looking for a HardDrive enclosure that is not a piece of crap?

So yesterday I purchased an eagle consus which turned out to be crap, it killed the Seagate 1TB HD I purchased, so I went back and got another HD a 1.5TB WD Green and a Sabrent Enclosure, so I put the new goods together and what do you know the stupid PowerSuply that came with the Sabrent Enclosure is defective, these people cant even get their instruction manual right and have many words misspelled like they are to cheap to even hire a real translator or something?

So my question is does anyone know of a good 3.5" HD Enclosure that is around 20-25$

this is starting to become very annoying everything I get is defective for some reason?

Why Micro-center sells such trash is beyond me....

 

What I use here...

http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/PID-MX24678(ME).aspx

...and I like it a lot (note price is CDN$)

 

I have the same as this one, but in Silver color. I have not used it a lot, but it has always worked for me. The only disadvantage that I can think of is that it is more work changing out the hard drive, but this is not an issue if you plan to keep the hard drive in the housing.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817173042

Note: I would read through the reviews to see if someone is using it with a hard drive capacity that you want to use. I have heard that some external enclosures do not support larger hard drives (larger than around 750 GB).

I also recently purchased the new USB 3.0 version of the above external housing. I selected the USB 3.0 version because I knew for sure that it would support the 2.0 TB hard drive that I put in it. I purchased the black color because it was cheaper than the Silver one at the time of purchase.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182211

 

Thanks for the info , after looking at the 3 I think the one that catches me the most is the

Rosewill RX-358-S BLK (Black) 3.5" SATA to USB & eSATA Ext. Enclosure w/Int.80mm fan The built in Fan is definatly a +

and it supports up to 2TB.

 

You might want to consider a HD Docking Station. This one supports both IDE and SATA drives so it is a bit more expensive than SATA only. What I like about docking stations is you can easily remove the drive and insert another. And because the docking bay is open, you don't have to worry about heat (or fan noise).

 

HD Docking stations are great, I will probably get one one of these days

I ended up grabbing a Kingwin F-35 because I didn't feel like waiting for shipping, I have had it on for some hours now Very great Performance, and it defiantly keeps the Drive Cool with the 2 Fans on each side, no heat issues I was concerned about because the case is plastic, the fans seem to be doing their job!

 

Not sure what you mean here. An enclosed case, regardless the material it is made of, even aluminum, will trap heat if no means of ventilation.

 

made my own from an old frame from a pc i can hang 4 hd in it not enclosed lasts 4 years so far free air flow works best
i tried some enclosed ones they get too hot , fail

 

Heat is not necessarily trapped. If the external temperature is lower than the internal (normal case), heat can be radiated to the outside. The material is important, an aluminum case is a better heat sink.

I have used "closed" Vantec USB 2.0 aluminum enclosures for several years without any problems. Now I am using a USB 3.0 one with an 1 TB disc and it also works well (except that the USB 3.0 chip does not report the disc operating parameters -- SMART, temperature, etc.).

 

It is true that some heat radiates, and it is also true that aluminum conducts heat much better than plastics. But any enclosure will still restrict dissipation - that is, some heat will still be trapped, and the enclosure will still prevent the free flow of some of the heat. You cover your bowl of mashed potatoes with aluminum foil to keep the heat in, right? And if there are not enough ventilation holes or slots, or no "active" (fans) cooling, then some heat will still build up, even with a case acting as a heat sink. And depending on how heavily used the drive is, and the drive's own heat tolerances, it may cause read/write problems, or impact life expectancy (as excess heat increases aging of all electronics). Note that most PC cases have vents (and often fans) in front of the drive bays so case fans can pull cool air across them.

I suspect with enclosures, like many other things, you get what you paid for. If you buy a cheap enclosure, it is not likely the maker hired an engineer who would take heat removal into consideration with the design. Vantec has a reputation for producing quality products and I have no doubt their well designed aluminum enclosures are better than most offerings. But a quick Google search will show lots of evidence that even with quality aluminum enclosures, heat and drive failure is still an issue for many users.

 

Also regarding heat, how often is the backup drive running for? In my case it's on and being written to/read from for no more than a few minutes at a time. It's turned off other wise when not in use, which is most of the time. It's only used for backing up images and data, so there's not much heat ever being generated in the first place.

@Warlockz, there looks to be no eSata connection for that drive? Too bad if that's the case.

 

That's a good point. External enclosures are most commonly known as backup devices, and not used for full time data access.

 

I have two "Eagle Consus" enclosures that I have had for well over a year. In one I have a 50Gig WD hard drive and the other an 80Gig WD hard drive. I have had good luck with both of them. Perhaps I have been just lucky. Anyway, for what it is worth my experience with the "Eagle Consus" enclosures has been good.

John

 

I thought it was going to Heat up quickly because the case is plastic instead of aluminum, the inside is metal tho, but I had it on all night transferring data and it kept itself cool around 96F the entire time, the 2 Fans do what they were intended for, compared to my "500GB My Book Essential" which heats up very fast wile transferring data, this enclosure is awesome.

I don't have an eSata connection on my machine.

I'm not to sure if the issue lied in the Seagate Barracuda I bought or the "Eagle Consus" enclosure, I read that Seagate drives whack out if theirs not enough power, I only had it on for 8 hrs and already had uncorrectable sector issues warned by Crystal disk info, so I ran Seagate tools and the tests failed. I didn't know what it was but didn't want to take a chance in either again.

Not always true, sometimes your just paying for a label, My friend had a Sony VAIO which he paid around $1,000 bucks for at the time, I opened it up to install a graffix card and the parts were the same parts they use in lower priced machines such as ACER machines and the DVD drive wasn't even Sony but some generic optical drive, so basically he paid $1000 for a stupid label.

 

you get what you paid for

i paid nothing for my home made one
4 drives 80g 150g 300g 20g
constantly have 2 on 150g and 300g

i had tried some cases but either the hd fried or the circuitry in the case failed

 

You should post a picture of it so that we can see what it looks like? what do you use to connect it to your current Machine?

 

You could consider an external HDD instead, especially 2,5", which does not need an power supply, just plug into USB. Like this waterproof and shock resistant.

 

Well, two fans should certainly be an effective means of ventilation - not sure why one would not do, however.

I have 3 computers in my home office. Each use quiet Antec cases with top quality 120mm or larger case fans. But with 3 power supplies, 3 CPUs, 3 graphics cards, and 2 case fans in two cases and 3 fans in the other, that is 14 fans whirling already. I don't need 2 more that are not inside a dampening PC case making noise too. So I still prefer a docking station with no fans. Sure, an enclosure looks nicer, and may come with quality fans, but all fans wear out and get noisier over time. A passively cooled docking station will never have fan issues, and the ease in which I can swap out a drive negates any aesthetic issues.

Also, a major down side to fans is they draw in dust and pack the heat trapping particles into every crack and crevice.

 

I have a 320GB Seagate Freeagent Go with the Doc, but its 2 years old and I become weary sense its 2 even though I have never had any issues with it I want to be 100% I don't loose my Backups, but this time I wanted to try something different and I hate my MyBook the thing is retarded, but who knows I have yet to upgrade the Firmware and software in it.

If I had that kind of gear I would have just installed the drive inside of the case, all I got is a refurbished Gateway DX4300 that I paid $450 for last year and I cant afford upgrading my 350w Power Supply or case at the moment. but its defiantly in my near future after checking out these cases.

Lucky You these cases are Awesome this one caught my eye right away.



and the specs are tight

• *
• Two Fleet-Release access doors open separately for convenient entry to drives
• *
• Top-loaded 2.5" hot swap SATA (SSD-compatible) drive bay
• *
• Two washable fan filters allow for easy cleaning
• *
• Bottom-mounted power supply isolates heat
• *
• CPU cutout for easy installation of CPU coolers
• *
• Cable management compartment organizes cables discreetly
• *
• 11 drive bays:
• o
• Up to 6 x internal 3.5"
• o
• 3 x external 5.25"
• o
• 1 x top external 2.5" hot swap SATA drive bay
• o
• 1 x internal bottom-mounted 2.5" SSD bay
• *
• Advanced cooling system: - 1 x top 140mm TwoCool fan
• o
• 1 x rear white 120mm TwoCool fans with white LED
• o
• 2 x front variable-speed 120mm LED fans with white LED
• o
• 1 x side 120mm fan for graphics cards (optional)
• *
• 7 expansion slots
• *
• Maximum graphics card size: 11.5" / 292 mm
• *
• Stylish blacked-out interior
• *
• Windowed side panel
• *
• Front ports:
• o
• 2 x USB 2.0
• o
• Audio (AC'97 and HDA compatible) In and Out
• *
• Motherboards: Mini-ITX, microATX, Standard ATX
• *
• Power supply not included
• *
• Unit Dimension
• o
• 485mm (H) x 198mm (W) x 486mm (D)
• o
• 19.1" (H) x 7.8" (W) x 19.1" (D)
• *
• Weight: 15.1 lb / 6.9 kg

but for now I clean my Machine all the time, It wont be so hard to unscrew 1 screw and blow the dust out of the HD enclosure for the time being.

 

Nice looking case but for me, it is too flashy. I expect my cases to sit quietly and discreetly out of the way and not draw attention to themselves. After all, I am paying attention to what's on my monitors. For me, fancy facades are fads that, like all fads, fade away. But - that's just my opinion. Fancy lights, however, do nothing for performance, draw some power, generate some heat, and do nothing for performance - worth repeating.

One thing I do like about that case is something all my cases have, and all my future cases will have, is removable, washable air filters. They make a huge difference in how often I have to lug my systems outside to blast clean.

 

@Bill_Bright, You do have a very good point, these lights look a little bit too overwelming.

 

You should have some little switches, somewhere on its back plate panel, to put those lights off. That is, on Antec cases.

 

Docking station seems an interesting option to me.

Do you know or can recommand some affordable one allowing us to easily swap PATA and SATA drives at will, by any chance?

 

ida-usb adapters i just ripped out the frame that holds the hd/cd/dvd/etc fom an old pc sorry camera broke so no pics

 

Hmn, yea I'm not really into old computer parts sitting on my glass desk