Converting an External to an Internal Drive

I

InventorBear

n00b
Joined
Mar 7, 2007
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33
Does anyone have any experience with this. Reason I ask is because I can get a 750 GB external drive way cheaper than an internal. Do the hard drive makers use the same drives in both products? If not, what are the performance differences? Thanks.
 
Chances are, it's a lower model, like a 2 meg cache and warranty is usually under a year. Using a lower model doesn't affect performance because it's USB 2.0, which doesn't transfer anywhere near it's rated speed.

If your motherboard has SATA, eSATA is the only way to go.

I NEVER buy a pre-made external drive. I always buy an internal drive and then stuff it in an external enclosure.........preferably one that at least has firewire. This way you can buy a drive that has a 5 year warranty, has better specs, possibly has better cooling, and usually costs the same.

I now use Hot-swap trayless internal SATA enclosures:

QuarterView2.jpg


HotSwapEject.jpg
 
A lot (if not all) pre-made external drives are just off-the-shelf internal hard drives in an enclosure. I doubt you'll get a 750GB drive that has just 2MB of cache unless they actually make those available as internal drives.

It may be worth just making your own external drive instead of pre-made external ones. This way you can chose exactly which hard drive you want.
 
MassiveOverkill said:
http://www.performance-pcs.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=212&products_id=22179

http://www.performance-pcs.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=212&products_id=22178

I would get the Koutech myself (I'll probably upgrade to this in the future, but for now I have one of each of the above models)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817364015
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Thanks, but I meant the enclosure, not the racks.

NM. I see that's yur case!
 
So nobody knows for sure if the the external drives are the same as the internal ones being sold? Right now, there are a ton of deals on 500 gb external drives for ~$100, but none on internal. I would like to pick one up and convert it to internal if there are no differences/performance concerns. Of course doing this will void any warranty so I just want to be sure.
 
InventorBear said:
So nobody knows for sure if the the external drives are the same as the internal ones being sold? Right now, there are a ton of deals on 500 gb external drives for ~$100, but none on internal. I would like to pick one up and convert it to internal if there are no differences/performance concerns. Of course doing this will void any warranty so I just want to be sure.
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There's no guarantees on anything. I've seen referb drives in pre-made externals. If you aren't concerned with a warranty, go for it. Ya get what ya pay for.
 
InventorBear said:
So nobody knows for sure if the the external drives are the same as the internal ones being sold? Right now, there are a ton of deals on 500 gb external drives for ~$100, but none on internal. I would like to pick one up and convert it to internal if there are no differences/performance concerns. Of course doing this will void any warranty so I just want to be sure.
Click to expand...

Think for a minute: Why would an external drive cost lest than an internal drive of the same capacity? Take into account that the external drive also has the added cost of the external enclosure. Also take into acccount that most of today's internal hard drives come with a 3 or 5 year warranty and that just about all of your external drives come with only a 1 year warranty.

If you're really strapped for cash, and your data isn't all that important, then go for it. I guarantee you you're not going to find a Seagate 7200.11 or a WD Raptor in one of those pre-made external drives. I highly doubt you'll find a 16 meg cache drive in there either, they're probably 2 or 8 meg cache leftovers.

CLIFF NOTES: Just pony up and buy a quality internal drive
 
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