What to do with 2 free 320gb drives?

i had been running dual 320gb drives in my laptop for a year now and upgraded to dual 500gb drives.

now that i have two free 320gb drives, what should i do with them? can anyone recommend any nice, compact external cases that would allow me to use two 2.5" drives as a single usb drive?

i considered making a nas also. what's the quickest/cheapest way to turn these into a nas? just buying a pc and sticking the drives in? any quicker/cheaper/smaller alternatives?

i considered getting a nano itx board and connecting the drives to it.. so far that seems like the quickest way to build a nas but i dont want to pay $300 for a motherboard =/ lol

thanks in advance gang!

 

1. You could use an external enclosure to house your extra hard drives, though I'm not sure if they have some that can hold two HDD's at once.

2. You could buy a NAS box, they're around $150-$200, probably cheaper than building an Atom powered PC or something.

3. Buy a NAS box would likely be cheaper.

http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.aspx?SubCategory=124&name=Network-Storage-NAS

 

you could build a windows home server around it, then later buy some additional 1tb 3.5" drive or so to extend the storage step by step...

then again, you wouldn't need that much storage in the laptop anymore, and could put that into the whs instead

 

thanks for the tips. dave, im loving your ikea homeserver! lol - i want to see a better picture of it!

 

hehe. I'll do. you noted that you actually watched the pics of it ON itself? page is now hosted on the home-server (since yesterday)

 

l0l thats cool. ps, change the 'my ikea home server' link in ur sig - it's dead! ;]

 

oh, crap, yeah, have to change it well, with the new pics together

 

Do you have a TiVo? I'd add them to my home server, so I can store more movies/tv shows to transfer to my TiVo.. I love that feature, as I cannot stand watching movies/shows on a laptop or monitor.

 

Tivo is non-existant outside of the u.s.

but i have a nice media center (ordered an 80gb ssd for it) that has digital tv over cable in (including hd channels), and a projector with a 2m x 1.1m wall (around 90" diagonal?) @ 1080p.

i watch, record, etc my stuff there. it then gets transfered to the winhomeserver automatically.

 

projector? nice!

brandon, thanks for the suggestion. i don't have tivo actually and, i agree, i hate watching movies on a laptop screen. i had always been outputting video onto a 42" plasma tv with vga cables but then, in april, i bought a 50" plasma and am using that for video playback via hdmi cables. i also play unreal tournement and lego batman on it. HDMI out is sick for video games!

i also stream netflix movies (in fullscreen mode)... it's the future of tv/movies

 

check out youtube, google davepermen. there's a video of my media center and how it is to play games on it in full-hd.. can't say more, but have fun

 

You can setup a nas under $50. Buy a router with usb NAS for $30 and 2 usb hdd enclosure for $10 each

 

Not to be a TiVo pusher, but all HD/S3 TiVo's can do netflix steaming as well! I agree, once their streaming content selection matches their mail-order selection, it will be perfect.

 

Oops, slight oversight on my part. I know they have a small UK base, but you're right, TiVo outside the US is not big at all.

Going to check out your youtube stuff now!

 

daveperman - saw your tv setup. that's a huge screen for n64 action

 

indeed, espencially as it's n64 on 1080p not on .. 240p like it was originally

 

I agree that an NAS set up is the simplest solution (and therefore the best) while remaining agreeable in terms of cost, but I wonder how you can secure 2.5" HDs can be secured in NAS chassis designed for 3.5" drives.

Just a problem to keep in mind.

 

^ exactly. i have been looking for 2.5" drive NAS but didnt find anything i could simply plug into my router.... i also found a 2-drive SATA to USB enclosure which was cool....

 

You'll be able to connect the drives for sure due to the standard SATA connection, but having your drives lying at the bottom of the box and completely unsecured by any caddy is not cool.

 

There are 2.5" to 3.5" drive caddies available, where you put your 2.5" drive in the caddy, and then secure the caddy into a 3.5" slot. Here are a few examples from Newegg.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...94064&cm_re=2.5_to_3.5-_-17-994-064-_-Product

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...93005&cm_re=2.5_to_3.5-_-11-993-005-_-Product

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...93014&cm_re=2.5_to_3.5-_-17-993-014-_-Product

 

^ thanks for the links. i have seen the bracket setup before. i duno, i'd prefer having a small form factor nas box as opposed to putting my two 2.5" drives into a larger 3.5" case.

i wish i could build an enclosure the size of a wallet that i can put these two in.... unfortunately, i dont have the resources for that...

 

Nonsense, just pile the drives at the bottom of the enclosure!

 

^ how wreckless! i would at least duct tape or crazy glue them to the bottom of the case for security.

 

Actually, buying caddies plus shipping may just be a waste of money if you can improvise with a satisfactory solution.

PS; I'm serious.

 

Maybe pricier than you're looking for, but I poked around and also found this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822102031

 

^ wow that looks pretty cool but the price.....! my two 500gb drives cost less than that enclosure! LOLOLOLOL

 

Well, keep in mind this is a full blown NAS, with its own processor and operating system, not a simple enclosure.

 

how about i get 2 of these:

http://biz.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2329300&csid=_25

i can maybe get some pieces of metal and attach the 2 drives. it'll be a ghetto usb storage device! LOL. i'd essentially be taking 2 320gb USB drives and using them as one.... haha!

 

btw, my pics will follow, but work took all my energy.. laters

 

Well, it'll still be 2 drives, even if they're connected together, since you can't make them show up as one to the OS without some form of RAID. It would work otherwise, though, although just remember that bare drives lying around can be asking for trouble if you have pets, small children, or forgetful adults wandering around with liquid refreshments...

 

^ LOLOL what a random set of things to watch out for! i love it

i actually went to a local computer store today and picked up an antec 2.5" enclosure.

it's this one:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0025X1A2M...e=asn&creative=380341&creativeASIN=B0025X1A2M



it's pretty slick looking so i said you know what, why not - instead of trying to figure out how i can externally raid these two drives together, i'll just use them as two external/backup drives... maybe one at work and one at home...

so i got one of these enclosures for about $38 w/taxes. if it works nicely, i'll get another one for the other drive.

 

Sounds good. Good luck with your purchase!

 

Ah i wish i had seen this post a little earlier!!

This external enclosure would have been perfect:


http://www.thecus.com/products_over.php?cid=12&pid=137

Supports 2 drives and raids them, maintains reasonable portability, can be used as a NAS. Actually i was planning on getting it once my drives get replaced

 

Yes, I listed that back in post 25. >.>

 

right.. apologies..

 

it's all good - i am loving the antec case so i bought another one --



the action shot (this picture makes my desk look dirty but it's NOT!) --


now the two spare 320gb drives are actually going to be used for something.

the enclosure are very small and stay very cool. i copied 25 gigs over to the drive and the casing was barely warm. the only part i didnt like - bc im a cheap a$$ - is that the enclosures were $38 each after taxes. so it cost $76 total for both but still a good value. at least the drives wont be sittin somewhere losing value. the antec cases are really slick and small - im glad i found these.

the nas enclosure pasted above (and in the other post) is great but i didnt want to spend that much $ on it... the two antecs were almost half the price of the case but, it's true, i dont have nas now. no biggie tho.

thanks to everyone for the suggestions - i really appreciate it!