does this exist? external enclosure for multiple sata desktop drives

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rfadream

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 26, 2006
Messages
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Hi guys I hope you guys can tell me if there is something out there that fits my needs.
I currently have a Lian Li PC-A05b with 1x 640gb and 3x 750gb sata drives.
I'd like to move the 3x 750's outside the case into some kind of external enclosure with usb and power.

Basically I'm asking if there is an external enclosure that holds 3 sata hard drives in one tidy package that I can hook up by usb when needed and left at home if I want to take my pc to a lan.

Thanks!
 
rfadream said:
Basically I'm asking if there is an external enclosure that holds 3 sata hard drives in one tidy package that I can hook up by usb when needed and left at home if I want to take my pc to a lan.
Click to expand...

"Dual" and "Quad" bay external enclosures are quite common ... don't recall seeing a "Tri" bay enclosure. Did a quick scan of "the egg" and found the following "Quad" bay enclosures ... Aluratek CyClone ACQES350F, AMS DS-2340SES, AMS DS-2350S,AMS VENUS ES5 DS-315SES, Galaxy METAL GEAR 4500M, ICY DOCK MB561US-4S, ICY DOCK MB561US-4SC ... there are certainly others available.

Suggest that you consider an eSATA interface.
 
Yup, pretty common, and I'd also suggest an eSATA interface. Another choice is internal PSU or external. Most internals, like the Sans Digital multibay enclosures I have, also have a fan that may or may not be noisy. But I like not having to carry around an extra power brick.
 
thanks for the help. yes i would much prefer the power brick to be inside. i have an eSata port on my laptop but not on my dfi mobo.
how exactly does esata work? the one on my laptop doubles as a usb port. if i take out my wd 750gb sata hd and connect it to my laptop's eSata port with a regular sata cable will it work?
it doesn't need a separate power cable? is it able to draw power thru the data connection?
 
rfadream said:
thanks for the help. yes i would much prefer the power brick to be inside. i have an eSata port on my laptop but not on my dfi mobo.
how exactly does esata work? the one on my laptop doubles as a usb port. if i take out my wd 750gb sata hd and connect it to my laptop's eSata port with a regular sata cable will it work?
it doesn't need a separate power cable? is it able to draw power thru the data connection?
Click to expand...
esata is physically a different connection. so no, you cant just take out sata hard drive and plug it into esata. Most esata enclosers i've seen still require separate power. Advantages of esata is that it's much faster than usb 2.0, or firewire 800/400. It's also natively sata, so it doesn't require much circuitry for manufactures to make esata enclosers for sata drives and fully supports all sata features. The reason they use a different cable is because the cables themselves have to shielded better than standard internal cables.

I've seen some motherboards taht come with esata connections in the form of little brackets that connect into motherboard and fit in the back at the pci/agp/pciexpress openings. Double check you didn't get one of these. Otherwise, just buy an esata card.
 
for some reason multi drive enclosures are all (that I've seen) ridiculously priced
you'd be better off buy 3 single drive enclosures
 
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