Question Need a hand sorting through some SATA/USB cable issues

[klippenwald]

I must be getting old. Can't sort this one out. I have a bunch of old spin drives. I bought a bunch of SATA to USB 3.0 connectors to plug the drives in to a computer and access them via powered USB 3.0 hub. I picked a high-watt version to be sure that it could handle the power needs of a few HDDs running on it, and figured the 3.0 would get me OK transfer speeds for drives that I only needed to access occasionally. The pigtails are combined power/data.

Plugged a drive in, turned on the hub...nothing. Wouldn't spin up. Tried a diff cable on the off chance that my first one was DOA, and same story. No spin. Tried a second drive, maybe the first was dead. Nope. Checked the hub with another device to see if the hub works and it does. Plugged the pigtail into the PC frame USB 3.0 port and still no spin.

So I'm guessing something's up with either the power being inadequate, I got the wrong cables (though I don't know how seeing as they're combined power/data and advertised as working with both SSD and HDD), they're ALL bad cables, or it's a signal issue not triggering the drive to spin up.

Anyone help me out here and tell me where I went wrong?

 

[USAFRet]

3.5" HDDs need both 5v and 12v power.

The 5v can come from the USB, but the 12v needs to come from a wall plug.

 

[klippenwald]

I gotta ask - why on earth do they make SATA to USB power+data pigtails then? What good are they if a USB 3.0 can't supply the 12v power? I did a quick look and didn't see any 12v/5v USB hubs. If I'd known that I would have just picked USB SATA cables and used an old PSU for power.

Thanks for the answer. Confirms what I suspected, now I gotta find a workaround.

 

[USAFRet]

I gotta ask - why on earth do they make SATA to USB power+data pigtails then? What good are they if a USB 3.0 can't supply the 12v power? I did a quick look and didn't see any 12v/5v USB hubs. If I'd known that I would have just picked USB SATA cables and used an old PSU for power.

Thanks for the answer. Confirms what I suspected, now I gotta find a workaround.

For 2.5" SSDs, or most (not all) laptop 2.5" HDDs.

There are a multitude of docks for 3.5" drives.
These, for example:
https://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-Drive-Docking-Station-inches/dp/B07RC6YWRX

Amazon.com

 

[klippenwald]

Oh I’m fully aware of the docks, and the SSD drives working with the connector. My fault for not knowing the different power requirements for the full size spin drive. Unfortunately these adapters claim to work with 3.5 drives, but I guess that’s not true in my case. I’ll have to cobble together some SATA setup with my old PSU, I don’t need a half-dozen wall warts for docks, and certainly don’t want to keep swapping drives in a single dock.

Thanks for the help.