External Case for IDE Drive - recommendations?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Ian Roberts
  • Start date Start date
I

Ian Roberts

Hi

I'm looking for an external enclosure for a standard IDE hard drive
that allows a quick an easy way of inserting and removing the drive.

Ive just found a neat piece of kit which allows any standard IDE drive
(HDD, CD, DVD) to be used externally via a USB port. So the only
thing I'm after now is a neat way to protect the drive while in use.
I'm now able to make use of some of my old drives which have just been
sitting in a cupboard!!!

Thanks for any info.

Ian
 
Ian Roberts said:
I'm looking for an external enclosure for a standard IDE hard drive
that allows a quick an easy way of inserting and removing the drive.

Ive just found a neat piece of kit which allows any standard IDE drive
(HDD, CD, DVD) to be used externally via a USB port. So the only
thing I'm after now is a neat way to protect the drive while in use.
I'm now able to make use of some of my old drives which have just been
sitting in a cupboard!!!
Click to expand...

Ian replies:
Here is one website http://www.firewiremax.com/hardriven.html

I've used the type that install in a std (1/2 size) Floppy/HD opening.
They connect as just another IDE drive to an existing IDE port.
Nice features are: Hot swappable.. But..
Regardless of How you do it..
They all pretty much use a 1" fan for "cooling", which doubles as
"toaster" when the fan gets stuck..
The HD drives work just fine in still air, but NOT in a small box
with NO air. :)

So they are now in my JUNK box, allong with 2 IDE drives. -:)
"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity;
an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
 
ME-320 5.25"/3.5" enclosure www.newegg.com

Works fine, combo model give you both USB 2.0 & IEEE 1394 connections,
plug & play, cools sufficiently to keep 7200rpm HDs cool, works fine.

(Avoid ME-720 model - this 3.5" only case is too small and crowded
inside, thus causing HD temps to go well over 50 degrees C and killing HDs.)
 
Sorry, hard to tell.
Craig replied not Ian.
Yes comman sense tells you that hard drives in small enclosures
need good fans, I suggest hard drive enclosures that have dual fans.
Click to expand...

The small 1" fans are worse than useless. dual is double useless.
Stall the fan, and turn them into "heaters".
Most (all?) power supplies have fans which suck air out of the box.
I have an auxilliary fan, blowing into the box to help cool the CPU.
(Doen't really work with covers on..)
Before I figured it out..
The auxilliary fan pressurizes the closed box.
This blows air over the "heater" and you have a very efficient oven..

I'm shying away from fans that sit on the heat sink.
Same problem, if they stall, the heat sink becomes an oven with a hat.

----- My favorite quote -----
"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity;
an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
 
Be brave! Make one yourself!!
Seriously, any old external HD box should do, just replace the scsi
(or whatever) connectors with IDE ones. It may look like an Acorn BBC
B but it should work. You'll probably need to get an IDE connector to
make the external port on your PC, available from all good broken IDE
hard drives, or you could just take the cable direct from the
motherboard out to the hard drive itself (through the PC case and the
hard drive case).

The way I would probably do it would be to get hold of an IDE port
(like off a hard drive) and somehow connect this to an IDE cable,
which goes to one of the IDE channels. Do the same with the external
case, then connect them up with a 1 - to - 1 IDE cable and voila! I
can now disconnect the external device without opening either the PC
or the external case.
Probably need some clips to keep the cables secured at either end, not
sure about that...
 
Be brave! Make one yourself!!
Seriously, any old external HD box should do, just replace the scsi
(or whatever) connectors with IDE ones.
Click to expand...

umm... Isn't he looking for a USB box? What you're describing sounds
like a cold-swap device to me (am I wrong?)

I remember reading quite some time ago that the Oxford 911 chipset was
the one to look for in external ide cases. But I think this is an
older shipset and for Firewire. Is there a chipset for an IDE<->USB
box that is best? Or is it just thermal considerations that set the
competing models apart?
 
http://www.cypress.com/products/dat...A-56PVC&familyName=USB High-Speed Peripherals
EZ-USB AT2TM USB 2.0 to ATA/ATAPI Bridge

Features

* Complies with USB-IF specifications for USB 2.0, the USB Mass
Storage Class, and the USB Mass Storage Class Bulk-Only Transport
Specification
* Operates at high (480-Mbps) or full (12-Mbps) speed
* Complies with T13’s ATA/ATAPI-6 Draft Specification
* Supports 48-bit addressing for large hard drives
* Supports PIO modes 0, 3, 4, and UDMA modes 2, 4
* Uses one external serial EEPROM containing the USB device serial
number, vendor and product identification data, and device
configuration data
* ATA interface IRQ signal support
* Support for a single ATA/ATAPI device configured either as
master or slave
* "ATA-Enable" input signal, which three-states all signals on the
ATA interface in order to allow sharing of the bus with another
controller (e.g., an IEEE-1394 to ATA bridge chip)
* Support for board-level manufacturing test via USB interface
* 3.3V operation for self-powered devices
* 56-pin SSOP and 56-pin QFN packages
 
In alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt, Msg ID: <[email protected]>
http://www.cypress.com/products/dat...A-56PVC&familyName=USB High-Speed Peripherals
EZ-USB AT2TM USB 2.0 to ATA/ATAPI Bridge
Click to expand...

This sure sounds like:
The USB port of the CY7C68300A is connected to a host computer directly
or via the downstream port of a USB hub. Host software issues commands and
data to the CY7C68300A and receives status and data from the
CY7C68300A using standard USB protocol.

Why. So I can use a USB cable?
Why. To put the drive in another room?
When I can use an IDE cable and support 2 IDE devices.
Or a SCSI cable and support 8 devices?
Features
Click to expand...

<snip The tehno mumbo jumbo..>
And If it weren't for winxx bullshit, they might ALL be hot swappable too.
Might have to reload the driver.. I really don't know.
But I do know I hate windows.
 
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