how to make a internal hdd external hdd

[rajesh_verma]

Hello I have a 5gb internal hdd i want to use it as external. Please tell me the whole proceedure to make it as external

[susk21]

dude!! you will get an external USb casing for RS 700/-.
you can also connect you CD & DvD writer in it. Check if it supports USB 2.0(faster speed!!)

But if you dont have an HDD to boot from, then how will you start your computer?
I am not sure about this But if you still want to do so then try knoppix.The os which runs from CD!!
check if it supports usb devices!! If this works:: WALLA!!
Cnverted from InTeRnAl to ExTeRnAl

Enjoy!!

[amitsaudy]

Seems he has another hdd to boot from as he has not stated that.
If thats it then no need for the live cd.
Just buy an ide to usb hdd casing.

[grinning_devil]

on looking at this thread just gave me an idea to make use of my old 40GB IDE PATA HDD(currently iam using 2 SATA drives)....

guys we just need a free USB port...thats it ???
lemme search on ebay and hen i'll look for it in nehru place!!

[infra_red_dude]

yeah, if possible get a usb2.0 casing. connect it to a usb2.0 controller supported port and thats it!

[grinning_devil]

okk....ebay doesnt have any ...
what will be the expected price ???
under 1 k ???
and recommended manufacturer ??

[amitsaudy]

Buy only a branded one.
TRANSCEND

[grinning_devil]

any online shop i can buy frm...
bcoz i think locating a branded casing in nehru place will be a lil difficult....
nd ofcourse the price..

[ashu888ashu888]

infra_red_dude wrote:
yeah, if possible get a usb2.0 casing. connect it to a usb2.0 controller supported port and thats it!
WIll there be any transfer issues like slow transfer speeds using a USB casing and conenctivity?? :? :?



amitsaudy wrote:
Buy only a branded one.
TRANSCEND
Can u try to post a screen shot of how this External USB casing (for an Internal HDD)looks like??

cheers n e-peace.....

[grinning_devil]

@ashu888ashu888,check out this link... have lots of cases...

http://www.npithub.com/product/pt_view.php?pcatid=1134

[rajesh_verma]

amit u r right i had another 80gb hdd from which i m booting
Thanks everyone for nice suggestion

[grinning_devil]

purchased a local brand...(gemini) USB2.0 External HDD Casing.... working like a charm!!
costed me 400bucks...cheap na ?? :))

[susk21]

are yaar!!!!
i bought it for 700/- RS.

KAY PHATAPHAT PRICE KAM HOTA HAI!!!!!

I am wondering about the prices after this budget!!

[grinning_devil]

I am wondering about the prices after this budget!!


lets hope for the best !!
i also purchased 50 blank DVD's Local Brad...for 450/- ...comes down to 9rs per DVD ... !! have burned 3 down...looking god till now...

[mayurs85]

Dude tat is all True salla Budget mein kya hoga God Only Knows.
BTW 4m Where did u get d DVD yaar v v Cheap i get Mosarbaer for 20 Bucks /DVD.
Mulund really Sucks

[grinning_devil]

Where did u get d DVD yaar

frm nehru place,delhi....
nd dont compare ur moserbaer with my local unbrabded one...
they are not comparable...
the pack of 100 DVD's frm Moserbaer were for 1550/- !

[Ankur Gupta]

Well grinning_devil is right on the money!!!!
he has qouted the prices of np perfeclty right.
moser for 20/-
sprint-15/-
unbranded-10/-

[susk21]

"how to make a internal hdd external hdd"
Its going off topic guys.Dont post for DVD costs.

[kanak]

ok is it better to buy a 5.25" enclosure (as it has a fan), and use a mount to keep the 3.5" drive secure in it


OR

to buy a 3.5" enclosure (no fan)

@ashu

Regarding the difference in speed, there is definitely a latency involved, but it isn't noticable if you use USB 2.0. If on the other hand if you use USB 1.1, then your transfers are gonna take forever

[Eazy]

I have 3 USB2 cases (2 x 3.5" and 1 x 2.5") and 2 USB2IDE cables and I have found the Vantec cases the BEST - the Vantec 3.5" case cost me 2500/- ... I think it is worth it to get this case. The other 3.5" case I have is the BAFO which does not recognise HDDs larger than 127GB.

Regarding speeds.....

when I have my 2 HDDs conntected to the computers Controller I get a data transfer speed of around 48mb/s

when I move one of these 2 HDDs to a USB2 case the data transfer speed comes down to 24mb/s

The USB2 2.5" case with a Seagate 20GB 5400RPM HDD gives me 11mb/s

This same Seagate 2.5" HDD when connected to the USB2IDE cable gives me 18mb/s

The Techcom USB2IDE cable is not good. The one to buy is...
http://www.dansdata.com/rdriver.htm
I got one of these from Lamington Road for 650/- 6 months back - I heard it is a bit cheaper now. The advantage of this cable is that it takes 2.5" and 3.5" HDDs as well as Optical drives and writers.

[casanova]

Hey, u people bought the usb casing. Does it boot from the usb Casing??

[yogi7272]

hey easy , i got " R DRIVER I " today .. which supports 3.5'' inch hdd and cd/dvd rom drives ... but has no support for 2.5'' inch .. for 375 rs from road side vendor at lamington road ..

now it is working very well with hdds but i am having no luck with odd drives .. could u pls help me in this regard .. what should be the jumper settings for odd drives .. master . slave or cable select ? pls help .. :cry:

[adityaksharma]

there arent any speed issues..... i use the same funda the 700 unbranded HD casing its usb 2 and it works jus fine and ..... all my games run frm tht hd and there are no performance issues so i dont think tht is too much of a bother

[Eazy]

hey easy , i got " R DRIVER I " today .. which supports 3.5'' inch hdd and cd/dvd rom drives ... but has no support for 2.5'' inch .. for 375 rs from road side vendor at lamington road ..

now it is working very well with hdds but i am having no luck with odd drives .. could u pls help me in this regard .. what should be the jumper settings for odd drives .. master . slave or cable select ? pls help .. :cry:

There are 2 versions of R Driver - with and without 2.5" support. The one with this support is newer and supposedly more stable. I paid 650/- for it to PC Guide in Lamington Road some 6 months back. Drives should always be jumpered as MASTER when connected to USB cases or cables.

[Eazy]

Hey, u people bought the usb casing. Does it boot from the usb Casing??

So far I got only Win98SE to start off an external USB HDD - I was not successful in getting XP to start off a USB HDD. :(

[casanova]

I brought 1 casing yesterday, but it is unable to load the drivers. I read the manual, it said connect ur HDD to Master. Is it necessary to do so.
Also, when I switched the power off, it said "Loading of drivers complete. Please restart." Even after I restarted it didnt show my HDD. Ne help

[Eazy]

I have 3 USB cases and 2 USBtoIDE cables and have never needed to install any drivers for XP. Even the Win98SE which runs on a HDD in a USB case did not require me to load any drivers.

Which OS do you use ? You should run XP with SP2 and there should ne no problem with the external USB drives.

In XP you have to format the drive to get it to show in Windows Explorer - format the HDD from Disk Management of XP.

Control Panel / Admin Tools / Comp Management / Storage / Disk Management

HDD in a USB case should always be set as a Master drive.

[casanova]

I am using WinXP Pro SP2.

In XP you have to format the drive to get it to show in Windows Explorer

That HDD has been formatted and has some data. (I was using it as a primary HDD till December)
Will i have to repartiton


HDD in a USB case should always be set as a Master drive.

Thx mate

[yogi7272]

HEY EAZY BUDDY , have u tries odd drives with these usb to ide cables ..?

then which drives u have successfully used . i mean which brand drives ?

[sabman]

With hard drives connected in casings, can i use them for long hours like normal hdd ? what are it's advantages and disadvantages over an external hard drive?

[ymhatre]

READING ALL THIS Stuff was cool..
But guys can these HDD be used as PLUG N PLAY devices...
I just like removable drives or pen drive...
Also Does SATA HDD supports Plug n play..
i mean i can remove sata cable out frm the rear pannel..
Aslo power cable can be removed out frm the same ..
when evr i want i can just plug n play the HDD...
BUt this is ALL about IF n BUTS..

[Eazy]

READING ALL THIS Stuff was cool..
But guys can these HDD be used as PLUG N PLAY devices...
I just like removable drives or pen drive...
Also Does SATA HDD supports Plug n play..
i mean i can remove sata cable out frm the rear pannel..
Aslo power cable can be removed out frm the same ..
when evr i want i can just plug n play the HDD...
BUt this is ALL about IF n BUTS..

YUP the drives work as PnP devices - only thing is you should not just unplug the drive but disconnect it from the system first by clicking on icon in systray. Need to do this so all data in memory buffers gets written to drive before it is disconnected from system. I hear this is necessary even before disconnecting pen drives and Card Readers.

@yogi7272 - I have used drives of various brands and sizes connected to the USB cases and cables - from a Toshiba 850mb to a Maxtor 250GB. I have a Toshiba Seagate Hitachi and MAxtor and all work fine.

@sabman - Some cases come with a fan built in and these keep the drive cooler - I have used a HDD in a USB case for a couple of hours - this was a Maxtor 250GB and the case was quite warm - I am sure the drive would have been hot. I think the way to go for long time use is to use a USB cable instead. This will leave the HDD in the open to be externally cooled.

The advantage of using external drives is obviously portability - meaning that you can attach same drive to many computers - and if you use a USB Cable than you can attach a CD or DVD writer to any computer or Notebook.

Downside is SPEED - I found that the same drive connected directly to the computer was twice as fast as when it was connected via a USB2 port.

[yogi7272]

now R DRIVER USB CABLE is working very well with ide hdds and odd drives too .. seems like i was doing something wrong .. also few odd drives i tried were not working properly themselves ..

this is a nice solution to make any hdd or odd drive function externally.. :)

i have burned cds with cd writer upto 48 x with this cable and its worked fine .. haven't tried any dvd writer but it should work .. i got this for 375 rs at lamington road .. so anybody looking for a such a solution do consider this product .. 8)

[casanova]

I am getting a delayed read/write error.

Also, at times, it shows empty folders with no data, even though i am gbs of dat in that folder. I exchanged my usb casing for a usb cable as my hdd was not being detected in Usb casing (I donno y??) and also it was heating a lot, even though there was no access to the HDD.

Any help to prevent the delayed read/write error.

[casanova]

I am getting a delayed read/write error.

Also, at times, it shows empty folders with no data, even though i am gbs of dat in that folder. I exchanged my usb casing for a usb cable as my hdd was not being detected in Usb casing (I donno y??) and also it was heating a lot, even though there was no access to the HDD.

Any help to prevent the delayed read/write error.

[Eazy]

I am getting a delayed read/write error.

Also, at times, it shows empty folders with no data, even though i am gbs of dat in that folder. I exchanged my usb casing for a usb cable as my hdd was not being detected in Usb casing (I donno y??) and also it was heating a lot, even though there was no access to the HDD.

Any help to prevent the delayed read/write error.

I have this problem with one USB case when I use a HDD larger than 120GB in it. I think the controller in the case/cable cannot handle drives larger than 127GB. Maybe your case/cable has a similar problem - if you want to confirm if this is the problem with your case/cable partition your HDD at 125 GB and then write to the first partition and you will have no problems filling it up - the moment you cross the 127GB area on the second partition you should get the same errors - I did :(

[casanova]

The hdd I am conecting to the usb cable is only 60GB partitioned into two drives of size 10gb and 45gb.

[Eazy]

Do you have a problem with writing to both partitions ? If the first partition is the 10Gb one and it has no problems then check if the HDD has the jumper set for limitting size to 32GB. All PATA drives have this jumper option for compability with old OS's. There is a limitation of 127GB and also 32GB - it could be possible that you have run into problems with the 32GB limitation. You can try make the first partition 32GB and the balance space as the second partition - if you have run into this limitation problem of the 32GB then you will not be able to format the balance space - that is 33 to 60 GB.

When I got this error I did a search for an answer via Google and I came across many suggestions but none worked for me.

[casanova]

No, I connect my hdd as master without the 32 gb limit. Also, it shows my disk capacities correctly.