I want to know about external enclosures

[Gilby]

I really know nothing about external enclosures. Oh, I know how they're supposed to work and all, but I don't know what to look for in a good one. What sort of chipset to look for, that sort of thing.

I want to use one with an optical drive that I'll sporadically want to use with my system. It would be very handy if the enclosure could also be used with a standard 3.5" hard drive. Anyone have any recommendations?

 

[Peter]

A recommendation: Get a case that has USB and Firewire. You'll find that USB is marginal for high speed DVDRW burners and too slow for harddisks.

An anti-recommendation if you choose to do so: Avoid cases that have a Prolific USB/FW-to-IDE chipset. Performance and operational stability are awful with those. Oxford Semi FW chipsets appear to be best.

Currently, cases that implement FireWire-800 begin to appear. These for sure don't have the dreaded Prolific chip inside.