Sabrent USB 2.0 To IDE 3.5"/5.25" Cable with Power Adapter

 Better than I expected
As an IT professional, I've been looking for something like this for a while. This gizmo works perfectly... just be sure to go over the easy to read instructions (one of the key points... make sure the device is jumped as "master".) It's a sure bet that this adapter received a few lower ratings because folks didn't "read the manual", which consists of 3-4 sentences.

 Do not buy this!!!
I bought this item through amazon (Tiger Direct) - got it home, it worked fine on one hard drive, then I plugged it into a perfectly good, working 160GB maxtor drive and the drive started smoking badly from the motherboard and had to be unplugged before it caused a fire!

Now my 160gb no longer even boots up! I am so displeased with this cheaply made converter, and it ruined my hard drive!

 It works
Got this for $14.99+tax from surplus computers, no shipping charge, as I bought from retail store in person.
After struggling a day, finally I realized that I was connecting upside down to the drive- (it fits in either way)- and to make it work it has to be "correctly" connected to the drive- (following the arrows marked on the adapter). Also it is necessary to change the jumper settings of the drive to make it "Master"- (if not already). I observed that "Cable Select", "Slave" both did not work. When these two points are followed, it worked great- I tried Hard Drive, CD drives etc.
The following are my obsevations:
(1) If you connect upside down- windows(xp) will show "IDE to USB", then it will show "USB Mass Storage", then it will show "A problem occured while installing your hardware- it may not work properly." No drive will show up.
Probably this is what happened to earlier reviewers for whom it never worked.
(2) If you do not make the drive as Master:
Nothing will show up.

 MUST FOR PROFESSIONAL, WORKS BEST NO COMPLAINT AT ALL
RECOMMENDED FOR COMPUTER TECH FOR HIGH END USE, BEGINNER BE CAUTIOUS FOR DATA LOSS.
GOOD SERVICE ON TIME THRU' TIGER DIRECT, QUALITY IS BETTER.

 Should work, but doesn't
I too bought this item through Amazon (Tiger Direct) and found that it did not perform was it was suppose to.. AT ALL! Even though I am running XP Pro and windows supposedly found the drivers for it, it would not fuction correctly. Could not access any drive that I attempted to use it on and the adapter kept blinking in and out of the device drivers.

Useless!

Had to call Tiger Direct to get phone number for manufacturer (it's not in the literature). Manufacturer was not available when I attempted to contact them. (Wednesday at 9 am MST). I couldn't get online at the time to go to their website or to attempt to find information online.

Ended up throwing adapter in the trash. Tiger Direct does NOT reimburse shipping even if item is defective. Not worth returning a $20 item and eating $14 in shipping (both ways)

I went and bought a different brand (exact same setup) at a local store and it worked like a charm!

 Smoked My 160GB Maxtor.
This thing Smoked My 160GB Maxtor!
The drive,with 160GB of information on it is no longer usable.
Use extreme caution!!!!

 Works great - nice addition to a hardware support tool kit
My experiences have been only positive with this product, and I don't work for Tiger Direct or the manufacturer. About 20 hard drives connected so far (notebook and desktop), and the only drives that did not work were those suspected of mechanical failure in their host machines. The adapter works great for retrieving data from a drive that will no longer boot due to OS corruption or for checking the contents of older drives.

The included power brick is cheap and probably the source of frustration for other reviewers, but don't expect much for $20. Limiting the connection time may be the only reason I've had good luck so far. If you are trying to convert a drive for external use, I would suggest a drive enclosure instead.

 Works well, IF you get a good one
I bought one of these from eBay. It was completely defective (Windows didn't even see a device plugged in). I got another one from surplus computers. In w2k, this one complained about "Function Driver not Specified for this Device Instance". In winME, it just said "unrecognized device." In winXP, it didn't complain at all, but just didn't work. For techies: the Vendor and Product PnP ID were both returned as 0. Returned that one to the store, and have had no trouble with the new one. The enclosed instructions say to set your drive to master, and power up all before plugging USB cable in. VERY IMPORTANT.