I need to add another external hard drive, but the enclosure I have for my other one is no longer made. The reason I got it in the first place was that it had firewire so I could daisychain additional enclosures and it was stackable. I'm running out of space on that drive and my new computer has firewire 800, not 400. I know I could get a 400 to 800 cable, but I want to keep things simple. Anyways, I'm not finding a ton of firewire 800 capable enclosures out there, why is this? Everything seems to be USB 2.0 and eSATA. I really want to keep things daisychain-able and keep my usb ports open.

So, any suggestions on a sub-$50 SATA 3.5" hard drive enclosure with firewire 800? Preferably stackable ones.

Also, I like sticking to enclosures so that if the drive fails I can grab another one and stick it in.

 

lack of firewire interest.

unless u find an old one, i am not sure you will find what you are looking for.

ebay and google are a wonderful place

josh

 

Unfortunately you'll be hard-pressed to find an enclosure with IEEE 1394 B (Firewire 800) for under $50.

~80 w/ ship
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817198006

and some others around that range.


Apple is no longer supporting Firewire and will be moving to USB 3.0 soon. That would be a major factor in current decline in the variety of Firewire 800 External HD's.

I know you mentioned how you enjoy the ease of swapping out drives as needed but have you considered installing them using the SATA interface? That will provide you with the best results and you could even set up a RAID array

Also what type of HD's do you run? (Size, RPM, Cache)

 

eSata is the next generation... =\

 

could you elaborate on "using the sata interface?" the iMac (new) has no esata port, only FireWire 800. I need to have two drives hooked up at all times (system back up and photography/design crap) as well as the USB 2.0 drive I use for class stuff. Also need to hook up the camera and phone from time to tome and would like to avoid cord juggling. The drives in the enclosure will be a 500gb 7200rpm (forget what size cache) and a 1TB drive, whatever RPM available.

$80 each is doable, just not ideal. I mean at that point, for two of those, I'm almost halfway to that dromo (drobo?) 4 bay enclosure

 

I think Lacie makes one. Not sure of the price point

 

Ok I see what you're working with


Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 7200rpm 32MB cache
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136534

Enter Code:
MEMORIAL3

Comes out to $70 with free ship


Enclosure can hold both your drives (the 500 and the TB)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817198031
Has RAID and JBOD support so you can set up the drives however you please.

Costs:
$180-10



Grand Total:
$273.60 (with tax and shipping)



This is just an example I slapped together for you

 

Thanks man! I'll probably end up grabbing one of those enclosures depending on what may paycheck looks like tomorrow. I really like the idea of having one power supply for two drives.