esata vs usb external drive?

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Mark
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Just interested in any experiences of eSATA against USB for external drives enclosures?

I'm about to upgrade the hd in my macbook and I realised that I have a choice since my main desktop and the laptop have esata connectors.

Is it much faster than usb? recommended caddies (2.5 or 3.5)?
 
GReat. Can you recommend a cheapish external caddy for my old 2.5 drive?
 
Make sure your old 2.5" drive is SATA not IDE. IDE drives won't work in an esata enclosure.

To be honest though if it's only an old 2.5" drive, I'd probably just stick it in a USB enclosure. It is much faster but most people don't need that performance and even for those who do, any performance benefits might be negligible if it's a small old drive.

Have a look at http://www.scan.co.uk/Index.aspx?NT=1-0-19-407-0 for external enclosures.
 
It is SATA and usb is slow. (quotes over an hour to backup 80gb)

Seems to be a bit of a shortage of cheap reliable 2.5 enclosures though - some reportedly need 2 usb connectors for power.

edit: I've had problems in the past with both scan and aria so I dont use them.
 
it would be a cost of case V's size of disc choice (assuming your drive is sata)

Last time i looked eSata cases where quite a lot more than USB.
Also keep in mind that USB 3.0 will be out fairly soon, which is expected to be faster still, and probably more widely used.
 
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