Hardware/softwareDell Precision M4500 (circa 2011) i7 chipsetWin 7 PRO, 64 bit-> cloning to Samsung 500 Gb 860 EVO SSDusing Samsung Data Migration software (not Samsung Magician)

I had 2 other cheap adapters and they kept giving me bad block errors and timeouts on my SSD's. I thought my drives were going bad and would have to replace them, but after trying this adapter, all the errors and timeouts went away and they worked flawlessly. I don't like the dim amber activity light on this model, but I would rather know my data is safe than have a brighter light.

My parents experienced a hardware failure with their old PC, so I decided to get them an Intel NUC (the one that only has M.2 storage). Usually I'd just hook up the old HD/SSD to a spare SATA port and transfer the data, but that wasn't going to be an option this time. I found an old 2.5/3.5" HDD dock, but it was only USB 2.0. A quick search yielded this item, supporting USB 3.0 AND available Prime 1-day!Packaging/AppearanceThere isn't much to the item, as it's only a cable... USB-A on one end, and SATA+SATA power on the other. It resembles a SAS connection, but it's not quite the same. The build quality seems adequate, and there didn't appear to be any fit or finish issues.Installation/UseThere isn't a lot that can go wrong with a product like this... it either works, or it doesn't. As long as you stay under the current limits of a USB 3.x port (assuming you have it hooked up to a USB 3.x port), you should be fine. Please note that the device itself takes some power, so you'll want to factor that in. Generally speaking, you're fine for all SSDs, and all but a few edge case 2.5" magnetic HDDs. While this type of thing isn't meant to be used as a full-time storage interface, it performs ok. Ultimately you're limited by the USB interface - while the bus bandwidth is technically greater than 6Gbit/s SATA, you will find that the performance is significantly lower. I ran some ATTO benches to check SATA vs. USB->SATA, and it bore this out. Regardless, it's still fast... in my case, I was able to transfer about 240GB to the new PC in about 5 minutes. Large numbers of small files are a weak spot. I've used this without issue in Windows 10, Server 2016, and Linux. Depending on your BIOS you can even boot from it (though I'm not sure why you'd want to do that).ConclusionI regard a device like this as cheap insurance, since you never know when you'll need to recover some data. I would think that a normal use case might be transferring data from a laptop HDD to another laptop. I definitely think anyone who's considering this item should get one.