NexStar 2.5" external drive enclosure
I needed to replace the old 320G drive in my MacBook Pro with a larger drive, at least 500G. I ordered a new drive, and it arrived a few days later. As always it was a cinch to install in the MacBook.
The enclosure came with a USB cable and its own little faux leather case, along with a screwdriver (not shown) for the tiny little screws that hold on the end cap.
But now I had a perfectly good 320G 2.5″ drive that was too good to throw away. What to do with it? I didn’t really need another external drive, but the 2.5″ laptop drives are so small, I thought it would be nice to have a tiny little external drive to tuck into my laptop case when traveling.
I had never put a laptop drive into an external enclosure, but this seemed like a good time to try it. So I decided to spend a few bucks on an external drive enclosure.
I ordered the NexStar TX SATA-to-USB enclosure from Amazon. At about $8, the price was right, and if it was problematic or it didn’t work, that wasn’t a huge amount of money to risk.
Here's the enclosure with a Coke can to give you an idea how small it is.
I couldn’t believe how easy it was to install the drive into the enclosure. The enclosure came with with its own tiny little screwdriver, which is used to remove the screws that hold the end cap in place. You simply remove the end cap, slide the drive into the enclosure until it snaps into place, put the end cap back on, and tighten down the screws.
The enclosure also comes with a double-end USB cable. Because the enclosure is powered by the USB cable, the end that plugs into a USB port on your computer has two plugs to make sure it gets enough power. If you’re plugging it into a USB hub, or a USB port on a keyboard, it probably needs that extra power boost. But I can plug just one of those into my MacBook or Mac Pro and get enough power.
If the drive doesn’t get enough power from the USB port that you plug it into, and if your available USB ports are limited, it could be a hassle needing to use 2 USB ports. But a drive enclosure with its own power supply is necessarily going to be bigger, heavier and costlier than a USB-powered enclosure.
Since I have plenty of USB ports on my Mac Pro, and rarely use either of the 2 USB ports on my MacBook Pro, it wouldn’t be a problem even if I did need to plug in both of the USB plugs.
Also included in the box is a little faux leather case to slip the drive into. The USB cable will fit in there too, which is nice.
I’m pleased to have discovered how inexpensive and easy it is to give myself an extra external hard drive. This is a tiny little thing, not much bigger a thumb drive, but the 320G drive inside will hold ever so much more than a thumb drive.
It’s easy to take with me when I’m on the go, small enough to store easily when I’m not using it, and it hardly adds any weight or volume to my laptop case.
The NexStar TX 2.5″ drive enclosure is available from Amazon, and they are also usually readily available on eBay.
NexStar Drive Enclosures For Sale At E-bay Now
| 7 items | Price or Current Bid | Shipping | Total | Time Left | |
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Vantec Nexstar TX 2.5IN SATA Hard Drive Enclosure USB 2.0 Black 42781 | ||||
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Bid: $8.99 |
$15.00 | $23.99 |
11 hrs 22 mins 6 secs |
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| Buy: $27.98 | Free | $27.98 |
2 days 22 hrs 48 mins 11 secs |
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Vantec NexStar TX 2.5-Inch SATA to USB 2.0 External Hard Drive Enclosure | ||||
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Bid: $2.25 |
$1.99 | $4.24 |
3 days 20 hrs 45 mins 13 secs |
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Bid: $11.99 |
Based on Zip | $11.99 Plus shipping
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5 days 19 hrs 5 mins 58 secs |
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| Buy: $13.36 | Based on Zip | $13.36 Plus shipping
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16 days 14 hrs 55 mins 22 secs |
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| Buy: $25.10 | Free | $25.10 |
28 days 13 hrs 17 mins 58 secs |
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| Buy: $25.05 | Free | $25.05 |
29 days 23 hrs 47 mins 54 secs |
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