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External SATA enclosure for multiple drives

It's very misleading. It converts SATA drives to USB 2.0 - and thereby you lose a huge bunch of speed. SATA drives are not daisy-chainable - only one drive per port. So to have 4 external SATAs, you need for ports to connect them individually.

You could fill a 4 drive case with PATA for less money and still have the same USB 2.0 speed.
 
Originally posted by: corkyg
It's very misleading. It converts SATA drives to USB 2.0 - and thereby you lose a huge bunch of speed. SATA drives are not daisy-chainable - only one drive per port. So to have 4 external SATAs, you need for ports to connect them individually.

You could fill a 4 drive case with PATA for less money and still have the same USB 2.0 speed.
Click to expand...



Good info, but I am looking for any other options. I have 4 SATA hard drives that are going to be used for storage. I guess I could just get 4 seperate external enclosures...
 
It still boils down to how many SATA ports your system has. You need one per drive. If the mobo has 2, you add a SATA PCI card and get a couple more.

The big case may be the cheapest route.
 
You can get multi-drive SATA enclosures which have a built in SATA hub - so you only need 1 eSATA port on your PC. (External SATA ports/cables are different to the internal SATA ports and cables that most people are used to).

However these more advanced enclosures are more expensive - you'd be lucky to get a 4 or 5 drive one for less than about $400.
 
Originally posted by: corkyg
It's very misleading. It converts SATA drives to USB 2.0 - and thereby you lose a huge bunch of speed. SATA drives are not daisy-chainable - only one drive per port. So to have 4 external SATAs, you need for ports to connect them individually.

You could fill a 4 drive case with PATA for less money and still have the same USB 2.0 speed.
Click to expand...

Uhh isnt USB2 rated at 480Mbps rate transfer? Sata is only 150 so lets say you even somehow use all 4 at once, USB2 should suffice because even SATA drives dont send data fast than about 70Mb.
 
I think you are confused. SATA is a bit faster than IDE, and USB 2.0, at 480 is much slower than either. Firewire at 400, is in actual practice, better than USB 2.0

SATA is 150 MBps - much faster than 480 Mbps. Note the case difference.

1 MB = about 8 Mb, therefore 480 Mbps equals but 60 MBps. And, 150 MBps equals about 1200 Mbps. So, SATA is about 2.5 times faster than USB 2.
 
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