Icy Dock MB994SP-4SB-1 Full Metal Quad Bay 2.5″ SATA 6Gbps Backplane Review

I know this may sound like i’m just repeating myself over with Icy Dock products, but I do like the clear cut approach that they take with their design and build. The matt black finish to the aluminium and SECC body of the backplane and caddies really does tick the right boxes in my books. Icy Dock focus more on the functionality of the drive which is vital rather than splashing them with unnecessary additions and this in turn keeps everything simple and the cost down.

With space at a premium when slotting two 2.5″ drives side by side in a 5.25″ bay, the frame of the backplane is very minimalistic making as much use of the space available as possible.

Turning round to the rear of the cage, we find the two 40mm fans that draw air in, through and out the back keeping drives cool when in use. To the left of there is a single molex power connection and above a on/off switch for the fans. With SSDs not producing as much heat as regular hard drives, there is the option to turn the fans off and in turn reduce system acoustics and a small amount of power draw. Behind each of the respective bays, there is a SATA data header to connect the drives to the motherboard or RAID card.

On the side of the backplane there is a sticker warning that only the eight screws included with the device must be used when securing the backplane into a 5.25″ drive bay. Standard screws are typically longer than the ones supplied and using these instead will enter too far into the frame of the backplane and will damage any drives that are installed.

Removing the caddies is as simple as pressing the left hand side of the latch inward, allowing the main latch to pop out. the caddie the pulls out from the cage. Installation is just the reversal of this.

Each of the cages has a full metal cover that surrounds the drive protecting it as much as possible. Installation of a drive is done by sliding it into the side of each caddy and securing from beneath. With the fans at the back of the backplane drawing air through, the front of each caddy is ventilated to maximise airflow.

On the underside of the cage, there are four screw holes for securing the drive into place. we did find that on all four of the caddies, the rear two holes could do with being further apart as we found on a number of different branded drives that the rear holes did not line up perfectly with the drive, however, part threading both screws in at the same time allowed them to both be fitted. 

Lastly in order to connect the drive to the power and data headers inside the backplane, the rear of each caddy is left open in the middle to allow for connection access.