Docking stations for hard drives

By Philipp Laage Aug 8, 2010, 12:38 GMT

Berlin - External hard drives are a frequent sight on home office desks. Take a look at the statistics, though, and it quickly becomes clear that the most popular type of storage device is and remains the internal hard drive inside the computer itself.

Special docking stations, though, have been developed to move content easily from point A to B. A docking station accepts conventional internal hard drives and can be connected to the computer via a standard USB cable. The stations are well suited for old hard drives that you've taken out of a PC or laptop.

For laptops in particular the docking stations are a big help when an installed hard drive is replaced with a bigger model, says Hard Lehner from the electronics chain Conrad Elektronik. It makes the hard drive's data accessible even if it's already been removed.

'The docking station offers fast data transmission for relatively little money,' Lehner says. Hard drives without casings are much cheaper than external hard drives,' says Thomas Littschwager from Chip magazine.

'A docking station is certainly not something every user needs at home, but it does offer certain benefits if large volumes of data are being moved,' he says.

There are docking stations compatible with 2.5 and 3.5 inch hard drives, notes Peter Tonev from Technaxx, a hardware maker in Germany. Some models even offer two hard drive slots so that two units can be run parallel.

The standard docking station uses a USB 2.0 connection to transfer data to the computer. 'If you move around large volumes of data, USB 2.0 is not going to make you very happy, though,' says Littschwager.

Models with a faster eSATA port are available to cure that problem. The hard drive in the docking station then runs just as fast as a hard drive installed within the computer itself, but you will need an externally-accessible eSATA port in order to use such models. The top speed ultimately comes through a USB 3.0 connection, which is still relatively new. Docking stations equipped with USB 3.0 cost around 40 dollars.

Shoppers should always also give stability and weight some consideration when looking at docking stations, Littschwager says.

That's because the devices are situated on end within the docks; the more stable the docking station, the less susceptible to jolts it is. A backup button on the docking station for quick launch of individual folder backups onto the computer or laptop is also helpful, Littschwager says.

Many computer users are unaware that docking stations can't work with factory-fresh hard drives. While the docking station itself doesn't require a driver when used with Windows XP or newer, the hard drive can only be automatically recognised by the operating system if it's been formatted.