They Sure Make These Things Hard to Get Into...

[Jason Dunn]

<p><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/dht/auto/1219015154.usr1.jpg" border="1" /></p><p>That pile of junk above is what's left of the <a href="http://www.maxtor.com/en/hard-drive-backup/external-drives/maxtor-onetouch-4.html" target="_blank">Maxtor OneTouch external hard drive</a> once I removed the 750 GB hard drive from it. I hate destroying perfectly working hardware, but I didn't have much choice: Maxtor made the enclosure completely user-inaccessible, and they decided to bring this product to market without an eSATA port. I had a 400 GB drive in a drive enclosure with an eSATA port, but I wanted to use that big 750 GB drive in there instead...and so I had to get messy. My primary tool? The claws on the back of my hammer - I use them to crack, bend, and break the enclosure. It's quite ridiculous that Maxtor would made the drive so difficult to remove - what are they afraid of? That users might want to remove the drive and put them into their computers? Or move them to another, non-Maxtor enclosure? The new drive is purring along nicely in the eSATA enclosure, and average transfers speeds are slightly more than doubled over the original USB 2.0 connection. It's hard to say no to that, even if things had to get ugly...</p>

[Phronetix]

LOL, cool.

But, will it blend? ;-)

_____________________________

Of course, now that Maxtor sees this, wonder what the next gen drives look like?

[Hooch Tan]

Wow, that's something might fierce. Please tell me that you're now thinking of your happy place, Jason!

Yeah, eSata is much nicer on speeds and cpu cycles too. I've tried moving several hundred gigs of data between two USB drives and it takes an excessively long time.

[bcre8v2]

Sweet! But I feel some sorrow for that poor enclosure that never stood a chance...

Is this the beginning of a new Thoughts Media website?
My vote is for: Digital Home "distraughts"....

-Steve

[EscapePod]

Of course, now that Maxtor sees this, wonder what the next gen drives look like?

Welded cases :D

[Jason Dunn]

Sweet! But I feel some sorrow for that poor enclosure that never stood a chance...

Yeah, I rarely if ever destroy hardware like that, but Maxtor didn't give me much of a chance.

Is this the beginning of a new Thoughts Media website?
My vote is for: Digital Home "distraughts"....

Haha...I don't think so. :D

[jeffd]

why did you kill it? seeing as its not usable again, didn't it defeat the purpose?

[Darius Wey]

The next step is to mail it back to Maxtor. Just a thought. :D

[makicr]

why did you kill it? seeing as its not usable again, didn't it defeat the purpose?

He put the drive itself in another enclosure. Just hacked the Maxtor box.

[Eriq Cook]

That's foolishness (Maxtor) LOL

[Jason Dunn]

why did you kill it? seeing as its not usable again, didn't it defeat the purpose?

Was one paragraph really too much to read? :)

[Phronetix]

Costco offered a $40 discount on their 320GB external notebook drives by WD, to make it $140 at the time. This was maybe 4 months back. And I had considered peeling the enclosure for the riches inside, then popping the drive in my MacBook. I have since found a better 320Gb drive at a better price, but this article made me think about that.

Darius has an excellently devious thought about mailing it back. What cleverness could you place in the accompanying note, though? Heehee.

Here's my idea:


Dear Maxtor,

I wanted to let you know that this 500GB drive that I bought is missing 50GB. My computer could only find 450GB on the hard drive. To assist you, I went ahead and looked very very thoroughly inside the case for the missing gigabytes, but I couldn't find them. I am returning the case for a new one that includes the missing 50 GB.

Sincerely,
Jason Dunn

[Rob Alexander]

The timing of this caught my attention because I just opened the enclosure of my Maxtor One-touch external drive to replace a bad drive. The difference is that mine is a first-generation one-touch (one of the blue ones) and it couldn't have been easier. It doesn't even use screws; it's held together by two plastic pieces that run the entire length along the sides of the enclosure. You just pop those off from one end and the case opens right up. Of course, there are other things to complain about, such as how this is the second drive of that model (250GB drive in a USB/Firewire enclosure) that has failed on me. Last time I sent it back to Maxtor and they sent me a replacement. This time, I had a spare Seagate 300GB drive, so I just put that in the enclosure and it works great. Anyway, back to your issue... I wonder if this first generation being so easy to open caused them support problems (drives being returned under warranty that had been opened or something) and that they made a conscious decision to keep people out this time. If that was their plan, it looks like it worked.

[jeffd]

"I had a 400 GB drive in drive enclosure"

Sorry.. since you linked in ultimate detail the one external drive enclosure, it was hard to catch the second drive enclosure in this sentence that is also using incorrect grammar. ;p

What was the 2nd box, something generic or a name brand?

One thing to keep in mind is the maxtor enclosure was probably not made by maxtor, but rather some cheap chinese device with snap together enclosure and rebadged by maxtor.

...not that I am saying maxtor ever made anything of quality. ;)

[Jason Dunn]

Sorry.. since you linked in ultimate detail the one external drive enclosure, it was hard to catch the second drive enclosure in this sentence that is also using incorrect grammar.

Grammatical error fixed - hopefully my adding of the letter "a" in the appropriate place is enough to help you wrap your brain around the message. :)

What was the 2nd box, something generic or a name brand?

It's a Vantec eSATA/USB 2.0 enclosure. I like Vantec stuff, it all works quite well.

One thing to keep in mind is the maxtor enclosure was probably not made by maxtor, but rather some cheap chinese device with snap together enclosure and rebadged by maxtor.

I'm sure it was made in China, but I highly doubt that Maxtor would use anything but a unique design - there's a design war amongst all the hard drive companies, and Maxtor isn't going to use someone else's design.

[Jason Dunn]

Darius has an excellently devious thought about mailing it back. What cleverness could you place in the accompanying note, though? Heehee. Here's my idea:

Haha...that would be pretty funny indeed! :D