Having a laptop and other 19" rack mounted equipment I've been wondering if that would be a good option (I've got vibration problems with my current external enclosure and a Samsung 400GB IDE drive).
I was thinking that I could buy an empty 19" rack enclosure, drill the necessary holes, figuring out the best way of mounting the drives in a vibration-free way etc.
I could fit at least two drives inside the enclosure that way!
I see there's a company which supplies ready-made 19" rack enclosures for hard drives. Nice, but way too pricey at US$ 375 for enclosure alone (it doesn't look like they've done anything to remove noise either, which is an important point for me -actually the biggest reason for considering a this project):
I can't use it anyway since my Powerbook only accepts Firewire 400/800 and USB. My existing enclosure have all three interfaces, which I think is a good idea -suggestions for a suitable "bridge" interface board?
With a solution like this I could have all my drives in one place, find the optimal solution for removing drive/vibration noise, do away with all the "wall wart" AC adaptors (I would mount a power supply inside the enclosure).
Any comments, experience or suggestions?