We get a lot of things sent to us to check out at Futurelooks and it’s up to us to figure out which things deserve a full review and which things deserve to go back to where they came from. Other times, we’re just so busy that we just don’t get around to it. Neither scenario is what we desire so we’ve decided to start doing some new “Quick Look” videos that should give you a good idea of what some of these products are all about. Today we have a quick look video of a product series from iStarUSA called the BPN-DE Series. They’re 3 and 4 bay drive enclosures that house 3.5 inch hard drives. Check it out above or directly on YouTube.
While iStarUSA is mainly known for manufacturing products for other companies, recently the company has started to focus on their own brand in retail. We have checked out a 6 bay 2.5 inch enclosure that fits in a 5.25 bay early this year. While the product was quite innovative, it definitely lacked some spit and polish for retail shelves in its brown paper box. With the BPN-DE series and the two models in it (BPN-DE230SS @ $76.99 and BPN-DE340SS @ $98.99) that seems to be changing with much more retail friendly packaging.
The enclosures do appear to be well built and I like the ability to drop a drive in without having to mount it to a tray. Just drop it in bare and go. The externally replaceable fan is also a bonus that makes swapping out a dead fan easy. The only thing that I wondered about was the vibration since there is no vibration dampening material. I’m happy to report that while there still is noise, drives seem much quieter once stuffed into one of these enclosures.
For more information on iStarUSA’s other products, check out their website: http://www.istarusa.com
Expect to see more quick looks of cool products in the New Year. Happy Holidays!