"I had been searching for a FireWire to SATA converter box, and found only one place on the entire internet that seemed to have such a device -- cooldrives.com. They had one for $30, so I placed an order.
After this, I made a comment about my purchase over at Macintouch.com only to find a number of people warning me about doing business with this company. Fortunately, I had no issues. The product shipped the same day and there were no issues.
Pre-sales tech support questions were answered swiftly, though often not with a satisfying answer. That's really the only non-positive comment I have.
Buyer beware: They go to great lengths to basically say "if you buy it, you better understand what you are buying" which could mean a problem if something doesn't work as you thought. (In my case, I understood this, so when my adapter didn't support Port Multiplier, I accepted this limitation and won't try to send it back. They'd already told me it wasn't designed for this, but I thought for $30 I'd take a shot.)
So do some searching -- there seems to be plenty of negative feedback on them, but I didn't have a problem, and their price and speed of shipping was excellent."
"I ordered the USB to HDMI Adapter USB USBDVI-HDMI 2.0 Video Card DVI and HDMI Output 1600 x1200. It arrived promptly and in excellent shape. No problems have been noted in shipping, billing or use.
Please remember that USB output is not the same as HDMI input from a USB source. Not all HDMI devices use the 1080P HD format and this adapter works best at 720 HD & SVGA (now just VGA) output.
This adapter works and works well for what it is intended. This is connecting a USB device to VGA, DVI & HDMI devices. I use it to connect my
lap top to my LCD HDMI.
Hint! Unless you match resolution output to match the second display in mirror mode, you will need to pan the second display screen to see the outside edges. Use the cursor to move the screen up/down or left/right.
"
"These guys are great. I have ordered from them on numerous occasions and have found them to be excellent on all accounts.
I recently ordered a SATA to IDE converter that is hard to find. Cool Drives had it in stock and got it to me in 3 business days using UPS Ground. Great products and great service!"
"This drive adapter is the best I have used so far. It works on sata ide hard drives, DVD & CD ROM drives. Some of the other drive adapters I have in the past would not even reconize or acknowlede the drives. So far this drive has worked on everything I have connected it to. I highly recommend this drive adapter with out a doubt. You will be glad you bought it. "
"I wanted to write a review of my experience @ Cooldrives.com, due to the excellent help and support they have given us in developing a SATA RAID Backup solution.
Their site has I believe the BEST range and DETAIL of SATA and eSATA products
Their pre-sales support was in-depth, personal and helped us determine the right combination of items to order
We got our items and had difficulty setting them up, these guys took the time to help us troubleshoot and isolate the problem - WAY above and beyond what most re-sellers would do
We still had difficulty so we sent back - they took our stuff - set it up, tested it and even sent us pictures of the items working and between that and still continuing to help us - we figured out the problem (Incompatiblity issue with Dell workstations - once we put on an Asus board - perfect)
When we got our stuff back we setup per their recommendations and it worked perfect, and they even continued to help us get some components for a new station that are compatible..
I wanted to write a review as this has been an extremely positive experience and rare for online support. Way above and beyond the call of duty and we will ONLY use them in the future for SATA items - HIGHLY RECOMMEND!!!
T. MARKS"
"Rating: Excellent
Product: 3.5 Inch 3GB/s eSATA + USB 2.0 Combo External Case with FAN
Price: Excellent
Shipping: Excellent
Ease of Purchase: Excellent
Customer Service: Excellent
I installed a Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD5000AAKS 500GB 7200 RPM 16MB
Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive.
Works on both of our systems, Window XP Pro x64 as eSATA and on Windows
Vista Home Premium as USB.
"
"Excellent pre-sales support. Received product as advertised. Product works well with my dual boot laptop."
"I ordered an SATA to IDE adapter and an SATA/IDE to USB adapter. The order arrived quickly and the items were exactly as described on their web site. I will definitely order from CoolDrives again."
"Drive enclosure exactly as described and worked perfectly. I was able to recover all of my files from a corrupted boot sector laptop hard drive.
Invaluable product, excellent web description including video about the product and all cables, hardware and even a screwdriver to put it together. Very satisfied."
"Great site. This is my second silver enclosure -Firewire 800 + 400 + USB 2.0 + eSATA Quad Interface 3.5; Aluminum Case for SATA Drives .. SILVER . Runs cool, quiet, has inside fan, removes safely. Good prices. Quick e-mail communication. I would wish for phone communication, but that is my only complaint about the site. Quick shipping. Quick responses. One of my favorite sites."
"I have been very pleased with the service, quality and performance of the drive enclosures I purchased from CoolDrives. I bought a firewire 800 enclosure from them after experiencing problems with another vendor and based on that good experience recently bought an eSata enclosure.
In both cases shipments were prompt and the orders arrived quickly.
The store sells equipment for experienced users and the quality of the parts is top-notch. "
"I own a business that does Apple laptop repairs, custom video and audio Mac systems, and laptop service for Macs.
We have been buying from the guys at CoolDrives for about a year now, usually ever few weeks for some odd thing.
Quite frankly, I'm a bit suspicious as to the postings here,as it is the polar OPPOSITE from the experience I've had with them.
They have ALWAYS been prompt and timely in communication, answered questions immediately, and have always shipped our orders immediately.
My only guess is that some folks want presales support, which is *NOT* what the cooldrive guys do. If you don't know what you want, or want somebody to hold your hand, go to BestBuy and pay thru the nose for one of the dorkgeeks to help you.
I would recommend cooldrives in a heartbeat - we switched to them over the friewiredepot guys (who IMHO are the biggest bunch of crooks on the planet, and who still owe me around $800) and we've never been dissapointed with a single order to date.
In case you think this isn't legit, look us up: www.ibookparts.com
Dave
"
"Rude and unprofessional.
Like others here, I sent back an item in exactly the same condition that I received it. They claimed the item was damaged and refused the return. They are liars and down right nasty. Stay away."
"Summary:
1.Wrong product received after many of my pre-sale questions answered essentialy "This will work."
2.According to Cooldrive Amir Rosmanic it is my fault and I cannot read.
3.Cooldrives has my US$30--price of my education, I suppose. [I should have read all y'all first!]
4. Cooldrives--Thumbs down as a vendor. "
"Prompt shipment. Excellent product. Pre sales tech questions were answered quickly. I found none of the negatives that others are reporting here. Product is a 5-drive sata raid enclosure. I installed the drives, formatted and configured the raid in less than 30 minutes."