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| Thread ID: 64858 | 2005-12-31 02:37:00 | Hard drive cradles or | Chemical Ali (118) | Press F1 |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 416763 | 2006-01-01 00:50:00 | Cheers for those comments Andy -- can you a bit more precise about what hardware (drives & SuperRacks) that you're using so I can look at costs etc. How many racks do you have -- is it 1 per drive or 1 per PC?? Many Thanks |
Chemical Ali (118) | ||
| 416764 | 2006-01-01 01:02:00 | I have found this (www.jaycar.co.nz) at Jaycar, I think this is the sort of thing you are looking for, although you might need multiple enclosures for the HDDs HTH :thumbs: |
The_End_Of_Reality (334) | ||
| 416765 | 2006-01-01 01:13:00 | The Vantec unit is expensive granted , yet the manufacturers site states it's suitable for SATA drives and is hot swapable . Wonder how that would work ... | KatiMike (242) | ||
| 416766 | 2006-01-01 01:17:00 | I actually have 2 identical pcs setup and networked and any drive can go in either machine (they are networked as well) so data can be backed up to the backup drive across the network. It all works really well. 2 identical PCs -- that's genius and really using your head. Wish I'd thought of that a couple of years ago ... |
Chemical Ali (118) | ||
| 416767 | 2006-01-01 01:25:00 | The Vantec unit is expensive granted , yet the manufacturers site states it's suitable for SATA drives and is hot swapable . Wonder how that would work ... will work fine for a data drive but certainly not for a drive with an OS on it |
bartsdadhomer (80) | ||
| 416768 | 2006-01-01 01:51:00 | Meaning it's not hot-swappable if its got an O/S on it -- that's what I thought as well. | Chemical Ali (118) | ||
| 416769 | 2006-01-01 02:09:00 | I have found this (www.jaycar.co.nz) at Jaycar, I think this is the sort of thing you are looking for, although you might need multiple enclosures for the HDDs HTH :thumbs: That is pure Jaycar rip-off price. You can get a plastic SuperRack for about $39, or a cast aluminium one for $70, whilst a DSE XH5067 plastic moulded one is just $26. |
Terry Porritt (14) | ||
| 416770 | 2006-01-01 04:56:00 | Cheers for those comments Andy -- can you a bit more precise about what hardware (drives & SuperRacks) that you're using so I can look at costs etc. How many racks do you have -- is it 1 per drive or 1 per PC?? Many Thanks Each pc has an identical setup - Asus K8N mobo with amd64 3000+ processor, 1 gig ram, ATI radeon 9600 graphics card and Panasonic 4 speed dual layer DVD writer. Each pc has a single drive caddy rack (only brand name that I can see on them is "DataBridge") - got them at PBTech in Hamilton. Initially bought 2 racks with caddys for about $55 each set. Later bought extra caddys for $30 each for other drives. Each caddy is fitted with a Seagate 120 gig Barracuda drive. I set the first pc up with Win XP Pro and got everything working with all the updates, then ghost imaged each drive (I did buy 2 copies of XP - one for each pc, just to keep it legal). Only strange thing that happens every few months is Windows wants to be re-registered as it says there have been major hardware changes to my system (there haven't, but I guess it could be due to swapping the drives) but I do it and it has never failed to work. Anyway, any drive seems to work happily in either pc. Only drawback is that if I decide to upgrade either machine I'll have to do the same to both. Windows and AGV updates seem to just work on any drive as it is booted. I have a Laser printer and scanner on one pc and an inkjet printer on the other but as they are all USB, it doesn't seem to be a problem as to which drive is where, it just picks up whatever peripheral is connected. XP seems a lot more tolerant to minor changes than previous versions. |
andy (473) | ||
| 416771 | 2006-01-01 05:22:00 | I use the DSE drive caddies on two of my machines for the master hard drives. They are really great for my needs. If you are going to be swapping around the drive trays a bit, then you might want to consider a more expensive (more solid) caddy. One of my plastic DSE caddy racks (the part fixed into the 5.25" bay) has a faulty key unit which means you cannot unlock/remove the tray without performing minor surgery on the inside of the locking mechanism. The other unit is fine still, but is not removed that often. Wear and tear from constant changing of the drives will soon show up faults in cheaper units. The pins shouldn't be a problem on the IDE drives, as it is a separate set of pins/connection which is part of the caddy rack and tray which do the actual connecting/disconnecting and not the actual IDE ribbon pins or HDD pins. As mentioned, you cannot hot swap a sATA drive which runs the OS. |
Jen (38) | ||
| 416772 | 2006-01-01 11:36:00 | this is something totally different, but saves a lot of p***ing around - have 2-4 PCs side by side, all connected to a switchbox sharing the same monitor, mouse, keyboard & speakers. I have this on my workbench & have set it up for quite a few clients. Imagine expecting the wife or hubby to swap a caddie just to check for emails. | quarry (252) | ||
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