External HDD Enclosures and heat dissipation

[3chordcharlie]

Construction - active cooling - brands?

I'm starting with the assumption that an aluminium enclosure would be best; what else should I know?

 

[montag451]

Has the case got fans?
Mine has, (unbranded, cheap, aluminium) but the people down the road know when i have mine switched on, cos it aint quiet.
Functions perfectly and, a must have, an off/on switch.
And not limited to 137GB

 

[3chordcharlie]

Originally posted by: montag451
Has the case got fans?
Mine has, (unbranded, cheap, aluminium) but the people down the road know when i have mine switched on, cos it aint quiet.
Functions perfectly and, a must have, an off/on switch.
And not limited to 137GB

Are some of them limited to 137gb?

Also is there any advantage to usb2 vs firewire? I would assume firewire is the better idea, but how much difference will it really make?

 

[Nocturnal]

USB2 is good enough.

 

[V00D00]

I think firewire has lower cpu ussage. Check out my sig, I have some benchmarks for various chipsets used.

I plan to update the list with newer ones, and possible compile a list of major enclosures and the chips they use.

 

[3chordcharlie]

Thanks for the help so far - I'm looking at a couple of models at the moment.

vantec nexstar 3 http://www.vantecusa.com/p_nst360u2.html


and

Bytecc ME-350(V3) http://www.byteccusa.com/product/enclosure/ME-350V3.htm

 

[Old Hippie]

I bought this because mine was a sata drive. Easy to open/close and very quiet.

 

[Bobthelost]

Firewire is a better/faster solution, but USB2 would work anywhere if you want to move the files elsewhere (while firewire isn't as omnipresent)

 

[dunkster]

V00D00:

Nice work on the USB chipset benchmarks!

I think work like that deserves a sticky.

 

[MercenaryForHire]

e.SATA > all.

Look into that if you're buying all-new hardware and need controller cards anyways.

- M4H

 

[3chordcharlie]

thanks for the input everyone - why would SATA be better - I'm still going to be limited by usb2/1394 speeds, not by PATA speeds, right?

 

[pukemon]

No. External Serial ATA is pretty much running a regular Serial ATA drive, except externally. It's going to be faster than USB or 1394 because the drive is running in its native mode.

 

[3chordcharlie]

Originally posted by: pukemon
No. External Serial ATA is pretty much running a regular Serial ATA drive, except externally. It's going to be faster than USB or 1394 because the drive is running in its native mode.

Ahh well that makes sense then.

thanks for clarifying.