Disks cheap as chips, but boxes cost a fortune

INTERNAL hard drive prices, especially on legacy Parallel ATA (P-ATA) storage, are one of the best bargains of the minute. Depending on the vendor, big box, instant rebates, mail-in rebates and phase of the moon, you can pick up anywhere from 120 to 200GB of storage off-the-shelf for under $60 with a 120GB Seagate at Best Buy for $49.99, and a 200GB Seagate from CompUSA for $59.99.

If you want to turn that drive into external storage, you're going end up shelling out another $25 to $40 so for a vanilla 3.5 inch USB 2.0 enclosure with no bells or whistles. Brands like AcomData and ADS Technologies will start upwards of $40. It might be one of the biggest rip-offs of the year, since you have to not only have to pay nearly as much for the enclosure as you did for the drive, but you also have to supply your own screwdriver and labor to put everything together. I bought a clearance generic from a big box store for $20 and was dismayed to find frayed power wiring when I got home and started to plug everything in.

Further, several of the U.S. Big Boxes, including BestBuy and Circuit City, either don't stock or have trouble keeping enclosures stocked on the shelves. CompUSA manages to keep enclosures on their shelves, but they stick the casual buyer with an extra $15 bucks surcharge. A USB enclosure with a "one touch" backup button list around $25 (plus shipping; minimum order of $150 for free shipping) on their website, but costs $40 for an off the shelf purchase.

CompUSA is at least nice enough to offer some different options for external enclosures. You can find USB 2.0 SATA enclosures starting at $30 on their website; $40 in the store. If you want to get a little fancier, they offer a "Network Storage" version - such as a 10/100 Ethernet, built-in FTP and Samba server for around $100 and a dual-bay USB 2.0 box (two drives) for $160.

Shopping around a little bit, I found some interesting bargains on external storage - no screwdriver, just plug and play away. Acom Data's 250 GB external drive with USB 2.0 and Firewire was running on CompUSA's website for $70, but they've already sold out. Circuit City website is pushing SimpleTech's external drives, offering a 160 GB USB 2.0 external drive for $70 (if you send in the $60 in mail-in rebates). The better deal is the 250 GB USB 2.0 external drive for $100 once the mail-in rebates are factored out.

People buying larger-sized drives might not have a problem shelling out $40 or more for a USB 2.0 enclosure (and also need to be aware that some manufacturers only support up to 320 or 400 GB drives), but I've decided that more smaller disks are better than fewer larger ones. That is, assuming I can figure out a simple way to manage them all in the longer run. µ