Addonics Technologies today announced the first hard drive solution that enables any standard 2.5-inch IDE hard drive to be used like a hot-swap data cartridge.

The Combo Hard Drive (CHD) USIB25 is based on Addonics' patent pending USIB drive cradle, which allows users to easily install a hot swap drive bay into a standard 3.5" drive bay (or 5.25 bay with optional adapter) in any desktop, server, or computing enclosure via the USB, Firewire or Serial ATA (SATA) interface without any expensive or complicated hardware or software. The same hard drive can also become an external mobile storage device and attach to any system that does not have a drive bay with the appropriate Addonics external cable.

Unlike other external hard drive enclosures that limit users to a single interface, the drive enclosure in the Combo Hard Drive USIB25 attaches to any computer via USB 2.0/1.1, Firewire/iLink, CardBus/ PCMCIA, Serial ATA or future interface standards. You can remove any drive in seconds and share or replace it with another.

The versatility of the Combo Hard Drive assures that data stored on your hard drive is easily accessible by a wide variety of computers, including systems with legacy hardware and operating systems. It also provides security since the drive enclosure can be quickly removed from the system like a data cartridge to lock away sensitive information, without shutting down and restarting the system.

The flexible power connection allows users to power the hard drive enclosure from the USB port, Firewire port, PCMCIA slot, PC power supply or the AC/DC adapter.

Maximum data transfer rates vary by the interface used and range from 1.5 Mbytes/sec for USB 1.1 to 150 Mbytes/sec for Serial ATA. Hot swap is certified with USB, Firewire under Windows 98SE, Me, 2000 or XP, and Serial ATA (when used with Addonics SATA Host controller) under Windows 2000 and XP.

The Addonics Combo Hard Drive USIB25 includes one Drive Enclosure, and one USIB25 Drive Cradle in a choice of ivory or dark brown. The package also includes a 110/220 AC/DC 5V power adapter; driver CD for Windows 98SE; and one USB 2.0, PCMCIA, Firewire or external SATA interface cable depending on the model.

The MSRP for the Combo Hard Drive USIB25 with USB 2.0 is $79; $99 with Firewire; $89 with CardBus/PCMCIA, and $89 with SATA.