Review on StarTech.com SuperSpeed USB 3.0 Card Adapter - Dual Port Flush Mount ExpressCard 54mm Controller with UASP for Laptop (ECUSB3S254F) by Darnell Murphy

Finally! I've had this amazing Qosmio laptop since 2010. That's right. SEVEN LONG YEARS! And it's still going strong. This is an excellent laptop. The only thing is that it never had USB 3 ports. I don't know why I never thought of it before, but until recently it never occurred to me that I could get a PCMCIA USB 3 card! In fact, I completely forgot that this laptop has a PCMCIA slot! I mean how often do you even think about PCMCIA TODAY? The reason this has become an issue lately is because I've had a few situations where I needed to move a few terabytes of data from one drive to another. Well, USB 2 can do it at around a few terabytes a day if you're REALLY LUCKY! Most likely less! With USB 3.x this can be done in a few hours. It will still take most of the day, but you can move 5, 6, or 7 terabytes in the same time as ONE terabyte over USB 2. THAT convinced me I had to find a way to get some USB 3 LOVE on this notebook. Wow, I found a PCMCIA port that I forgot a long time ago. The only real problem I had with this card was caused by an overly strong spring in the PCMCIA port. This is a spring-loaded device that allows you to press down on the card to pop it out. When I press on this card, this button does not fully seat, and this causes a slight external force on the card, causing it to disengage, although the card still appears to be fully seated. I saw some other people complaining about the connection coming and going and I figured it was a bad driver or some other issue. I finally realized the problem was fixed when I manually clicked on the card! The connections are solid, but the hard drives are online! So I took the card out and used a metal nail file to firmly press the spring-loaded button in the slot. I carefully slide the card back in and insert it, being careful not to press too hard to activate the spring-loaded button. Since then it has worked flawlessly! Boy was I glad I found out. I called StarTech Support. I called them and gave them a thumbs up because I didn't want them to think there was an issue here. This is a great product and I'm glad it's still around even though it's been on the market for many years. away! Thank you StarTech!