Be Excellent To Each Other

I have a couple of old hard drives. I wish to purchase a device that I can attach to the old hard drives, and also attach (via USB) to my PC, for the purpose of transferring all my old crap on to my new computer.

I know these devices exist, but dunno what they are actually called, which is making looking for them in online shops quite difficult.

Anyone know what they are, or have a reccomendation of which ones are good?

Ta!

You'll want a caddy. I can't recommend a particular one as I can't even remember where I put mine.

You need a USB Hard Drive Enclosure.

I've got this one: http://www.amazon.co.uk/SHARKOON-QuickP ... 735&sr=1-7

Buy it and stuff.

I have one - it's just a removable IDE caddy / enclosure / potato

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?ie=UTF8&keyw ... ovqma7bn_b

Well fuck me there's two posts telling you that and one with an Amazon link like mine but HAVE IT ANYWAY BITCH.

(And my URL Is bost. BOLLOCKS)

You don't want quotes in a URL tag.

How do YOU know what I want? Are you Derren Brown? Are you? ARE YOU?

(fixed)

Old people and computers just don't mix well.

Think mine is called a Magic Bridge, and is bloody awesome as you can plug any type of HDD into it and use the USB2 connection to transfer all the data.

Plz send mobile number so I can ring you saying "Where's the Start Button? Oh right - well it doesn't say Start on it. I've clicked on that and there's another menu come up that says Properties now what? Oh sorry, I've done a left click on it and now another menu has come up. Oh wait a policeman has come up on the screen saying I need to pay £100 because I've been on naughty web sites. I've paid that now what? HELLO? HELLO?

Mine is called Sergeant Sausage.

Oh, wait...

Cheers, folks!

Right, so I got one of these and I can't get it to work. I think I might have the wrong one.

The hard drive doesn't fit in the enclosure, so did I buy one for laptop hard drives maybe? I can stick the adapter in to the HD (wahey!) and then into the USB port. The computer recognises the USB bridge, and that there's a removable drive, but it won't let me access it. Do I need to do something else? Like buy the right effing device?

Did you buy the one I said? Why not? Does the cheap crappy one you bought have an external power supply? Does the drive spin up?

If you just want to transfer data get a drive docking station. This is the first one I came across on Ebuyer:

http://www.ebuyer.com/229064-startech-hard-drive-docking-station-satdocku3s

Dunno if its a good price or indeed a decent model. But I have one hanging around and for quick access of a bare drive nothing beats it. Slot the drive in and you are away. Genuinely useful thing to have hanging around.

If you want to keep the drives afterwards then get caddies.

No
Coz it was spendy
No
Possibly not

Try a shorter usb cable. Try a different usb port.

But if it's a 3.5 inch drive, you're gonna need some sort of power as usb just aint gonna cut it, chum.

Try it in a mac, then it will "Just work"

More seriously, it does sound like you've got a device for laptop drives and it may not give enough power. (Or it may be usb3, and not in a usb3 port, or the Y cable is knacked - I've come across both of them)

A link to the device bought may be handy, if only so we can tell you that you've been doing it wrong.

Well, fuck you, toddler.

It does appear to be the power thing. I was initially connecting it to the USB 3 ports, as they are more accessible, and got told to move to the USB 2 ones on the back.

They do appear to be 3.5 inchers though, and the one I bought is for 2.5 inchers and doesn't supply them with power.

Ho hum! Back to the drawing board!

How was I supposed to know that? None of you specified these things!

You never told us what types of drives they were, which is why I linked to something that did the four most popular ones.

I said IDE caddy. Therefore my information was best.

Gah!

You fucking twerp.

What if he had SATA drives?

He said "old".

Is it a 2.5" drive that is full height, Curio? i.e. if fits the HDD connector but the lid won't go on?

Because a 3.5" IDE drive has a different size connector to a 2.5", and it won't even slightly fit.

Slighty Green mentioned this up there, and it covers all bases so it looks like this would be a good bet.

http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/storage/6 ... ge/?page=3

/throws toys out of pram

Dunno. They are big things. The adapter plugs in easily, but the drive itself is way too wide for the casing. They're a few years old but not too ancient. Both are SATA thingies that were standard hard drives as would be found in a typical Dell home PC.

I can take photos if you want, but they just look like regular, bog standard hard drives to me.

In all seriousness, pictures would be helpful as I found a hard drive over Christmas and I'm not sure what's on it. Obviously, I don't want to spend too much finding out but this thread could help.

This is the one I bought, as it was cheap and had five star reviews and shit.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B002VY1 ... 05151_dp_1

I have one of those already for an old laptop hard drive. I think I paid about a fiver off eBay. Whether it's cheap Japanese junk, remains to be seen.

No, i think we have found out.

Now you've said that.. It does get quite hot.

If you drives are SATA then I can recommend this

http://www.amazon.co.uk/IB-111StU3-Wh-A ... 392&sr=8-3

Unlike cheaper HD caddies this one will recognise drives larger than 2TB, which makes it a bit more future proof.

If you don’t have USB3 on your PC then there is a USB 2 model that is a bit cheaper.

I do have USB 3.

Also trying to spend as little as possible as I am:

a) Skint, and
b) Unlikely to ever use it again.

Did you take a picture of your drive yet?

I think if your still looking for help then a picture of the back of the drive (and the info stuff on the top) and a picture of what you've bought (or a link so we can see what it does) would help.

You should have been able to pick up a basic drive caddy thingy for around £10 / £15 and if you didnt want it afterwards get around 1/2 that back from Ebay (or get about that back and bundle it with the drives which you'll probably not want).

No. They are at home and I am at work.

I await the hilarity when it turns out I've been trying to plug in a DVD driver.

Or a baboon.

What you could almost do with then is a friend who could lend you one then?

Say, at the next music quiz?

Next music quiz is Feb. I need it yesterday. Or, failing to achieve time travel, this coming week.

Tsh. Can't help you so much then. Although I would've thought that someone you knew could manage a simple data grab off a drive without you having to spend anything.

(Also: Feburary. Psh.)

I bought an icy box enclosure. It works.

Oh dear Lord I have all my stuff from the last ten years again.

This is going to take me weeks to sort through, and it shall be GLORIOUS.