Experience with external USB HDD enclosures?

[az]

I'm looking into buying a USB HDD enclosure for my 3.5" PATA HDD. Does anybody here have any experience with them, in particular with regards to sending the HD into standby?

I've read that the RaidSonic Icy Box does this, but the only source I got this from is Dan's Data, and he doesn't know first hand either. Are there any other inexpensive, fanless units (that still provide enough cooling to a 7200 rpm HDD through metal enclosures or whatever) that do this?

What are my other options of not letting the harddrive die an early death? I don't want to buy a fanned unit or an NAS device - though I would consider an NAS if it were really cheap.

[GNEP]

Using a couple of Icy Boxes here - got the version that does SATA or USB - occassionally I'll run them SATA when I have machines part-disassembled...

Not sure I've ever seen them go into standby on their own though.

The boxes are v. useful, don't get too warm, but due to their rather thin-walled nature, if you've got a noisy drive to start with they won't exactly help. Thicker feet than those provided will stop any vibration being transmitted to the desktop though.

[Technoid]

my experience with them is that for 3.2 inches enclosures, the psus fails after a while and that in the "usb powered" 2.5 enclosures the circutry fails.....

[ND66]

..... in particular with regards to sending the HD into standby?

I'm using 2 Ultra make enclosures, and my "Stand By" mode is..... the ON/OFF Power button on the back.
Once is installed, after turning the power ON it's usable after a 3 or 4 seconds.
And I wouldn't trust anything without a fan, I’ve seen enclosures getting so hot, you couldn't touch it.
Yes it’s noisy, but I have a peace of mind that my digital pictures and video files will not disappear if the HD smokes… .

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=31389&CatId=1204

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[Wulfman]

I'm using some freecom-unit. one of the advantages it has is the network port (needs special software though, not useful for linux), so you get decent speeds with older laptops (usb1.0) as well. usb2.0 is available as well, of course.

the hdd turns itself off after some time (spins down), is that the stand-by you are talking about?

cheers,
wulfman

[az]

Yep, that's it. Is it cheap, quiet, fast and driverless as well? (For USB 2)

[Wulfman]

it was comparably cheap, can't complain about the speed, but have never done any comparisons. there is a problem though - my unit came preloaded with a hdd, not sure if you can get a "barebone". no fan, but the hdd is kind of noisy (hardware manager says it's a whatever samsung spinpoint, the internal spinpoint is definitly less noisy).

http://geizhals.at/a137093.html

cheers,
wulfman