I am wanting to occasionally boot my old iMac HD up with a 2010 27" iMac. Any advice on what enclosure I should buy?
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2010 iMac boot from external drive
- Thread starter HE15MAN
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If you just have the "bare" HD, don't buy an enclosure at all.
Instead, buy a USB3/SATA docking station. To see what's available, go to amazon, and enter "usb3 sata dock" in the search box, and you'll get many hits.
The advantage of having a dock is that you can use the drive you have..... or another drive.... or another drive..... -- you don't have to be fooling with enclosures.
The drive will behave "as if" it were an "enclosed" drive. You can boot from it, etc.
The only disadvantage is that it doesn't look quite as "clean" as would a drive enclosure. But the benefits of "swap-ability" outweight that (at least for me).
I've had good experiences with docks from plugable.com (no financial interest other than being a paying customer).
Instead, buy a USB3/SATA docking station. To see what's available, go to amazon, and enter "usb3 sata dock" in the search box, and you'll get many hits.
The advantage of having a dock is that you can use the drive you have..... or another drive.... or another drive..... -- you don't have to be fooling with enclosures.
The drive will behave "as if" it were an "enclosed" drive. You can boot from it, etc.
The only disadvantage is that it doesn't look quite as "clean" as would a drive enclosure. But the benefits of "swap-ability" outweight that (at least for me).
I've had good experiences with docks from plugable.com (no financial interest other than being a paying customer).
Would it run ok over USB 2.0 since that is all the iMac I has supports USB wise? I was thinking Firewire would be better
Yes, USB is backwards compatible so it would work, but you are correct FW 800 would be faster.