Product Reviews

IOI's MirrorDrive II is a hard disk enclosure that can accommodate two 3in SATA disks and connect them to your computer using either eSATA or USB. Like Freecom's Data Tank, it supports both RAID 0 and 1. Alternatively, you can use up to 50 per cent of your storage as a RAID 1 array and the rest as a separate RAID 0 array.

The MirrorDrive feels reassuringly well made. Fitting disks

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into the removable disk trays isn't difficult, although the tiny RAID selection switch on the back of the MirrorDrive is fiddly. We were disappointed by the MirrorDrive's distractingly noisy fan, though.

When connected through the eSATA interface, the MirrorDrive was one of the fastest external disks we've seen, whether it was configured as RAID 0 or 1. Unfortunately, its performance wasn't as record-breaking when connected through USB. Using RAID 0 over a USB connection, it copied large files at 21.24MB/s and small files at 20.14MB/s. Performance was similar with the MirrorDrive configured as RAID 1, but it was a little slower when transferring large files. Overall, these speeds are slower than those of many non-RAID USB disks we've seen, which is disappointing.

The MirrorDrive is worth buying if your computer has an eSATA port and you don't mind the noise, but it's expensive at £80. Unless you must have RAID, Enermax's Jazz enclosure is better value.