Choose from the following:

1.8″ Hard Drive Cases	2.5″ Hard Drive Cases
3.5″ Hard Drive Cases	5.25″ Hard Drive & Optical Drive
IDE & SATA Cable Kits	Portable Hard Drives

Whilst Hard Drive enclosures are an excellent way of reusing your old hard disk drive and creating a back up solution there are times when their use is not appropriate.

Hard Drives enclosures are really designed as a permanent or semi permanent solution for your HDD. This is simply because the enclosures are designed to provide a “protective wrapper” around the Hard Drive that then allows you to carry it with you or in the case of larger enclosures for 3.5″ HDD’s to stand it on your desktop.

To use the enclosure you’ll typically need a screwdriver and a few minutes to open the case, carefully insert and connect the Hard Drive, secure the Hard Drive in place and then reseal the enclosure using the supplied screws. Not difficult to do but it does take a little time and its not something you want to be doing every day.

So, if you’ve got lots of Hard Drives that you want to use, to test or recover data from then a dedicated enclosure is probably not the way to go. Similarly if you’re an IT or support engineer and part of your job is to test Hard Drives an enclosure will use up valuable time and just be cumbersome. You’d also have to have an enclosure for each size and type of Hard Drive, e.g. 2.5″ Hard Drives, 3.5″ Hard Drive and then a version for IDE and a version for SATA – simply not practical.

A much simpler option in these circumstances is to use a USB to IDE and SATA Cable kit.

These IDE and SATA kits are worth their weight in gold because they support pretty much every Hard Drive you will encounter, they come with a power supply so that you can independently power the hard drive and they connect via the ubiquitous USB.

They’re not pretty to look at and you wouldn’t use then for a permanent connection but if you’re simply looking for a quick and effective way to test hard drives or to recover data from hard drives then these kits are an excellent solution.

They work with all current PC operating systems and with Macs and the easy set up means you can be up and running in seconds. (Remember for 3.5″ Hard Drives you’ll need to set the “jumpers” to Master before connecting the HDD or it will not be recognised).

• Physical size – First make sure you’re clear about the size of Hard Drive you have as this is going to be critical. Hard Drives typically come in three different sizes 1.8″, 2.5″ and 3.5″ with the 2.5″ and 3.5″ being by far and away the most popular.

But beware its no good taking your ruler and trying to measure the hard drive to see which one you have because the sizes refer to the “disk platter” inside the Hard Drive casing. These dimensions have developed as a short hand description over the years and are commonly used to describe the size of the Hard Disk and also the Hard Disk Enclosures they fit.

The actual physical dimensions of each size of Hard Drive (should you want to measure one) are as follows:

1.8″ Hard Drive are 54 mm × 8 mm × 71 mm
2.5″ Hard Drvies are 69.85 mm × 9.5-15 mm × 100 mm
3.5″ Hard Drives are 101.6 mm × 25.4 mm × 146 mm

The 1.8″ Hard Drives are typically used in digital audio players, and very small notebooks, 2.5″ Hard Drives are usd in standard Laptop PC’s and 3.5″ Hard drives in Desktop PC’s

There is one further “gotcha” to be aware of as far as size is concerned for 2.5″ Hard Drives and that is they come in different thicknesses (height) with 9.5mm being the default standard but 12.5mm being used by some hard drive manufacturers for first generation high capacity drives. Most 2.5″ hard drive enclosures are designed for 9.5mm thick hard drives and will not support the larger 12.5mm version.

• IDE or SATA – Your hard drive enclosure needs to support the interface on the end of the hard drive. Your hard drive will either have an IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics) interface (subsequently renamed ATA) or a SATA (Serial-ATA) Interface. The IDE/ATA interface is pretty easy to identify as it has 2 rows of pins (40 in total) then some additional Pins for the “jumper” settings. SATA hard drives have no pins as such but two flat “spade” type connectors.

* Interface – Once you’ve worked out which size Hard Drive you have and what the interface is on the end of it you then need to think about how you want the Hard Drive case you’re going to put the drive in to connect to your PC. There are 3 basic options:
o USB
o eSATA
o Firewire
o Combinations of the above, e.g. USB and Firewire

USB is by far the most popular option and providing its USB 2.0 the data transfer speeds are good and broadly comparable with Firewire 400. If you have SATA on your PC and you can take advantage of an eSATA connection from the Hard Drive Enclosure then the data transfer speeds will be around X3 times that of USB 2.0 or Firewire.

• Powering the Hard Drive Enclosure – 1.8″ 2.5″ Hard Drive enclosures are BUS powered – that is they draw power from the USB port to spin the hard drive and power the unit. Most of these smaller enclosures are supplied with what’s commonly referred to as a “Y” cable. These cables have a single connection to the enclosure and allow for the other end to be connected to two separate USB ports. Sometimes the maximum 500Ma that a USB port can deliver is not enough to spin the hard drive so connecting the 2nd lead will provide the power needed (note: using the 2nd lead is not always needed. It depends on the hard drive you are using and whether your USB ports are delivering a true 500Ma output)

All 3.5″ enclosures are supplied with a Power Cable/unit to power the enclosure.

• Fans – None of the smaller enclosures come with or need a fan but some of the larger 3.5″ enclosures do. Typically the fan can be independently switched on/off but providing you are buying a good quality aluminium enclosure then fans can be more trouble than they are worth. The enclosures are designed to dissipate heat so whilst they might get a little warm adding a fan can make them noisy and intrusive.

There are other less tangible considerations such as design, colour, flashing lights but most of these are just a matter of personal choice. The key is to buy the right enclosure for you hard disk drive with the correct interface from the enclosure to your PC. Don’t always buy the cheapest either because there are some enclosures that not that well made. Read reviews from other customers or speak to people that have used them or sell them and get them to recommend a solution for you. USBNow carry a wide range of Hard Drive Enclosures and are always happy to help.

Enclosures are often used to house hard disk drives salvaged from an old PC but they can also be used in conjunction with new hard drives (You’ll need to format the new hard drive once in the enclosure before it shows up on your PC). The benefit of using a new hard drive is that you will typically buy a hard drive with a larger storage capacity than any hard drive you salvage. Salvaged hard drives are effectively “free” and the motivation for using a salvaged Hard Drive is often to recover data from the drive (particularly if it was removed from a failed PC) and then to put the drive to good use as a back-up by using it in an external Hard Drive Enclosure.

Because hard drive enclosures are external devices they are portable and can be used on multiple PC’s or used to transport large amounts of data between say work and home. The smaller enclosures used to house hard drives from laptop PC’s don’t even require an external power supply because they draw all of their power from the USB connection. Larger enclosures will have their own independent power supply. Key benefits of Hard Drive Enclosures are:

Flexibility of Connection Type: Enclosures give you the freedom to connect your hard drive to your PC in a variety of ways. USB is the most common but you can now buy hard drive enclosures with Firewire or e-SATA connection options. Typically USB is the default connection and Firewire and/or e-SATA available in addition to the default USB connection.. Hard drive enclosures with dual connection options like this are referred to as “Combo” Hard Drive Enclosures.

Interface: Most new hard disks are now SATA (Serial-ATA) disks but if you are looking to use a hard disk salvaged from an old PC it’s probably going to have an IDE interface (also described as ATA or PATA). The IDE interface is pretty easy to distinguish as it has 2 rows of 22 Pins along the connection interface. A SATA Hard Disk will have to simple plastic looking connectors. Ensure you buy your hard drive enclosure with the right interface.

Back Up: External hard drives can be used to back-up selected files, folders or for creating a “ghost” image of the main hard disk installed on a PC. In the event of a failure of the main hard drive the “ghosted” back up can then be used to get you up and running again in no time at all. Some hard drive enclosures come with “back-up buttons” and software that make this easy. If you buy a hard drive enclosure without this feature and you don’t want to manually manage the backing up of files you could consider popular software solutions like Acronis True Image .

If like many the use if the external hard drive is to copy or back-up selected files then it’s simply a matter of selecting the external drive as the target drive to save to or “dragging and dropping” files onto the external drive.

Security: If you have sensitive or financial data then it makes sense to store this on the external hard drive. Because this drive is independently powered it can be turned off when not in use and this then removes it from the threat of any virus, or Trojan horse software. It also gives you the freedom to physically remove the hard drive and store it securely away from the PC

Archiving: Whether you are downloading music and videos from the Internet, saving Digital photo’s from your camera or digitizing your old record collection today are rapidly accumulating very large amounts of data and when all of this data is stored on your primary PC’s drive it can cause problems with access speeds, increase the need for defragmentation of the Hard disk etc.

Hard drive enclosures allow you to move or duplicate this data onto an external hard drive thus enhancing the performance of your primary drive.

Running an alternative Operating Systems: If you ever fancied having a “play” with Linux but don’t want to install it on your PC then you could install it on a hard drive in an enclosure and run it from this. You will need to tweak you Motherboard BIOS settings if you want to boot from the external hard drive as well as the primary drive installed on your PC but it’s not that hard

Hard Drives are getting bigger (in terms of storage capacity) because we’re all storing more information on them like music downloads, movies, family videos and pictures. They’re also bigger to cope with the “bloat” in Operating Systems and program files all of which are now significantly larger than they were just a few years ago.

Keeping this growing amount of data in one place where it’s prone to corruption, failure and theft is not a good idea. Add to this the threat of virus’s and Trojan security attack and then you realise that backing up your data on an external hard drive is not just a good idea its essential. Unfortunately too few people have considered this and its only when disaster strikes that the consequences of not having a back up are fully realised.

Backs up solitions don’t have to cost a fortune either. You can of course spend money on packaged hard drives from companies like Maxtor, Lacie and Freecom but a more cost effective solution is to buy an external had drive enclosure and use a hard drive salvaged from an old PC. Or if you don’t have an old PC just buy a new Hard Drive and an Enclosure and combine the two – both approaches will save you a significant amount of money.

An external hard drive enclosure is slightly larger than the hard drive itself, it will often come with a stand or carrying wallet and all the cables you need to connect it to your PC.

The hard drive and the enclosure sit outside of your computer and are connected to the computer through a high-speed interface cable, which enables the external hard drive to communicate with the computer by means of interfaces like USB and Fire Wire.

When it’s connected you can use the external drive just as you would the drive inside the computer but it has the added benefit of being removable and portable. So, you can store it securely or take it and your data with you.

Hard drives enclosures are available in two basic formats: SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment) and IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics). IDE drives use a 40-pin connection. SATA is the standard for all new Hard Drives, it’s faster and transfers data at six times the speed of IDE external hard drive.

Whatever option you choose remember to back up on a regular basis.

Of course for many the aesthetics of the Hard Drive Enclosure (also often referred to as a HDD caddy or HDD case) are important because you’ll often want the enclosure to match with the other bits of kit you’ve got on your desk or in your home office. For some features likes fans or flashing lights are also key.

One further consideration you might give is ease of use and ease of making back-ups to the Hard Drive in the Hard Drive Enclosure. The later point is particularly pertinent because for many the primary reason to buy an enclosure and build an external storage solution is data back up. Given how much information we now store on our PC’s including family photos, movies, music collections and of course work files, backing up our cherished data (and our work) is critical.

Ease of data backup is helped if you buy a hard drive enclosure with a built in “One-touch” back up button built into it. These enclosures are supplied with software that is easy to load and simple to use. The software allows you to define which directories, sub-directories, folders, files and even specific files that you want to back up. When you then press the backup button on the enclosure the files you have elected to back up with automatically be copied from your PC to the Hard Drive in the enclosure.

This feature, whilst not something everyone will need, is an excellent option. It takes the guesswork out of what you need to back up and because it’s so easy to do its far more likely you will actually back up your important data. A good routine to get into is to press the back-up button before you power off the PC for the day.

The fact an enclosure has a back-up button built in does not impair its use in any other way. You can still copy, save, retrieve data from the hard drive just as you would using any hard drive enclosure. There’s no compromise on the types of Hard Disk Drives that can be used, the connection options or the styling. What you will have do however is pay a small premium for a case with this feature but given the costs of not backing up your data it’s a small price to pay.

Find the correct HDD Enclosure for you. Take a look at some of the following:
External Drive Enclosures, 1.8″ Hard Drive Cases, 2.5″ Hard Drive Cases, 3.5″ Hard Drive Cases, 5.25″ Hard Drive & Optical Drive, IDE & SATA Cable Kits, Freecom Hard Drives, Fujitsu Hard Drives