iodd Iodd2531 - USB3.0 - HDD - SSD - Virtual CD-ROM - Enclosures - Made in Korea … (1 Unit/lot)

Awesome! This is an incredibly useful product that has done away with CD/DVD drives. I have all my useful ISO's in one place and no longer need to worry about scratched disks. It works great, and makes clean installs of operating systems. It also is great for using the Acronis TrueImage bootdisc for backups and restores of computers. I must say that this case is the best purchase I've ever done. I work doing many system reinstalls, diagnostics tests from live cd's (now images thanks to the case), and that kind of stuff. I used to have tons of DVD's and CD's all over the place because it's the simplest approach, since having tons of USB flash drives with all my software just doesn't quite get the job done and doing bootable drives is a nightmare for some programs. However, the virtual drive function of this enclosure is worth multiple times the price you'll pay for it. Basically, you throw your ISO images into a folder on the drive, and after a quick rescan, they appear on the menu. You can then use the rocker switch on the side to select the ISO file you want, and it gets presented to the computer as if it were a CD-ROM. It is so nice to be able to boot an ISO image right from the device and it is super fast on USB 3.0 as well. I do not have words for how useful this is! Not only is reading the CD data off of a hard drive much faster than reading off of a real disc, but you can carry your entire disc collection with you in this small package. If you're an IT guy, this is a must have item. If you're not, you can still copy your discs onto the drive and stash the originals away safely. I highly recommend this Iodd 2531 VE300.

A nice usb attached file based cd/dvd-rom emulator. It let's you "emulate" a real physical cd/dvd (read-only) optical disk drive. The case has a small electronics section with a multi-line backlit LCD panel that produces pixelated symbols, graphics and text. The "jog switch" on the Left side of the unit allows thumb control up, down, and momentary press into the body of the device. The "jog switch" allows scrolling through a two line text menu which displays wrapped text if items have labels that are too long. Then pressing in on the "jog switch" selects the item. - The device arrives without a hard drive, it will take a spinning drive, or an ssd. The software requires the drive be formatted as a "simple" MBR volume, and not a GPT volume. Once the volume type is chosen, the drive can be divided into partitions and formatted with a file system. The enclosure electronics only support NTFS and FAT file systems. The device can function (both) as a USB hard disk, and as a USB CD/DVD-rom drive "simultaneously" or as one or the other (HDD or CD/DVD) "exclusively". Once the drive is formatted creating a folder called _iso and putting iso files into the folder activates the ability to "mount" the iso files in emulation mode. The first time after the _iso directory is created the device must be unplugged and replugged in, so that the device sees the _iso folder and starts in "dual HDD and CD/DVD-rom emulation mode". Once in dual mode the LCD screen lists the iso files it can see in the _iso folder. Scrolling up and down the list with the "jog switch" then selecting one by pressing into the body of the device with the jog switch.. automatically mounts the selected iso file and exposes the file as virtual CD/DVD physical media to the computer. In dual mode, the computer "lists" a USB hard drive and a virtual USB CD/DVD drive (empty), pressing the jog switch to "mount" an iso file is reflected on the computer as "actively inserting a CD/DVD" physical media piece into the virtual drive, and will activate Autoplay. Pressing again on the jog switch emulates "actively ejecting a CD/DVD" physical media piece from the virtual drive. The Last virtual CD/DVD "mounted" is remembered when the device is unplugged and plugged back into the computer.. this is called "saving".. which means "save the current state of the device to memory".. so that when it starts again.. it immediately mounts and exports the iso file as a "filled CD/DVD virtual device" with bootable media already in its slot. The silver switch on top of the device is called the "Backup" button.. which means.. "backup the current state of the device to the device memory, before unplugging it" in my experience it remembers state without doing this.. but if you do press the Silver top button and hold it down long enough the LCD displays "Data Saving..." as a confirmation. Microsoft VHD and RMD read/write formats are also supported, but I have not tried those. WindowsToGo is supposed to be supported but I have not tried that yet. A virtual CD/DVD-R burn function to allow a computer to burn virtual media would be helpful, but the current software does not emulate read/write media that looks like a piece of CD-R or DVD-R media. It comes with a black neoprene carry case wrapped in black fabric. It also comes a white USB cable that is 3 feet long, has a USB 3.0 micro-B style end (not a type C) [this is the split, dual sided connector that looks sort of like a mini-SATA connector] that plugs into the top of the device and a normal size type A connector on the opposing end to plug into a computer. The internal drive connector is a normal SATA drive style connector with power and signal sides. The case does not have a facility for mounting the drive, the drive is plugged in and shoved into the case and held in place by friction and a landing zone at the bottom made of plastic that works to center the drive in the case. The case display and electronics are bolted into position by "peeling" the flexible top of the rubber strips on eithr side away from the grooves to get access to screw holes in the side of the case. The electronics package with the drive attached is shoved into the case until the copper accented holes of the electronics packages line up with the holes in the case. A minature screw driver 1 inch long and four tiny screws are provided.. however you only need two to secure the drive electronics to the sides of the case.. and by association, with the entering plastic base inside the case for the user supplied SSD or spinning drive.. the drive is also secured. The rubber strips are then "pressed" back into the sides to cover up the screw access holes used to secure the electronics package. Because the ends of the rubber strips are narrower than the main body of the rubber strips they flex underneath the groove edges and smooth out of their own accord. Advanced menus contain a LCD panel brightness, USB volt meter, Drive model and serial number and manual mode control. Some antivirus suites will (hide) the HDD by default, and it must be manually forced (online) from the Windows Computer Management > Disk Management - control panel component, by right clicking the Left drive grey control box and clicking on (Online) to bring it online and automatically assign it a drive letter. Hot swap and possible data corruption depending on the Operating System handling of USB devices is still a problem enforced by the Operating System behavior. The enclosure Advanced menus do provide features to manually Safely disconnect.. but mostly it just seems to work. The GPT volume limitation, and requirement for MBR volumes only.. means 2 TB is the (limit) to the supported drive size in this device, anything larger will be be unreachable outside of the first 2 TB of drive space. This drive model is not encrypted, data is breachable if lost. A different model supports on the fly drive encryption.

I love this thing!!! What a time saver!!! No more DVDs for me... They could improve the joystick on this thing, but I take a horrible joystick over burning and carrying CD/DVDs any day of the week!!! You need to put your ISOs inside a folder called _ISO or _iso , and inside that folder, you can create sub-folders to organize your stuff... It also can emulate external HDs and Thumb drives (writable or read-only)... Which is great for keeping your stuff safe on unknown system (if you write protect it). And if you like to integrate all windows updates to your installation disk, you can use the virtual thumb drive instead of creating ISOs, that way, you can always change something later on, without having to recreate the whole thing... (I personally use NTLite and WinReducereX, they both do basically the same thing, but sometimes one is better than the other, depending on the version... So if it doesn't work on one, try the other...) I hope this helps... Some tips: # Use a SSD instead of a regular HD (the Samsung 850 evo up to 500GB is perfect (it uses very little power, one of the lowest on the market) (the 1TB uses way more power... Stay with 500GB or less... You can Google "samsung 850 evo power consumption" and look at the anandtech site for the power consumption compassion of many models and sizes) # Format your drive as NTFS (the only compatible with the VHD_Tool++.exe that you download from their site) # Use VHD_Tool++.exe to create VHD files with the size you want the virtual HD to be; # f you want it to be a virtual thumb drive, rename the VHD file to RMD (virtual Thumb Drive); # You can also add &D and &DW to the name of the files to force a behavior; VHD and RMD modes based on the name of the file: (I used VHD as the extension, but it works the same way for RMD) NAME.VHD = CD-MODE (it will mount you virtual HD or thumb drive only) NAME&D.VHD = DUAL-MODE (it will mount your virtual HD and the real HD, but the real will be read-only) NAME&DW.VHD = DUAL-MORE (same as above but the real HD is writable) # Create a folder structure that makes since for you... i.e: _ISO\ISOs\Windows Install\Win 7 _ISO\ISOs\Windows Install\Win 10 _ISO\ISOs\Tools\Some recovery iso (whatever tools you use...) _ISO\ISOs\Live Images\Ubuntu.iso _ISO\VHDs\virtual drive you use to backup you friend's file before you do a clean install.VHD _ISO\RMDs\virtual thumb drive you keep you windows installation disk updated (using NTLite).RMD

Good product An excellent tool for work efficiency

Tenía una cantidad de imágenes ISO y cada vez que necesitaba una tenía que instalarla en un pendrive para usarlas. Hasta ahora!! He copiado todas esas imágenes a un disco duro SSD que compré y santo remedio. He probado con ISOs de varias distribuciones linux (arch, lubuntu, deepin, etc), android (AOSP, x86, Plasma, etc), forenses y windows y con todas he podido iniciar diferentes dispositivos. Incluso con imágenes de pendrives y también ha funcionado. También he probado a leerlo como unidad USB y como CD una vez iniciado el sistema operativo y sin problemas. Realmente ha sido una compra fenomenal para mí. Ahora puedo probar cual distro va mejor en un equipo simplemente seleccionado la imagen ISO al iniciarlo. Si te ha resultado útil, espero que dejes tu voto :-)

After using this product for nearly 4 years, I think it is time to give a review. I have found this very useful as I have a lot of ISOs from Windows/Linux builders to Rescue Media recovery tools that I may need when I work. Rather than having about 20 USBs I can store all my ISOs in one place. This VHD has not had an issue since I bought it. The wheel to select/lock in ISOs is very intuitive. I use a Samsung evo 860 1TB SSD and had no issues getting the ISOs recognised when placing then in the _iso folder. Never had an issue with "ghost" isos if I deleted them. The Micro USB B to USB 3.0 cable originally provided is still in good, working condition and I have travelled quite a bit with this device. Only minor issue I have with this product is the Bootable VHD device does not lock into the case provided so detaches from the case if you grab it from the top but if you switch around HDDs/SSDs a lot I think this would be a positive.

Questo case hard disk consente di emulare floppy, cdrom, chiavette USB e hard disk. Inoltre ha una funzione di WRITE BLOCKING hardware, che già di per se giustificherebbe prezzi ben più alti. E' probabilmente un prodotto da "tecnici" o da "smanettoni" più che da utenti "normali", ma alla fine costa abbastanza poco ed è un prodotto di qualità tale, che anche un utente non particolarmente interessato alle funzionalità aggiuntive potrebbe trovarlo interessante semplicemente per la qualità generale del prodotto. Per me poi, che sono un tecnico e mi occupo anche di computer forensics è una manna dal cielo e mi aspetto di comprarne altri nel medio termine. Funziona bene, risolve un sacco di problemi ed è un piacere da usare. L'unico neo che ho riscontrato è che l'emulazione floppy introdotta recentemente ha qualche incompatibilità con i vecchi bios. Mi è capitato infatti di non riuscire a fare il boot dal floppy emulato, laddove invece un floppy esterno (sempre USB) funziona senza problemi. Detto questo, il firmware è aggiornabile, c'è un apposito sito ed il produttore sembra rispondere alle segnalazioni di bug...

Awesome product, I own a computer store and we use them for the bench, bought 1 and then a second.....

Bien faire attention au formatage du disque dur et tout fonctionne nickel Faites une recherche google pour la configuration c'est un peu plus clair que la notice. Je n'ai pas fixer le disque dur avec les vis fournies, comme cela je peux m'en servir de dock pour d'autre disque (en cas de dépannage ou de récupération de données pour une autre machine). Boitier extrêmement simple a ouvrir et fermer. Bref je recommande fortement ce produit de qualité.