Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt (
More info?)
The USB housing only exposes to the outside world a USB interface, so the
internal architecture is really not relevant to the outside world. These
enclosures can support MANY internal architectures, including IDE or SATA.
Consider a USB enclosure w/ an internal IDE interface. Because it's
internally IDE, you can grab a standard, ol' IDE HD off the shelf and
install it inside the enclosure. The enclosure contains a very short IDE
cable and power lead that attaches to your HD, just as if you were
connecting the HD to an IDE cable and power supply inside your PC. But what
makes the enclosure different from your PC, is that the other end of the IDE
cable is connected to a small PCB (printed circuit board) w/ IDE-to-USB
adapter/chipset. The enclosure exposes ONLY the USB interface, keeping the
IDE interface hidden inside. Thus, you've effectively converted an IDE HD
into a USB HD! And as long as your OS supports USB, and can recognize such
an external USB device as a removeable storage device, it can be installed
in nearly any OS (sometimes, though, an older OS, like Win98 may require
drivers). MAC? Look to the product specs for that detail, it should
indicate specifically if it does. In general, if you go w/ the units that
support USB *and* Firewire, they will be far more likely to support both
Windows and MAC.
The same concepts apply whether the external interface is USB, Firewire,
SATA, whatever. Nothing stops anyone, for example, from exposing an
external SATA interface for IDE drives (just requires different PCB/chipset
for the conversion), or even a combo USB/Firewire enclosure that internally
supports both IDE *and* SATA drives (the internals, of course, would need to
have multiple chipsets, both sets of IDE and SATA cables, etc.), just about
any combination is possible, given a market for it.
In some cases, depending on the brand, it will support other ATAPI devices,
like optical drives. But these are less common and more complicated since
they usually require some means to access the internal unit itself (e.g.,
sliding tray). But they do exist, you just have to buy an enclosure
specifically designed for it (it will usually state something like
"HD/Device" in the spec). But most of the inexpensive USB/Firewire
enclosures are strictly for HD, since once enclosed, there's really no need
for internal access again (short of replacing the HD itself), and none is
provided.
Personally, I find the Argosy line at Dealsonic.com to be quite nice, a wide
selection, including fanless models, USB/Firewire/SATA combo units, 3.5" and
2.5" (laptop) HD models, etc. (
http://www.dealsonic.com/argosy.html ).
Here's an example (non-Argosy) of one that support other ATAPI devices too
(
http://www.dealsonic.com/eumeidetousb.html ). How well is anyone's guess,
they seem a little clumsy to me, but maybe they work just fine, never used
one myself. One thing to watch out for w/ 3.5" HD enclosures -- make SURE
it provides at least 2 AMP power supply for any large HD, let's say 160GB
and over. These tend to have higher power demands than your typical 20, 40
or 80GB HD. Most of the Argosy models do, but some cheapo brands don't,
beware!
HTH
Jim
"~Aart" <bogus@nowhere.net> wrote in message
news:8MadnRvHesY07e3dRVn-uw@comcast.com...
> Hi Guys,
>
> I have seen USB "housings," that look like an eide case, for sale for
about
> $30 that you can put eide drives into. So what I'm asking is; do you get
> one of them in case you have an old burner, or hard drive laying around ,
> plug the drive into the case, and it bridges the ide 40 pin cable to the 4
> or 6 pin usb port? Then you have in effect, an external USB device. Is
> this what's going on?
>
> And if it is, will it work on an iMac?
>
> cluelsess in cliffton
>
> aArt
>
> ps: Here's an example for pricewatch:
>
> House Brand
> ONLINE ORDER ONLY - - Plumax PM-525U2-PCS Silver USB 2.0 External
Enclosure
> for 5.25 / 3.5 Inch HDD/Device w/ Fan Retail
> Details:
> -Fitting for USB 2.0 52x24x52 48x16x48 48x12x48 42x24x42 CD-RW EIDE
> Duplicator DVD 16x Combo 1 Year Warranty
> Part - DSCWCPM525U2 Updated - 4/2, 11:52 AM
>
>
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