3.5" SATA HDD powerd by Laptop

[k_mridul]

hi guys

well i m a lot confused rite now, so i need your help

i have 6 3.5" PATA HDD with all my data (aprox. 400GB) cluttered into them. and almost no free space left.
now i have a laptop with 160GB SATA HDD, that too is cluttered and full.

and what i need to have is a BIG (500GB-1TB) HDD to transfer all that cluttered data and organise them and i can connect it with my laptop whenever i want
(then i will discard all those PATA HDDs, to cover up the expense of the new one)

As usual I started to search over the net to get best deal for me ..... And as usual again I got confused .......

What I figured out is that my laptop has an eSATA/USB Combo Port and eSATA gives way faster data-transfer speed than USB 2.0 ........ so why shouldn’t I go for an eSATA interface when I have that feature built-in my laptop.

I also figured that this eSATA/USB combo port has an advantage over solo eSATA port i.e. to draw power for HDD from the laptop just like USB (i.e. 5V i guess), this is important ....as I don’t want a solution that requires an external power supply

Well a 2.5" SATA HDD (500B) + a SATA to eSATA connector/enclosure seems to be good choice for my need

But when I checked prices of HDDs, I got a doubt because of price over space issue ....... A 500 GB 2.5" SATA HDD costs almost same as 1TB 3.5" SATA HDD (and not to mention that double to a 500GB 3.5" SATA HDD)

So my first and big question is : Can I connect a 3.5" SATA HDD to the eSATA/USB combo port without external power supply (i.e. power is drawn from laptop itself )

When I searched for this ....... I didn’t got a concrete answer to this, ............as I stumbled upon the WD (Western Digital) site and looked at the specification of WD Caviar Black / Green / Blue 3.5" SATA HDDs, they have given two separate Power specification for 12V and 5V ....... So is this mean that they can run by the power drawn from the laptop? and will this cause any performance issue?

Also do we have any similar choice with any other manufacturer, such as Seagate or Hitachi etc.

please clarify my doubts!

please check following links for reference:-

List of WD HDD Models
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/produ....asp?t=1#jump2

WD Caviar Blue Details (Goto Specification Page)
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=301

WD Caviar Black Details (Goto Specification Page)
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=552

WD Caviar Green Details (Goto Specification Page)
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=772

WD Scorpio Black Details (Goto Specification Page)
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?DriveID=477

WD Scorpio Blue Details (Goto Specification Page)
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=506

Price of WD Caviar Black (3.5" SATA) 500GB @ebay.in
http://cgi.ebay.in/Western-Digital-W...item1e5aa845b7

Price of WD Caviar Black (3.5" SATA) 1TB @ebay.in
http://cgi.ebay.in/Western-Digital-W...item20afab8605

Price of WD Caviar Green (3.5" SATA) 500GB @ebay.in
http://cgi.ebay.in/Western-Digital-W...item414d0719fd

Price of WD Scorpio Blue (2.5" SATA) 500GB @ebay.in
http://cgi.ebay.in/Western-Digital-W...item1e5ab0d8c6

PS: if this is not the solution then please suggest a cheap (value for money) and best HDD for my requirement.

thanks