The unsuspecting customer would be wise to know that there are two models:
Buyer beware indeed Charles_A. Like several other people, it was discovered (post purchase) that Windows would not detect the drive on one certain desktop and laptop to which it was supposed to serve. Of course it seemed to work fine on my computer, but that matters little. Incompatibility problems anyone? Yes, indeed, the Genesyslogic GL881E-04 bridge chip seems to suck the big one --- but don't tell these guys, as they seem to think its honky dorry. Alas, with no firmware update available on the net, back she went.
Perdictably, the store wants to do a diagnostic, and just as perdictable as that, it predictably worked on their test machine. Nevertheless, given that it was purchased within the all so gracious 7-days-or-less-and-maybe-we-might-do-something period, and it was accompaigned by the sacred reciept, the tech wrote upon the reciept that we could exchange or return but a 15% restocking fee applied. The lame excuse for the restocking fee was that they couldn't sell it as new any more. Well, I got news for them, I've never seen them sell any opened merchandise before, so they dock the customer 15% and then send it back to the distributer for whatever type of RMA/return/refund. Nice.
Anyways, that just didn't sit too well, and so we complained to the manager (who seemed like a decent fellow, and whom even admitted to knowing about a compatibility issue with the chipset for that particular enclosure). After 3 minutes of badgering, he caved and allowed a swap without restocking. He explained that the problem he faced was pressure from head office -- and I completely believe him, but thats too bad -- Don't pass the buck. If there's a known problem with hardware, stop stocking it, and stop trying to stick it to the customer. Send it back to the manufacturer and say wake up! -- Anyways, the only other problem was that the model we swapped for was $10 cheaper. This took another 2 mins of badgering to ensure that we would receive the $10 refund and not have to purchase an equivalent $10 worth of stock to make up for the difference (personally I was quite willing to do this - to meet the guy half way - but I couldn't think of anything I needed at the moment, and my cousin just doesn't need anything). In the end, alls well that ends well.
Now as for the replacement (Bytecc ME-705U2), it worked straight out of the box without problem (a quick glance in the store [Mgr. opened it for me] indicated it has a Cypress chipset). And dispite being cheaper both cost and construction wise (plastic as opposed to aluminum), I liked this replacement model better for the fact that it has ventilation slats all along its sides -- whereas the tempermental ME-350 is/was a totally enclosed enclosure! I don't care if the thing was made of aluminum, that's just asking for baking a drive.
- the older one which is the ME350U2, but also refered to as the ME-350U2 (see the url).
- and the newer one which is ME-350....which they apparantly distinguish as the 355 (i.e see the url, ... also conveyed in Newegg's item number).
Buyer beware indeed Charles_A. Like several other people, it was discovered (post purchase) that Windows would not detect the drive on one certain desktop and laptop to which it was supposed to serve. Of course it seemed to work fine on my computer, but that matters little. Incompatibility problems anyone? Yes, indeed, the Genesyslogic GL881E-04 bridge chip seems to suck the big one --- but don't tell these guys, as they seem to think its honky dorry. Alas, with no firmware update available on the net, back she went.
Perdictably, the store wants to do a diagnostic, and just as perdictable as that, it predictably worked on their test machine. Nevertheless, given that it was purchased within the all so gracious 7-days-or-less-and-maybe-we-might-do-something period, and it was accompaigned by the sacred reciept, the tech wrote upon the reciept that we could exchange or return but a 15% restocking fee applied. The lame excuse for the restocking fee was that they couldn't sell it as new any more. Well, I got news for them, I've never seen them sell any opened merchandise before, so they dock the customer 15% and then send it back to the distributer for whatever type of RMA/return/refund. Nice.
Anyways, that just didn't sit too well, and so we complained to the manager (who seemed like a decent fellow, and whom even admitted to knowing about a compatibility issue with the chipset for that particular enclosure). After 3 minutes of badgering, he caved and allowed a swap without restocking. He explained that the problem he faced was pressure from head office -- and I completely believe him, but thats too bad -- Don't pass the buck. If there's a known problem with hardware, stop stocking it, and stop trying to stick it to the customer. Send it back to the manufacturer and say wake up! -- Anyways, the only other problem was that the model we swapped for was $10 cheaper. This took another 2 mins of badgering to ensure that we would receive the $10 refund and not have to purchase an equivalent $10 worth of stock to make up for the difference (personally I was quite willing to do this - to meet the guy half way - but I couldn't think of anything I needed at the moment, and my cousin just doesn't need anything). In the end, alls well that ends well.
Now as for the replacement (Bytecc ME-705U2), it worked straight out of the box without problem (a quick glance in the store [Mgr. opened it for me] indicated it has a Cypress chipset). And dispite being cheaper both cost and construction wise (plastic as opposed to aluminum), I liked this replacement model better for the fact that it has ventilation slats all along its sides -- whereas the tempermental ME-350 is/was a totally enclosed enclosure! I don't care if the thing was made of aluminum, that's just asking for baking a drive.
Hopefully this isn't the case in this case ! Er, this external case that is!