Too Cool not to share

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BThunderW

Active Member
Jul 8, 2013
242
25
28
Canada, eh?
www.copyerror.com
Too cool to not share

I didn't even know these things existed. For the longest time I was thinking about designing and building my own but for this price there's no way I could come up with something looking this good.

This is the Zalman VE-200 (or VE-200SE for silver)
Zalman VE 200SE Storage Enclosure External Black Silver 1 X Total BAY 1 | eBay

Seems like a normal, portable 2.5" drive bay. Except, it also works like an DVD-Rom Drive emulator.

You basically load a 2.5" drive up with ISOs, connect it to any machine, select any iso from the folder using the jog-wheel and the machine will detect it as an attached DVD-Rom and boot off of it like regular optical media drive. It basically saves you burning ISOs to DVD or creating boot USB sticks and dealing with crapload of media.

There's a newer version of this, the Zalman VE-300 (and VE-400 with encryption and code keypad), both are USB3 which use a USB3 hub cable which might not be readily available if you misplace it.

The advantage of the VE-200: Standard USB2 cable, eSata, cheaper. Most servers use USB2 anyways so no advantage to going with USB3
 
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burr

New Member
Aug 11, 2012
28
2
3
Birmingham, AL
Just ordered one. This seems like a unicorn to me. Maybe i can finally get rid of the 20 random usb flash drives in my office now. ;)
 

jtreble

Member
Apr 16, 2013
93
10
8
Ottawa, Canada
I didn't even know these things existed. For the longest time I was thinking about designing and building my own but for this price there's no way I could come up with something looking this good.

This is the Zalman VE-200 (or VE-200SE for silver)
Zalman VE 200SE Storage Enclosure External Black Silver 1 X Total BAY 1 | eBay

Seems like a normal, portable 2.5" drive bay. Except, it also works like an DVD-Rom Drive emulator.

You basically load a 2.5" drive up with ISOs, connect it to any machine, select any iso from the folder using the jog-wheel and the machine will detect it as an attached DVD-Rom and boot off of it like regular optical media drive. It basically saves you burning ISOs to DVD or creating boot USB sticks and dealing with crapload of media.

There's a newer version of this, the Zalman VE-300 (and VE-400 with encryption and code keypad), both are USB3 which use a USB3 hub cable which might not be readily available if you misplace it.

The advantage of the VE-200: Standard USB2 cable, eSata, cheaper. Most servers use USB2 anyways so no advantage to going with USB3

Nice find.

John Treble
Otatwa, Canada
 

BThunderW

Active Member
Jul 8, 2013
242
25
28
Canada, eh?
www.copyerror.com
Yup. I ordered 3, showed it to a friend and he wanted one too. I have binders full of CDs/DVDs I could get rid of if this works as advertised, and based on reviews I read, it does.

Just ordered one. This seems like a unicorn to me. Maybe i can finally get rid of the 20 random usb flash drives in my office now. ;)
 

sweloop64

New Member
Feb 28, 2011
10
0
0
Sweden
Been using the VE-200 (hdd) for maybe two years now, very happy with it.
Been using the VE-300 (ssd) for almost a year and I'm even happier with that one, makes one look a lot at front usb spec when checking cases/server specs, only to find out that most are only 2.0 :(


VE-300 with a SSD is really nice when running usb 3.0 :cool:


Some good links
The (korean)maker of the Zalman VE-series: ì•„ì´오드
Some random info/troubleshooting: 34 - The ZALMAN ZM VE200 SATA hard disk caddy with DVD/HDD/FDD emulation - RMPrepUSB
Review: Review: Zalman VE200 External Hard Drive/Virtual Drive Enclosure
Review: ZALMAN ZM-VE200 2.5†HDD ENCLOSURE/VIRTUAL DRIVE REVIEW | TWEAKNEWS
 

Biren78

Active Member
Jan 16, 2013
550
94
28
Here's my question for the group. Can I use the USB 3.0 enclosure in a USB 2.0 port?
 

BThunderW

Active Member
Jul 8, 2013
242
25
28
Canada, eh?
www.copyerror.com
Yes, it's backwards compatible.

Personally I'm avoiding anything USB 3.0. I've had major issues with USB3 across systems. I went through a lot of HDD docks, hubs and nothing was ever very stable. Random BSoDs, aborted file transfers, etc.



Here's my question for the group. Can I use the USB 3.0 enclosure in a USB 2.0 port?
 

dba

Moderator
Feb 20, 2012
1,477
184
63
San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA
I didn't even know these things existed. For the longest time I was thinking about designing and building my own but for this price there's no way I could come up with something looking this good.

This is the Zalman VE-200 (or VE-200SE for silver)
Zalman VE 200SE Storage Enclosure External Black Silver 1 X Total BAY 1 | eBay

Seems like a normal, portable 2.5" drive bay. Except, it also works like an DVD-Rom Drive emulator.

You basically load a 2.5" drive up with ISOs, connect it to any machine, select any iso from the folder using the jog-wheel and the machine will detect it as an attached DVD-Rom and boot off of it like regular optical media drive. It basically saves you burning ISOs to DVD or creating boot USB sticks and dealing with crapload of media.

There's a newer version of this, the Zalman VE-300 (and VE-400 with encryption and code keypad), both are USB3 which use a USB3 hub cable which might not be readily available if you misplace it.

The advantage of the VE-200: Standard USB2 cable, eSata, cheaper. Most servers use USB2 anyways so no advantage to going with USB3
I like the idea, so I ordered one of the USB3 versions. I'm hoping to replace a rather large stack of install disks.
 

TvdH

New Member
Jul 17, 2013
18
8
3
The Netherlands
Pretty neat devices, spotted them last weekend to on a dutch forum called Tweakers.net.
In the thread over there someone noticed that the device could also mount VHD's, wich is actually a pretty neat feature too!
 

33_viper_33

Member
Aug 3, 2013
204
3
18
The VE400 is amazing! Much quicker and much more user friendly than my ve200 and that darn rocker switch. The interface is awesome. Since I'm in a community environment often, i love the ability to secure my keys and personal data.

I have used the ve200 for over 2 years now. It does its job, but the rocker switch can be a pita. When scrolling, it will sometimes double scroll passing the file you want. When pushing in on the rocker to select a file, it will some times scroll and select the wrong file. If you want to boot immediately to a specific mode, you have to remember the proper rocker position. I taped the key to the outside of mine.

The ve400 has nice soft buttons with a menu interface that is intuitive. Also, it reads the smart data from the drive. I've had mine for about 3 months months now without a hiccup. Drive encryption works well. Another great thing is it will sleep the drive.

Cant speak for the ve300. Let us know how you like it. I think I want another but don't need encryption.
 
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SteveSi

New Member
Aug 28, 2013
2
0
1
I have found that using a Y-cable is best so that you can get power from two USB ports to power the Zalman (especially when connecting to a notebook or netbook USB port).
If you want a more portable solution, checkout my Easy2Boot USB Flash drive project here which can boot most ISOs (linux, Windows Install, PE, AV, etc.)
It will boot 99% of the ISOs that the Zalman can boot, but has the advantage that you can add unattend.xml files or drivers folders etc. and can install from an XP ISO to an AHCI computer without needing to modify the XP ISO at all.
Easy2Boot was also designed to work from a Zalman so that you can either boot from the Zalman as a virtual CD and pick an ISO using the jog wheel or as a USB HDD and run Easy2Boot and pick an ISO from the Easy2Boot grub4dos menu.
 

vv111y

Member
May 6, 2011
76
4
8
Niagara Falls, Canada
Very cool.

Reading amazon, newegg reviews, seems QA is erratic for all models. Forget about customer service from zalman.
If you've got a good one great.
Anyone popped one open to see if the usb plug can be beefed up?
 

33_viper_33

Member
Aug 3, 2013
204
3
18
For drivers, the Zalmen works well. You can initilize the device in "dual mode" which makes it look as 2 seperate drives, an ODD and an HDD. Boot the ISO, browse to the Drivers foldier.