LaCie Hub Now Shipping, Connects eSATA Drives via Thunderbolt

Announced at CES earlier this year, the LaCie's new Thunderbolt eSATA Hub is now shipping. The device allows external eSATA drives to be connected to Thunderbolt equipped Macs. The daisy-chainable hub includes two eSATA ports and retails for $199.

eSATA is a high performance drive connector used to connect external hard drives to your computer. eSATA has never been a standard option on Macs, but is a faster alternative to USB 2.0 and Firewire and is commonly found on high performance external drives and storage arrays.

esatahub
For those who are have existing eSATA drives or are waiting for Thunderbolt drives to drop in price, this could be a good interim solution. The Hub isn't yet available for order on LaCie's website. We spoke to someone at LaCie's sales center who told us the first batch had sold out, but that more were to arrive in a few days. Interested parties can contact LaCie sales directly to place an order for one of these backordered units, and it'll ship out when LaCie receives them.

Popular Stories

streaming black friday 2025

Black Friday Streaming Deals Include Big Savings on Disney+, Hulu, Apple TV, and More

Monday November 24, 2025 8:03 am PST by
We've been focusing on deals on physical products over the past few weeks, but Black Friday is also a great time of year to purchase a streaming membership. Some of the biggest services have great discounts for new and select returning members this week, including Disney+, Hulu, Paramount+, Peacock, and more. Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When you click a...
iOS 26 on Three iPhones

iOS 27 Will Reportedly Have Two Key Upgrades

Sunday November 23, 2025 8:48 am PST by
iOS 27 will reportedly have two major elements: quality improvements and new AI features. In his Power On newsletter today, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said that iOS 27 will be similar to Mac OS X Snow Leopard, in the sense that Apple is focused on improving "quality and underlying performance" over adding new features. Gurman said there is one exception to this rule, though, as he expects...
General Black Friday Deals 25 Red

Apple Black Friday Deals Available Now on AirPods, iPads, Accessories, and More

Friday November 21, 2025 8:48 am PST by
We're only a few days away from Black Friday, which will take place on Friday, November 28 in 2025. As always, this will be the best time of the year to shop for great deals, including popular Apple products like AirPods, iPad, Apple Watch, and more. In this article, the majority of the discounts will be found on Amazon. Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When...
iOS 26

iOS 26.2 Adds These New Features to Your iPhone

Thursday November 20, 2025 10:50 am PST by
iOS 26.2 is currently in beta testing. The upcoming update includes a handful of new features and changes on the iPhone, including a new Liquid Glass slider for the Lock Screen's clock, offline lyrics for Apple Music, and more. In a recent press release, Apple confirmed that iOS 26.2 will be released to all users in December, but it did not provide a specific release date. Keep reading...
maxresdefault

The MacRumors Show: iPhone 18 Pro Looks Like a Huge Upgrade

Friday November 21, 2025 9:10 am PST by
On this week's episode of The MacRumors Show, we talk through all of the new features and improvements expected to come to next year's iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max models. Subscribe to The MacRumors Show YouTube channel for more videos Apple's next-generation iPhones are less than ten months away and we already have a good idea about what to expect based on corroborated leaks, rumors,...
Apple Foldable Thumb

Foldable iPhone to Debut These Three Breakthrough Features

Tuesday November 25, 2025 7:09 am PST by
Apple's first foldable iPhone is expected to launch alongside the iPhone 18 Pro models in fall 2026, and it's shaping up to include three standout features that could set it apart from the competition. The book-style foldable will reportedly feature an industry-first 24-megapixel under-display camera built into the inner display, according to a recent JP Morgan equity research report. That...
apple news banner

Apple News Loses CNN

Monday November 24, 2025 7:56 am PST by
American multinational news company CNN has abruptly pulled its content from Apple News, Semafor reports. CNN quietly removed its stories from Apple News over the weekend and there is no longer a feed from the network to subscribe to in the app. This effectively ends its distribution agreement with Apple while the two sides negotiate new terms. Discussions are apparently ongoing and CNN's...
amazon black friday

Amazon Kicks Off Black Friday Sale With Major Discounts on Apple Accessories, TVs, and More

Sunday November 23, 2025 7:12 am PST by
Black Friday deals have begun, and Amazon is one of the best places you can find steep discounts on numerous products this week. We've already collected all of the best Apple-related deals you'll find at Amazon (and other retailers) in our Apple Black Friday Deals post, so below you'll find other discounts on devices like Anker accessories, Beats headphones, video games, TVs, and more. Note:...
Apple Shopping Event 2025

Apple Announces 2025 Black Friday Event, Here's What You Can Get

Thursday November 20, 2025 6:28 am PST by
Apple's annual four-day Black Friday through Cyber Monday shopping event is returning on Friday, November 28 through Monday, December 1 in many countries, including the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Thailand, and others. During the shopping event, customers can get an Apple gift card with...

Top Rated Comments

barkomatic Avatar
178 months ago
To think I waited and waited for thunderbolt to be introduced on the Macbook pro because I thought I could use all these fast new peripherals. Little did I know how stupidly expensive they'd be and that for the entire life of my computer I'd never once use that port.
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)
669532 Avatar
178 months ago
Awesome (sarcastic)

changed you mind quickly on that one :)
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Domalais Avatar
178 months ago
The pricing on this doesn't make sense.


Why would I pay that much to get ****ed by Apple? I can get ****ed for a lot less than $250.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
scarred Avatar
178 months ago
Thunderbolt continues to be a big disappointment. That is the one feature on my MacBook air that is going to waste. Too bad.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
gnasher729 Avatar
178 months ago
They talk about eSATA being faster than USB2, but isn't it slower than USB3? So the only advantage of doing it with Thunderbolt is daisy-chaining?
Every hard drive has a SATA connector.

USB2 hard drives have a USB2 adapter plugged into the SATA connector.
USB3 hard drives have a USB3 adapter plugged into the SATA connector.
Firewire hard drives have a Firewire adapter plugged into the SATA connector.

Each of those translates the data from the SATA connector to their own format.

eSata does not translate data, it is a direct connection between SATA connector in the computer and the hard drive.

So no connector could ever be faster than eSATA. If you have a 5 GBit USB3 adapter plugged into a 3 GBit SATA connector, you will never get more than 3 GBit out of it.

Now all that said, this box is just stupid. Every hard drive in the world has SATA. SATA is electrically the same as eSATA. So instead of $200 for a box with two eSATA ports, which forces me to use bloody expensive external eSATA drives (a quick look showed a 2 TB eSATA drive for £180, while a 2 TB USB drive is only £85), it would be much more effective to build a box with two SATA connectors and space for two internal SATA drives inside. That would save the customer £200 on the drives, so the box would be worth its money.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Westside guy Avatar
178 months ago
You can get a USB2 -> eSATA adapter for like $20.

Which pretty much defeats the purpose of using the SATA port...
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)