At the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show, Thermaltake introduced a novel idea in the category of external storage, the hard drive dock. The BlacX dock supported either 2½" or 3½" SATA drives via a hot-swap, plug-in interface and featured USB 2.0 connectivity. It was an instant success. Although many other manufacturers would soon develop their own versions of the external drive dock, Thermaltake continued to refine their original design with subsequent models that added support for a 4-port USB hub, dual drives and finally eSATA.


The item we have for review today represents the latest in the evolution of Thermaltake's drive dock, the BlacX 5G. Drawing its name from the theoretical 5Gb/s bandwidth of the newest USB 3.0 specification, the BlacX 5G otherwise remains virtually identical to the original model we first took a look at nearly three years ago. The dock's dimensions, weight and physical appearance are functionally the same, however in addition to the interface change, Thermaltake claims that the drive controller has been upgraded to support the latest SATA 6.0Gb/s as well.

Join me as I take a closer look at the Thermaltake BlacX 5G.