The Hagibis External 10Gbps USB NVMe Enclosure and Linux

📅 January 6, 2023
During my Adventures with 20Gbps USB in Linux I was impressed with the Quiizlab Rugged NVMe enclosure. Sturdy. Well-built. You could probably drive a wet truck over this mass of metallic NVMe protection and it would be safe.

Sure, it might be limited to a 10Gbps USB interface, but the Rugged is exactly what I have in mind when protecting data on the go.

Seeking related enclosures of like quality, I chanced upon another similar NVMe enclosure: the Hagibis. Yes, yet another cheapo-sounding name nobody has heard of. But is the enclosure any good?

Here are my thoughts after using this with a 10/20Gbps USB port and Linux.

Adventures with 20Gbps USB in Linux

📅 March 14, 2023
“Faster, Skippy! FASTERRRRR!”

What? Is 5 Gbps USB not fast enough for you? Well then, Skippy, the new USB specs have you covered to satisfy your need for external speed…on paper. Reality is another matter.

USB speeds are increasing with each new revision (and confusing USB naming scheme), so the questions now are, “How compatible is Linux with USB 10Gbps and 20Gbps? Does it even work?  What do we need to set it up?”

I needed a faster mechanism for backing up and transferring files using pluggable external media via USB, but the existing USB on older motherboards is too slow to impress. It was not worth an entire system upgrade just to buy a new motherboard with 20Gbps USB, and even then those are usually limited to a single port at the moment. With USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 (which translates to 5Gbps USB) on existing hardware, I could really use a faster interface in order to transfer greater amounts of data in less time. Therefore, I settled on a USB 20Gbps PCIe card in order to:

1. Check how well USB 20Gbps works with Linux (Ubuntu Cinnamon 22.04, Xubuntu 22.04)
2. Become familiar with the hardware details involved setting it up
3. Use it

Sounds simple, right? Oh, silly, silly me. What was I thinking? While the speeds live up to the hype, I discovered that it was not a simple matter of installing a card and moving data. Oh, no, no, no and again no

I was met with a number of unexpected surprises (you will probably not anticipate them either), so here are my results with a variety of hardware, cables, and a brand new USB 20Gbps PCIe interface card to help others who might be contemplating the move to 20Gbps USB in Linux.

Ready for the adventure?