Amazon Owc Mini Stack Max Quad Interface (for

I recently purchased the v3 to complement my existing group of two of the older MiniStack v2s. Overall, I like the firewire 800 and the quality of construction seems much improved. But the new fan in the V3 is louder than the old MiniStack which is quite a bummer.

But with the Firewire 800 and Sata support, it's much faster than the v2. And the fact that they throw in every cable you could need is a nice touch. Also I have to take issue with some of the other reviews here. One person ding'ed it because it didn't have a drive.

That's not the fault of the MiniStack - clearly the person didn't do their research - this is just a harddrive enclosure. But then another person complained that it 'failed' and they lost their data - that sounds more like the harddrive they put inside the MiniStack failed, not the MiniStack itself. And lastly, I haven't had any hub problems at all. You just need to realize that if you want to use the USB ports, you must connect the MiniStack to the computer via USB as well. You can't connect it to your computer via Firewire and expect to be able to use the USB hub features (this is all explained clearly in the manual). Overall, it's a nice little drive enclosure that fits in well with the mac mini or even iMac (same brushed aluminum). I just wish it was quieter.

For the curious, I grabbed a Western Digital Caviar SE16 640GB drive to put in it - very nice:. I recently purchased the v3 to complement my existing group of two of the older MiniStack v2s. Overall, I like the firewire 800 and the quality of construction seems much improved. But the new fan in the V3 is louder than the old MiniStack which is quite a bummer.

But with the Firewire 800 and Sata support, it's much faster than the v2. And the fact that they throw in every cable you could need is a nice touch. Also I have to take issue with some of the other reviews here.

One person ding'ed it because it didn't have a drive. That's not the fault of the MiniStack - clearly the person didn't do their research - this is just a harddrive enclosure.

But then another person complained that it 'failed' and they lost their data - that sounds more like the harddrive they put inside the MiniStack failed, not the MiniStack itself. And lastly, I haven't had any hub problems at all.

You just need to realize that if you want to use the USB ports, you must connect the MiniStack to the computer via USB as well. You can't connect it to your computer via Firewire and expect to be able to use the USB hub features (this is all explained clearly in the manual). Overall, it's a nice little drive enclosure that fits in well with the mac mini or even iMac (same brushed aluminum). I just wish it was quieter.

For the curious, I grabbed a Western Digital Caviar SE16 640GB drive to put in it - very nice:. Sadly, I had a similar experience to other reviewers. Worked great for 11.5 months streaming video to/from EyeTV. Then it started unmounting the drive in the middle of recording or playback. Switched it to different computer/different drive, worked fine long enough for the warranty to run out. The problem occurs on both USB and Firewire hookups. The drive is now in an aluminum enclosure and working fine.

Not willing to get the ministack fixed and risk my data again the next time it flakes out. A note about the fan noise - it's not really as loud as some reviewers make it seem. It's certainly nothing like the fans in some PCs or rack servers. That said, if you're in a very quiet environment, you really do notice it and it is intrusive. Much quieter now with my fanless aluminum enclosure.

As in 'slower than molasses.' As in 'watching the individual bits pass.' My initial Time Machine backup in Mac OS 10.5.7 wrote data at a pitiful. In addition to the many other bad reviews here, these so-called 'Classic' Ministacks will no longer boot a earlier Mac (pre-2006 or so G4, G5 and/or Intel Duo), allegedly due to a newer chip-set in the case. Further, with FW800, the unit will have power despite the power switch being 'off' and the power supply NOT plugged in. Also, these drives will randomly unmount themselves and then can't be re-mounted without powering down EVERYTHING you have off for several minutes - sometimes requiring several re-start attempts.

On top of all that, at least one on my latest Mini-stack 'Classic' drives (which are NOT compatible with 'classic Mini's) will 'decide' to power itself up (but not actually mount) even when switched off and the power is unplugged. The only possible way it could have power available is via FW800 - which is fkn nuttier than a squirrel turd (I'm told)- since Firewire is intended for data transmission (my opinion), not as a secondary DC power supply. FW400 was great, FW800 fkn SUX. The original Ministacks (V1 and V2) were very reliable, stable drives. These new ones are utter garbage.

I have had three of these replaced, they almost lasted a year each. However, the bridge card burns up on them. I have spoke to tech support and they claim that it must be environmental issues causing the failures. However, I have since upgraded my entire system including the UPS, computer and all peripherals.

It still failed, this time out of warranty. They told me it would cost more to replace the bridge card than it would to buy a new one.

I am now in the market for another FW800 enclosure and it will not be this one. I suggest using separate hubs and drives.

I have several USB and FW800 enclosures and none of them have ever had a problem except this one. I recommend looking for other enclosures. All spinning drives fail at some point. So, that's not unexpected. It's just that I'm thinking that this one failed before it should have. I've had the ministack v3 for a little over 3 years.

I have been using it as an external Timemachine backup. It is now starting to fail - randomly ejecting (corrupted at one point), sometimes seems to have a hard time starting up (you hear it whir up, then whir back down again.) It has served the exact purpose I bought it for - to be the backup drive AND to provide additional USB and Firewire ports.

I just usually expect drives to last longer than 3 years. Initially when it worked it worked well using my IMAC & Snow Leopard. However you can forget Firewire, both 400 and 800, after only a few weeks the drive started to freeze up completely and either dismounts or has to be force ejected. When I take the disc out and put it in another enclosure the disc works perfectly every time.Put the disc back in the unit and it freezes immediately with FW800 and fairly soon with FW400.

Newer Technology Ministack

The unit also appeared to permanently crash my Imac FW800 port although this is now working again with an enclosure using the Oxford 934 chipset. As regards USB the unit is very dependent on which of the Imac USB ports I use, use the wrong one and you get constant freezes. I am using a WD 1.5Tb Green disc which works fine in all my other enclosures which have 2 amp power supplies.

The Ministack came with a 3 amp supply so the problem would appear to be with the chipset rather than power. Now I know my unit may be faulty and I will return it to my supplier but the fact that 11 out of 21 reviewers give this only 1 star citing similar problems is worrying. Update 2016:Have had this Ministack in constant use for several years now with WD green drives in it, currently a 2TB unit.

I have been using it successfully as a Time Machine backup drive but only connected with USB since it has proven to be more stable than Firewire and since Time Machine works in the background speed is not really an issue. The Ministack is now used with a 2011 MacBook Pro and the combination is much more stable than with the previous 2007 IMac. I think most of my problems were down to the IMac Firewire port.

I purchased this product in 2009 as a backup solution and to expand our available ports for our 20' iMac (circa 2006). The product worked well for the first 6 months, then it started dismounting during backups.

I performed the disk repair when it refused to mount again and it seemed to work fine for another month, but it started having issues again. I contacted newertechnologies, who offered to replace the unit free of charge, however I did not feel safe sending it in with all of our backup data still on the hard drive. In the end I purchased an external hard drive case and USB hub. I pulled the hard drive from the miniStack and have been using it in the new case without issue for a couple months.

This would seem to indicate that the miniStack itself was the problem. Based on my experience, and other reviews of this nature, I would strongly recommend not purchasing this product.