Looking down on to the EZ-Dock, we see where it is labeled that it accepts both 2.5" and 3.5" SATA hard drives.  The drive is lowered into the receiving area where its data and power ports link to the Kingwin EZ-Dock's posts.  Voala, you're set!

Here's a shot of the Kingwin EZ-Dock with a Western Digital 250GB Caviar HDD installed.

Performance

To test our Kingwin EZ-Dock's performance we are going to use the HD Tach program on a Western Digital 7200 RPM 250GB SATA HDD.  HD Tach will give us average read and burst speed in MB/sec as well as random access speed times.  Our test bed is my very underpowered AMD Turion MT-40 Acer laptop with two GB of RAM.  We will be interfacing with the USB connection and not the eSATA for this test.

Not bad but certainly nothing like the 3GB/sec of the eSATA.  Let's look at this included software and see what it brings to the table.

PC Clone EX Lite

Installation of the PC Clone EX Lite gave us no issues.  Use of the software was likewise easy.  You choose what files and parameters the back up will address within the control panel of the program.  After doing so all that needs be done in the future is to hit the 'back up' button to set it all in motion.

You actually have to push the 'back up' button twice to back up the files you selected.  This keeps you from accidentally starting the back up program until you are ready.  Progress is displayed as well as a completed window.

Conclusion

The Kingwin EZ-Dock is the only way to go as far as speed with swapping in and out drives from an external enclosure.  It even puts the old terminology of "external enclosure" into question.  The Kingwin dock gave us no issues or problems at all.  It's plastic construction was lightweight but did not feel flimsy.  What really makes Kingwin's $25 unit shine is the inclusion of the PC Clone EX Lite software and the integrated one touch back up.  A system back up at a single touch that the end user predefines is fantastic.

The Kingwin EZ-Dock certainly wasn't the first HDD Dock on the market but considering it is priced at $25 where the competition prices out at $40, it is the least expensive.  Also, the competition doesn't have the one touch back up functionality and included software either.  The EZ-Dock should be a real winner for Kingwin.  For the price the Kingwin EZ-Dock just can't be beat.  Here's a link to it over at Directron.

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