External use for Internal SATA hard drives?

[Dennis Peacock]

Does anyone know of a reliable product that will allow me to use 2 internal 250 GB hard drives as a backup device via USB or like interface? Heck, it's 500 GB of storage that I'd like to use as a backup disk to push backups to.

Any suggestions or experiences to share?

[Rob Wachala Jr]

Hit up newegg.com or tigerdirect.com or google "sata to usb cable".

[Matt Meiser]

I've got a no name single USB one that works fine.

[Chuck Wintle]

Does anyone know of a reliable product that will allow me to use 2 internal 250 GB hard drives as a backup device via USB or like interface? Heck, it's 500 GB of storage that I'd like to use as a backup disk to push backups to.

Any suggestions or experiences to share?

the vantec enclosures work very well...

Vantec Nexstar CX 3.5IN SATA to USB 2.0 and eSATA External Hard Drive Enclosure

I have one of the vantec enclosures for extrenal backup.

[Eric DeSilva]

Does anyone know of a reliable product that will allow me to use 2 internal 250 GB hard drives as a backup device via USB or like interface? Heck, it's 500 GB of storage that I'd like to use as a backup disk to push backups to.

Any suggestions or experiences to share?

Run a search on Amazon or newegg for "SATA enclosure"--lots of people selling relatively cheap boxes to put internal drives in. Very easy to hook up.

[Dan Hintz]

Hard drive dock...

[Zach England]

I have an adapter in the back of my case that allows for SATA plug in. I have never found it useful, but it came with the case so I installed it anyway. It just fits in a card slot.

[Prashun Patel]

Personally, I think you should just get a new USB hard drive.

They're like $70-100 for a upwards of 250G storage. There are 2 advantages:

1) You won't have to mess with drivers and trying to install yr hd into a dock.

2) Newer, smaller USB drives can be powered through the USB port, which means fewer cords to wrestle with, which means yr more inclined to whip it out and back up regularly.

[Bryan Morgan]

Look for a device like a Thermaltake BlackX docking station. Just plug it in and stick your drive in it. No screws or anything. Some of them have a button for "one touch backup". There are enclosures too that work fine. eSATA connections you can just leave the bare drive hanging there but I don't recommend it. eSATA is way faster than USB of course.

[Dan Hintz]

My Rosewill USB/SATA docking station came free with purchase of my SATA drive from NewEgg (that deal is often on NewEgg, too)... it's great for doing backups of data, as I can hot swap a new drive in/out without any attachment.

[Steve Costa]

You can buy a tera byte of storage from Seagate or Wester Digital for approximately $130 to $150 at the office product stores. Probably cheaper other places. Can backup all of your computers running on a home / small network.

Steve

[Jerome Stanek]

I would look into a network storage box I got one and it is so nice to access the files from any computer at any time. I can go out to the shop and retrieve files on my control computer and not have to run back and forth.

[Shawn Pixley]

I'd second a external 1 TB drive. 100$ for a lot less hassle.

[Jason Roehl]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812200155&cm_re=USB_hard_drive_adapter-_-12-200-155-_-Product

I have something similar to this (mine's made by Sabrent, but I couldn't find it just now on Newegg.com, which is where I think I got it). It may not be the IDEAL solution for using an internal HD as external storage, but it can do double duty, allowing you to fix the HD on another computer from a good one, or (as in my case) recover the data from the HD on a dead laptop.

[Larry Frank]

The Vantec docks work great for bare SATA drives. I have used them for backing up and making an image of my drives.

[Keith Outten]

Dennis,

I bought one of the CoolMax aluminum drive boxes from a local computer store. It has a cover plate that slides onto the end of the drive that has an on/off rocker switch and connectors for a USB cable and a power supply for the drive. $20.00

I threw the aluminum case away and just use the cover plate to use internal style SATA Drives for backup purposes or to format old drives. The aluminum case contained the drive and there wasn't any cooling so the drive ran to hot for my tastes.
.

[Bill Huber]

Been there done that with just about everything people posted.
I have ext. SATA drive that works great and I have ext. USB slow and a Firewire 800 ext. drive. They all do the job but......

I now have taken them all off the PC, cleaned off the desk and have gone to Carbonite, for $55 a year, unlimited space you just can't beat it in my eyes.

Set it up and forget it, everything is backed up and I can get anything I would by just restoring it.

Backup drives are good but if you have a fire or a good lighting strike you can kiss it all good by.

[Bryan Morgan]

You can buy a tera byte of storage from Seagate or Wester Digital for approximately $130 to $150 at the office product stores. Probably cheaper other places. Can backup all of your computers running on a home / small network.

Steve

WD and Seagate drives of that size have a lot of reliability issues... Supposedly Samsung is fairly reliable... Newegg has all of them for $100 or less depending on the model.

[Brian Ashton]

You can buy external HDD cases that will do what you want, but I don't think you can buy one that will house more than one drive unless you plan to spend a lot of cash. The alternative is that some can be linked together if you're willing to spend the money. They're pretty basic in that they supply power and are a conduit to access the HDDs so most brands will satisfy your needs.

[Jim O'Dell]

This is what I use also. Lots of places to find them. I think I got mine at Frye's. It hooks up either USB or eSATA, depending on what your computer has available. I'm guessing eSATA would be quicker. The nice thing about this over the external drive I got my wife for back up is that this has an on/off switch, her's doesn't. You don't want a back up drive on all the time. Jim.


the vantec enclosures work very well...

Vantec Nexstar CX 3.5IN SATA to USB 2.0 and eSATA External Hard Drive Enclosure

I have one of the vantec enclosures for extrenal backup.