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what is the difference between moble racks & external enclosures for hard drives

S

Sossity

macrumors 65816
Original poster
I have seen icy dock external enclosures & mobile racks, which are less expensive, what is the difference?

& would a mobile rack work for connecting to my macbook pro & for swapping out 3.5 in hard drives as I backup & exchange files?
 
Not exactly sure what you mean by "rack." Is it one of THESE? I find them pretty stylish 🙂. Functionally, there's no difference between that and an enclosure. They work the same way.
 
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Description
Extended from the MB122 Series, the MB123 Series is an economical drive rack that is also aluminum cooling built to steer clear of drive overheating in protecting the precious drive within. The compatible removable tray with ICY DOCK MB452 Series enables interchangeability between a desktop and a laptop platform. Simply pop the removable tray and insert into the MB452 Series housing to mobilize your storage drive anywhere fast, easy & convenient! It’s another perfect storage device for media storage systems that enables media file archiving without having to deal with the usual hard drive disassembly from your PC.
Click to expand...
The above is used for a desktop PC of a certain type/series and can be connected to any Mac via USB or Firewire.
A dock is a better solution if you have many S-ATA (2.5" and 3.5") HDDs flying around.
Enclosures are also good, but the constant swapping of HDDs with one enclosure might be a bit too much.
I have currently 6 2.5" HDDs in five USB enclosures and one Firewire 800 enclosure, then I have two 2.5" HDDs in FW800 enclosures and one FW400 enclosure for some other S-ATA HDDs I have.
It works quite okay for me.
 
simsaladimbamba said:
!B94-P3gBGk~$(KGrHqZ,!k0Ey+jCzKnQBM7Dus!)JQ~~0_12.JPG


The above is used for a desktop PC of a certain type/series and can be connected to any Mac via USB or Firewire.
A dock is a better solution if you have many S-ATA (2.5" and 3.5") HDDs flying around.
Enclosures are also good, but the constant swapping of HDDs with one enclosure might be a bit too much.
I have currently 6 2.5" HDDs in five USB enclosures and one Firewire 800 enclosure, then I have two 2.5" HDDs in FW800 enclosures and one FW400 enclosure for some other S-ATA HDDs I have.
It works quite okay for me.
Click to expand...

thanks for the info, what dock are you using? the only concern I had with a dock was that my hard drives might be exposed to some dust, & if I found I had to use one of my bare hard drives on a computer without the dock it would be awkward, are there some docks that are portable? some of them look a bit bulky.
 
Sossity said:
thanks for the info, what dock are you using? the only concern I had with a dock was that my hard drives might be exposed to some dust, & if I found I had to use one of my bare hard drives on a computer without the dock it would be awkward, are there some docks that are portable? some of them look a bit bulky.
Click to expand...

I don't use a dock. only enclosures.
You could also look into something like this, as docks are quite bulky.
 
simsaladimbamba said:
I don't use a dock. only enclosures.
You could also look into something like this, as docks are quite bulky.
Click to expand...
thank you, this looks just as good as a dock, would this work if I had to do an overnight back up of a drive connected with one of these kits?

and if I did, where would be a safe place to sit the bare drive to keep it cool while doing a backup?
 
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