External Hard Drive Enclosures?

[Westly32]

I came across this item while foraging ebay for stuff 'I'd like to waste money on but don't really need'. I've never heard of these hard drive enclosure cases-and there isn't detailed info explaining the basic question I have. I have an old drive taken from a desktop tower. So would this case allow me to plug that drive into it, which I could then connect to another pc? Most of the cases mention connecting laptop drives to a laptop, but do they make them so that a larger desktop drive would fit in one?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120424961690&ru=http%3A%2F%2Fshop.ebay.com%3A80%2F120424961690%2509%3F_from%3DR40%26_trksid%3Dm38%26_nkw%3D120424961690%2509%26_naf%3D1%26_fvi%3D1&_rdc=1

[soup]

You could look at these:

http://www.thermaltakeusa.com/Products.aspx?C=1346

Or these guys:

http://www.vantecusa.com/

[NightTran]

why waist money to buy enclosure when the new external HD now are very cheap, 1.5 TB this week at BB only 130$

[Westly32]

As I mentioned, I already have a drive I took out of an old pc, plus the cases I saw listed weren't expensive, so I wondered if they could be used with a desktop sized drive as well as notebook sized drives.

[drfsupercenter]

Wow, such ripoffs...

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0245436

I've seen these for $12.99 at the store. I guess they charge a bit more online.

And to answer your question: There are two kinds of enclosures, the 2.5" ones and 3.5" ones. If it's a 2.5" it'll only work with smaller (laptop) 2.5" drives, the 3.5" only works with 3.5"... it's kinda straightforward.

[Westly32]

Wow, such ripoffs...

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0245436

I've seen these for $12.99 at the store. I guess they charge a bit more online.

And to answer your question: There are two kinds of enclosures, the 2.5" ones and 3.5" ones. If it's a 2.5" it'll only work with smaller (laptop) 2.5" drives, the 3.5" only works with 3.5"... it's kinda straightforward.

Thanks for this. Mine looks like a 3.5, and searching Walmart online, I found some there. I just needed some guidance as to whether these types of case worked with a larger desktop drive. The old drive looked a bit bigger than 2.5, which was in all the specs of the dozens on ebay.

[drfsupercenter]

2.5" enclosures are cheaper. Micro Center has them for like $5.

But yeah, if it's from a desktop, you'll need a 3.5" enclosure. The link I pasted is the cheapest I can find on their website, though I've seen some Chinese ones for $12 in-store.