deuces wild Posted January 19, 2006 Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 I am looking for an external hard drive enclosure (USB 2.0 access) for a newer W.D.seriall ATA 3.5" internal hard drive. Doing a search on Ebay I find hundreds. Can anyone recommend a particular brand? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scarecrow Man Posted January 19, 2006 Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 I just purchased one. It was a brand manufactured by the local BestBuy. I cannot recomend one, as I have not used anything other than this one.I will say that USB 2.0 external enclosures work in bursts. This means they send a large amount of data at a time, then pause. They do not work contiulously as an IDE hard drive would. Therefore, do not try to burn any sort of CD/DVD from your external. Always transfer to an internal first. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andsome Posted January 19, 2006 Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 My son and daughter bough me a Western Digital from here. It stands upright on its own small legs. So far I am very well pleased with it.They bought it from here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thos Posted January 19, 2006 Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 I bought an external hard drive from here and have been very pleased with it, the price and the speed of service. I bought their own brand but they do a variety of others.Thos. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deuces wild Posted January 19, 2006 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 I just purchased one. It was a brand manufactured by the local BestBuy. I cannot recomend one, as I have not used anything other than this one.I will say that USB 2.0 external enclosures work in bursts. This means they send a large amount of data at a time, then pause. They do not work contiulously as an IDE hard drive would. Therefore, do not try to burn any sort of CD/DVD from your external. Always transfer to an internal first. Can music files be stored on it and played back easily with any interruption or skipping? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-pops- Posted January 19, 2006 Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 Can music files be stored on it and played back easily with any interruption or skipping?Have DVD files on an external hard drive. These playback and write to disk with no problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deuces wild Posted January 19, 2006 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 Can music files be stored on it and played back easily with any interruption or skipping?Have DVD files on an external hard drive. These playback and write to disk with no problem. Is it an internal hard drive in an external hard drive enclosure pops? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-pops- Posted January 19, 2006 Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 Yes, a normal IDE hard drive which I put into an enclosure myself but, from what I have seen, the commercial ones are very similar.Putting the disk in a box yourself is lower cost than buying a made up unit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trackrat Posted January 19, 2006 Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 Mine is an internal H/D in an external H/D enclosure and I have 10gb of music on it and no problems playing them.The enclosure is a Belkin one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scarecrow Man Posted January 19, 2006 Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 Sorry, I should have specified.Yes. Video/Audio/Data will play just fine. The USB 2.0 is fast enough to throw data in bursts so the RAM (which is doing the actual playback) can keep up. Mind you if you have a very minimal amount of ram, you might notice skipping or buffering.I was just warning about burning data/audio/video from an external drive. Since it works in bursts, you will get buffer under-run errors.I am using a Maxtor 200GB IDE drive in an enclosure I put together myself. It is not hard. 4 screws hold the drive to a controller board, and 4 screws hold the drive together. All the work is done by the controller board.Rather than going and buying an external drive, I recomend buying an internal drive and an external enclosure seperatly. You can save yourself a lot of money. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deuces wild Posted January 19, 2006 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 Thanks all. The problem I have seen is that the brand name external enclosures are anywhere from $50 to $100. However, I have seen a number of off brands on ebay for $20 or so. I don't want to sink a lot of money in this and was wondering if the off brands would work just as well. Here are some examples: http://tinyurl.com/adodf Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scarecrow Man Posted January 20, 2006 Report Share Posted January 20, 2006 I cannot recomend a brand, but some things to look for:Material: Aluminum will not conduct heat as much as some materials. I'd stay away from plastic though, as it could melt.Fans: If the drive includes fans, that is a plus although you do not nesessarily need it.Brand: Is the brand a name you have used before? If so were you satisfied with thier product or not? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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