Q on Portable Hard drive enclosures and AVI/DivX players.

[Cleveland Metal]

Looking for a new 3.5 hard drive enclosure. Had several Ultras and iMicros, and they seem to die very prematurely. Sick of getting new ones even if they are cheap.

Anyone have a brand/model recommendation that is robust and doesn't fry out?

Also, I was curious about the $50 HD enclosures on eBay that I see that are also AVI/DivX/etc etc players that will output to your TV. Anyone use one of those?

http://cgi.ebay.com/Hard-Drive-AVI-Divx-HD-Player-Enclosure-3-5-SATA-HDD_W0QQitemZ220375950220QQcmdZViewItemQQptZPCC_Drives_Storage_Internal?hash=item220375950220&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=72%3A1205%7C66%3A2%7C65%3A12%7C39%3A1%7C240%3A1318%7C301%3A0%7C293%3A1%7C294%3A50

[OnlineStageGear]

Are you really using the MP3 player and video out on those? If not, just get an external USB flash drive or a caddy for an external drive that you can swap out if it goes bad.

[Cleveland Metal]

I've only used the cheapie regular portable enclosures. But, they don't seem to last very long. The iMicro's I found AREN'T hot swappable, and I've killed a couple forgetting to power them down before swapping. Smokes something in them doing that.

I was curious about the AVI player ones, as it would be cool to have a drive full of DivX movies on tap to have in the front room to watch with company. And they're really about 20 or so bucks more than a decent portable enclosure. I'm skeptical of them I guess. haha...

"caddy for an external drive"? Isn't that what I'm talking about?

[Newc]

I've been through about 8 of those external HD cases, and they all suck except for the ADS Tech USBX-804. The USBX-834 is ok, but not as good as the 804.

The 804 is big enough for a full-sized DVD/CD drive, but it's also got a better fan, which is the really important part. The 834 has a fan, but IMO it's not big enough. Forget those aluminum/metal cases without a fan that are supposed to dissipate heat - they simply let it pass through, and the drives still get baked.

However, good luck finding an 804. Last I saw on Ebay they were SELLING for $100 used.

[Cleveland Metal]

Cool on the 804. Funny how the average looking one rocks and the space age aluminum finned flashy light cool ones suck, haha...

Wow, I haven't had drive failures somehow. It's always the USB interface stuff that takes a crap. These ones I get cheap locally, apparently aren't hot swappable and the first time you do that, they die and you smell burnt components, haha... iMicro, beware The Ultra was the best, last maybe 6-8 months and just die.

Wondering about that player case still. That sounds cool for home media purposes. But, for 55 bucks, it's prolly crap. Very cool premise tho.

I just like to keep a basic enclosure for when I do work on friend's and family's systems and have all my rescue software on it and the typical free scumware/spyware stuff that I always load on the new format. As well as temporarily pulling any stuff off their system they are keeping etc. blah blah...

They're cool for being able to move large audio files from a PC in the basement to be used to record band stuff to the upstairs PC where I can work on them in my office.

[krimson]

I burn all my DIVX files to DVD-R then play them on my Phillips DVD Recodable player with DIVX capabilities. This way I don't clutter a hard drive and still have the file saved for the future. Magnavox makes a DiVX DVD player that cost about $35 at Wal-Mart.

[Cleveland Metal]

I burn all my DIVX files to DVD-R then play them on my Phillips DVD Recodable player with DIVX capabilities. This way I don't clutter a hard drive and still have the file saved for the future. Magnavox makes a DiVX DVD player that cost about $35 at Wal-Mart.

You and your simple solutions, haha... Probably the best thing to do, haha... It's basically what I do now, just not in DivX yet, didn't know they made a DVD style DivX player, way cool. Thanks!

Wasn't a major quest. But, I guess was just thinking the possibility of something I could sit on the couch and select on a GUI from a stash of movies. Although that would suck up a lot of disk space I spose. Seems I get a lot of playback errors when burning DVD's too... Yet the files always play well on the PC. Sucky burner prolly.

[krimson]

Typically you can save 4-8 full length Divx movies on one 4.7gb dvd-r disc. It works great for me. Here's a player on Walmart.com

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=10378916

[Cleveland Metal]

Man, I figured some of you guys were into this sorta technologies... Interesting...