OWC

Name: OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 / OWC ThunderBay 4 Spare Drive Tray
SKU: OWCMEQX2TRAY
Price: 14.99 USD
Availability: InStock
Rating: 4.77 (43 reviews)

Hard Drive Tray
for the OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2
or the OWC ThunderBay

This is a spare hard drive tray for the OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 or Thunderbay four-bay RAID enclosures. Having a spare tray allows you to easily swap drives without the need for extra tools.

Potential Uses:

Stand by "cold spare" available for hot swapping a drive
Rotating backups, keeping drive backups off-site
Separate storage for individual clients or large projects

OWC Mercury Elite Qx2 These drive trays are compatible with the four-bay Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 Professional Grade Performance Solution.

OWC ThunderBay These drive trays are compatible with the four-bay ThunderBay Professional Grade Performance Solution.

Gallery

Package Contents

Hard Drive Bracket.
Four hard drive mounting screws.
3 Year OWC Limited Warranty (tray only)

Customer Ratings

Write a Review 4.7 / 5 40 out of 43 (93%) reviewers would recommend this product

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Top 50 Contributor

Reviewer: MountainMan Location: Woodland Park, CO Age: 55-65 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Qx2 review, Chapter 2 February 11, 2017 Lest anyone have doubts about OWC customer service, consider my experience with the Qx2. I had major problems with my unit, covered thoroughly in an earlier review. After two years of service, it stopped working reliably, disconnecting often and ultimately corrupting my drives (even though I was running in independent mode). No amount of tech support at OWC (and we spent many hours trying) was able to diagnose or identify the problem, so I essentially gave up on the device, considering it nothing more than a large paperweight.

Robert J., technical customer service rep at OWC, noticed my negative review and took it upon himself to contact me. After a few back-and-forth emails discussing my experiences, Robert determined that it was still under warranty and arranged to have it returned to OWC (even providing a prepaid shipping label).

OWC tested and confirmed the random disconnect problem, apparently a malfunction within the Qx2's circuitry. Within a few days, Robert and OWC returned to me--again, at no cost--my Qx2 with new innards. So far, it is working flawlessly, so I assume I was simply unlucky with the original unit.

As other reviewers have mentioned, don't trust any single device with irreplaceable files. I will continue to monitor the performance of my "new" Qx2, and trust that my problems are things of the past. Four stars for the Qx2 itself, as I'm still a bit gun shy, but six stars for Robert and OWC customer service.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure. Customer Videos:

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Adamski

Rating: 3/5 Affordable but LOUD January 30, 2017 Affordable but LOUD. Also, don't like that a key is required.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from 12.0TB OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 4 Bay eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 Hardware Desktop RAID. Customer Videos:

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: peterl7 Location: Austarlia Age: 45-54 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Excellent Raid solution January 17, 2017 quality unit ++++++

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure. Customer Videos:

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: peterl7 Age: 45-54

Rating: 5/5 A great unit!!! January 17, 2017 Excellent RAID solution

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from 8.0TB OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 4 Bay eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 2.0 Hardware Desktop RAID. Customer Videos:

Reviewer: adamwc Age: 35-44 Experience Level: Home User Owned Product: over 6 months

Rating: 5/5 Be Mindful, RAIDs are not failsafe January 4, 2017 I agree with other reviewers here that the Qx2 system is fantastic. It's quiet, the performance is excellent in RAID 5 and RAID 0 configurations (what I use) and probably in others, too.

But I want to point something out based on a recent experience. I had a Qx2 with enterprise drives in RAID 5 mode fail on me EIGHT years after my initial purchase. That's a good long life for any hard drive, I'm not complaining. However, at that point, the hard drive I would use to replace my failed drive has different firmware installed. And according to DriveSavers, attempting to rebuild a RAID 5 with drives that have different firmware can actually corrupt the entire RAID, resulting in total data loss. The data recovery estimate from DriveSavers (which is a partner with OWC and offers purchasers a 20% discount) ranges from a bit over a thousand dollars to $7000.

The Qx2 products are awesome, but they're not failsafe. If you're using them to back up critical documents, back those documents up on other drives and in the cloud and on BluRays, too. And seriously consider buying a couple of extra drives (I should have done this in the first place) that exactly match what OWC is installing in your system, so you'll be in an ideal position to recover data in the event of a drive failure.

This is a fantastic product, but nothing made by man is made to last forever. Cover thy assets.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from 24.0TB OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 4 Bay eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 Enterprise Class Desktop RAID. Customer Videos:

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: TomDFrog Location: Central Maryland Age: 35-44 Experience Level: IT Professional Owned Product: less than a month

Rating: 4/5 A Great RAID box November 30, 2016 I have begun replacing my Mercury Rack Pros with these. They are great. Their innards are the same as the MRP, so the drives swapped right in. And, they run quieter. Hopefully, they are more reliable over the long haul.

Their one flaw compared to the MRP is their reliance on mounting the drives into carriers to be inserted.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from (*) OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure. Customer Videos:

Reviewer: Nicholas Location: Derby, United Kingdom of Great Britain (UK) Age: 35-44 Experience Level: IT Professional Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Perfect Solution for MASSIVE iTunes Library November 11, 2016 Really love the build quality on this unit. Nice an heavy and extreamly well built.

Fan in the unit works well but is not at all noisy, four happy blinking lights all operting in Raid 5 and quick as lightning.

This unit replaces an aging Lacie d2 Quadra and now provides 24TB of storage for my iTunes folder which is perfect for my needs (8+8+8+8 in Raid 5)

Unit is very fat connected over Firewire 800 to my 2010 Mac Mini server and I am pleased as punch.

I would recommend this item to a friend! Customer Videos:

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Macinations Location: Colorado Age: Over 65 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Got just what I wanted November 7, 2016 What I wanted was a USB3 4 bay disk enclosure that would run large drives as a JBOD peripheral. And that is what I got. I really like the build quality and appearance of this unit as well as the different kinds of ports. The fan is quiet and disks are easy to install and change but this does require use of a screw driver.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure. Customer Videos:

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: DoctorOmaha Location: Omaha, NE Age: Over 65 Experience Level: Home User Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Works flawlessly October 14, 2016 I bought case without drives. Easy to install, Works well, easy to set up. I've had it for about a month, no issues

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure. Customer Videos:

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: pennywise Location: Hollywood, CA Age: 45-54 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: 3-4 months

Rating: 5/5 Interchangable.... September 12, 2016 I love this enclosure. I like the fact that I can have 4 independent drives. I HIGHLY recommend you DO NOT use this as a RAID. I had done this before, but my bridge connector sizzled and toasted all my drives in this enclosure. I'm back though, and pleased as punch.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure. Customer Videos:

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: ecallero Location: Los Angeles Age: 25-34 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 4/5 Great RAID September 1, 2016 My only complaint is that the USB 3.0 cables supplied with the device are pretty much useless because they are so short. I would gladly trade the included FW and eSATA cables for a longer one.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from 12.0TB OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 4 Bay eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 Hardware Desktop RAID. Customer Videos:

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: New York, NY Age: 55-65 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: over 6 months

Rating: 5/5 Excellent Unit, Excellent Service July 24, 2016 I purchased two Mercury Elite Pro units to accommodate back ups and day-to-day work with photos and video. The units have delivered reliable service with one glitch--one drive on one unit failed recently. The warranty in force, I returned the failing drive and had a replacement in hand in short order. The new drive rebuilt as expected from the RAID array. I am very happy with this device. When I need more storage, I will definitely be looking at purchasing another these units.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from 8.0TB OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 4 Bay eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 Hardware Desktop RAID.

Verified Buyer Top 100 Contributor

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: Middle of nowhere Age: 55-65 Experience Level: IT Professional Owned Product: 3-4 months

Rating: 4/5 Gets all those boxes off your desk April 16, 2016 I use the T-bolt version of this device for my active files. It comes with SoftRAID that allows almost complete customization. Recommended if you use multiple work disks. (Using SSDs in RAID 0 yields data access rates almost the same as internal SSD.)

This in contrast is cheaper, slower with USB-3 and best as I can tell gives less flexibility in RAID choices. (You get one and that's it for the whole device.) Would be nice if SoftRAID would work on these USB boxes.

Still they are an excellent value, and I'm using them it as a JBOD device and have multiple backup storage in it (including a complete bootable system). I also have my Time Machine on a huge 6TB drive. I once would have said I'd never fill up such a large drive, but I've been proven wrong many times.

Highly recommended for those needing various storage arrangements and also who can live with a single RAID configuration and don't need highest thru put possible.

(1 star off for RAID limitability.)

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from (*) OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: Baltimore Age: 35-44 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: over 6 months

Rating: 5/5 It just works April 11, 2016 it's my working horse for the last 4 years.

This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 2.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: Dallas, Texas Age: 55-65 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: over 6 months

Rating: 4/5 Improved design, have had both series March 26, 2016 I handle high end creative as a hands-on CD - video / FX, HTML5 animation, image editing and compositing, product design, site authoring, print, packaging, displays, marketing support, etc. — Major projects for leading brands. I stress my hardware to the max. I use a QX2 that is two years old for my main live storage and a second QX2 (a couple of months old, with an improved internal design) for my main backup. The internals of my original enclosure failed after three years (out of warranty) and I replaced it with an identical unit. The drives and content were immediately recognized and everything fired right up. The newer version of the enclosure (which I've had for a couple of months) features an improved internal design and I'm hoping it will far outlast the warranty. A month ago one of the original four drives began to vibrate but the older enclosure did not specify which drive was bad. It simply indicated that there was a problem. After yanking the drives and running Drive Genius on the individual drives, I was not able to tell which one was bad. I'm going to put two of the drives in a spare Mercury Elite Dual and mirror them. If one craps out, I can then know what to use for my next set of wind chimes. Meanwhile, I tried to buy a couple of matching drives for the older enclosure, but the manufacturer had changed hands and dropped that model. The result was that I had to buy a new set of four drives for the older enclosure. Lesson learned, when I bought new drives I bought the same model of Toshibas that were in the new RAID, along with a couple of spares. Make sure you but an extra drive or two in case one drive dies. All four drives must be the same model or you will be stuck with either a JBOD or you'd have to buy a new set of four. As for my very first QX2 - which tanked a couple of years ago, I never actually threw it out. The thing is so solidly built that I might need it to prop up my car for the next oil change.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from 8.0TB OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 4 Bay eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 Hardware Desktop RAID.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: Sudbury MA Age: 45-54 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Great RAID solution February 18, 2016 This is a great RAID solution. It matches the style of the MacPros until the 2013 update. Easy to set up, and your choice of RAID configurations. I happened to choose RAID 5, loaded it with 4 x 4TB drives and have a 12TB monster that should take a decade to fill. Ok, maybe just 5 years?

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: Torrance, Calif. Age: 45-54 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Awesome for Mac, RAID5/RAID1+0 January 10, 2016 Bought two of these since happy with prior purchase of the rack mount version. We're using one as RAID5 with 4x/6TB, and another for audio/video work in RAID 1+0 with 4x/6TB (2+2 stripe+mirror). With our venerable Mac Pros (Xeon, 5,1 era), and eSATA cards these really scream. Great upgrade vs having multiple internal drives.

I did a speed test this weekend just for laughs, while also testing the new OWC Accelsior S card -- I will post these specs on that item as well.

VERY HAPPY WITH THIS PRODUCT -- hence buying a second one. Using Toshiba 4TB in the RAID5 unit, and we're using HGST/NAS Deskstar for the RAID1+0.

BLACKMAGIC DISK SPEED TEST/1.9.16+1.10.16 Music Mac (Mac Pro 5,1; 8 core/Xeon; 32GB DDR3; OSX Yosemite 10.5) -- average read/write**; not peak or low /5GB test -- (1) write 138.8 MB/s || 138.7 MB/s (2) write 165 MB/s || read 233.9 MB/s (3) write 185.4 MB/s || read 237.6 MB/s (4) write 185.4 MB/s || read 378.5 MB/s

(1) = Audio drive, WD Velociraptor 1TB 10K/RPM HD; 3GBS/SATAII-BUS (2) = Boot Drive, 240GB Mercury Electra 6G SSD; 3GBS/SATAII-BUS (3) = OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 RAID(1+0) stripe+mirror (2+2); HGST 6TB Deskstar/NAS 7200RPM x4; external/Newer Technology MAXPower PCIe eSATA 2-Port SATA 6G. (4) = Boot Drive, 240GB Mercury Electra 6G SSD => 6GBS/PCIe 'Mercury Accelsior S' Card

All drives/hardware sourced from OWC/MacSales.

**(NOTE: SSDs use compression for speed, which doesn't work as well with audio/video files, so the "actual" WRITE speed is usually half as much as "advertised" for most A/V work vs small uncompressed files.)

Obviously the SATAIII/6GBS bus speeds up legacy Mac Pro no matter how you slice it, either internal card or external eSATA card.

My setup for PCIe (PCI bus speed 'x') A/4x - OWC Excelsior S w/SSD B/4x - OWC eSATA 6GBS External Card C/16x - UAD2 Quad PCIe D/16x - The base level video card for its era (less heat)

:-) CLS

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: Indianapolis, IN Age: 55-65 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: less than a month

Rating: 5/5 Performance for Now and Later December 28, 2015 I have a 2010 17" MBP and wanted a high-performance backup solution to replace a very outdated NAS box in my home, as well as TimeMachine/USB 2.0 backups. I can honestly say I've noticed a huge performance increase just going from USB 2.0 to FW800. The next step will be eSATA. What I really like is that I have the additional headroom for USB 3.0 when I'm ready for my next machine. The support had been excellent from MacSales an I wouldn't hesitate to purchase this product or any of the other upgrades I've purchased previously.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from (*) OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: Maryland Age: Over 65 Experience Level: IT Professional Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Very capable and fast. December 28, 2015 As usual, OWC supplies solid performance at a fair price and quick delivery. Instructions are easy to follow and accurate. I loaded the unit with 4x2TB of storage that was vital. As my requirement was for 4 individual drives and the default RAID 5 configuration requires reformatting, I was quite anxious about the first power-up. The instructions firmly say that you have to select the individual option. Short bit of breath-holding and my fears were gone. A quiet, fast and versatile storage set was humming beautifully.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: New York Age: 55-65 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Great drives! Lots of extra storage December 15, 2015 The setup is a little tricky, so be sure to set the little dial to the desired formatting. You do need to put the drives into the case yourself, but that is very easy. Once up and running you have a cool 12 TB os drive space!

This review is from 12.0TB OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 4 Bay eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 Hardware Desktop RAID.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Experience Level: Power User

Rating: 4/5 OK November 28, 2015 I have owned several of these units, since when they were USB 2.0 (sloooow by nowadays' standards). The USB 3.0 is quite fast, it's hardware RAID (including RAID 5), and never had trouble with any of these. The problem is that the drives never seem to go to sleep! Not a huge deal for me in particular since I have content on the drives that is continually updated, but otherwise I would have probably returned the unit (say you use it for daily backups or media or other things used only a few times a day). Big bug in my opinion, with many users on discussion boards reporting on this, for years! Should be fixed.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from (*) OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

Verified Buyer Top 100 Contributor

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: New York City Age: 45-54 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Excellent quality as always November 21, 2015 Plugged it in and away I go. Great quality as always.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from 8.0TB OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 4 Bay eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 Hardware Desktop RAID.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: Australia Age: 55-65 Experience Level: Power User Owned Product: over 6 months

Rating: 5/5 Outstanding performance - Nice and quiet. November 20, 2015 I chose to buy the enclosure and the drives seperately. When I selected and installed the drives it just became a fantastic mega drive with all the space under the sun. It is quiet in operation and has the look and feel of real quality. Happy? Unquestionably.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 2.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Owned Product: over 6 months

Rating: 4/5 Haven't used it as much as I had planned November 12, 2015 Ordered this empty box in 2011 and put in 4 2GB drives to give me a 6GB RAID. Ended up using it more for backup purposes than anything else, and up until recently it mostly just sat. Still works fine when I do use it, which is a bit more as of recent days, but it's no SSD.

Did try it with a 2 meter eSATA cable at one point, but eventually figured out that it wasn't terribly reliable that way, so 1 meter eSATA is probably best fit for it.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 2.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

Verified Buyer

Reviewer: Anonymous Location: Switzerland Age: 35-44 Experience Level: IT Professional Owned Product: 1-3 months

Rating: 5/5 Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 October 16, 2015 I hacked my 2009 imac and added esata to it, so I could edit some video with some sort of speed for a change. When I first connected the Qx2, it was only seeing one disk. After realising I need to push in the little reset button and setting the raid config....Voila!!!! I've had this for a month now and am using Hitachi 7200 disk in it, and so far, its working like a charm. Disk were easy to install, its design is very matching the Mac look, and its super quiet!! Need just a chasis now to hold my backup disk, and I think I'll get this again and use it for that purpose.

I would recommend this item to a friend! This review is from OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 eSATA,FireWire 800+USB 3.0 4-Bay SATA Desktop RAID Enclosure.

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OWC Drive Tray for OWC Mercury Elite Qx2 / ThunderBay Models Mfr P/N: MEQX2TRAY MacSales.com SKU: OWCMEQX2TRAY Easily swap drives without the need for extra tools. 3 Year OWC Limited Warranty Ships: Same Day

Reviews (43)

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OWC

Hard Drive Trayfor the OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2or the OWC ThunderBay

Gallery

Package Contents

Customer Ratings

Hard Drive Tray
for the OWC Mercury Elite Pro Qx2
or the OWC ThunderBay