Any real differences between eSATA and USB 3.0?

[Megalith]

I bought a quad-bay enclosure in June, which is hooked up via eSATA and working great so far. I'm looking into getting another, but since I have only one eSATA port, I'll be connecting it via USB 3.0.

I'm pretty sure that regular read/write operation will be very similar (I'm not using SSDs), but what if I'm transferring data to multiple drives within the enclosure simultaneously? Is one connection type going to outperform the other?

 

[staticlag]

USB 3 is easier to setup.

eSATA is faster. Though it depends if you have a 1.5, 3, or 6 Gbps eSata port, not all eSATA ports are the same.

 

[AthlonX2]

eSATA has the potential to be faster, but most manufacturers use eSATA 3Gb/s while USB 3.0 has 5Gb/s capability, though if your not using solid state drives you most likely wont notice a difference.

If your looking for external enclosure I would recommend you take a look at some of the products from Teratrend, they command a bit more in terms of price but the quality is great and backed by Silverstone.

 

[omniscence]

It depends how the enclosure is designed. Most use a SATA port multiplier connected to a SATA-USB bridge, but only use a 3 Gbps connection internally. So as long as you use UAS (USB attached SCSI), there should be no significant difference.