Hard Drive Enclosures

[laidbackliam]

is there a difference in types of enclosures i could get?

i've got an 80gig hitachi driver thats not doing anything, want an eclosure to keep all my video files on. on newegg, i've seen that enclosures can cost as little as 15.99$ to 75$. any major differences i should be looking for?

 

[techound1]

Make sure the physical size of the box works with your drive, make sure the type of connect from the drive to the box is the same, and I would recommend getting a firewire connection for speedier transfers (those are usually the more expensinve ones).

 

[laidbackliam]

yeah, i'm wanting firewire, as i enjoy working on video/audio stuff (planning on making a movie this summer). also don't know whether or not i should get one with a fan in it, etc etc etc....

 

[galstaph]

Maybe see if you can get one that supports both firewire and usb2, then you can use it on anything (practically). This is what I am doing

 

[techound1]

The fan is really nice for big tranfers in non-climate controlled environs (oh, say, like if you're shooting on location).

 

[laidbackliam]

what format should i format the drive in? disk utility gives me odd choices, such as

mac os extended
extended (journaled)
extended (case sensitive, journaled)
""case sensitive
ms dos
unix


which do i do?


i would like to be able to use the drive on a non Mac machine as well, so thats why i really ask

 

[blodwyn]

what format should i format the drive in? disk utility gives me odd choices, such as

mac os extended
extended (journaled)
extended (case sensitive, journaled)
""case sensitive
ms dos
unix


which do i do?


i would like to be able to use the drive on a non Mac machine as well, so thats why i really ask

You only have one choice if you want to share with non-Mac systems - choose the MS-DOS option. This will format the drive to FAT32.

 

[After G]

You have another choice - use MacDrive.

It costs money, but gets rid of the nasty 4 GB file limit on FAT32 systems. Might be useful if you are doing digital video.