Barracuda XT, Barracuda, Barracuda Green, DiamondMax and other desktop SATA and IDE drives

[DaBombDiggity]

I am having trouble looking for an enclosure for the hard drive mentioned. The trouble is because of the required power to the drive (2.8A). Most enclosures I find are 2.0A. I need it to have an eSATA port (or regular SATA) for sure, be able to support 2TB, and be able to power a 2.8A drive. It would be nice if it can handle SATA II/SATA III speeds and has a USB port, but not necessary. Also would be nice if it looked good.

[DaBombDiggity]

Bump... Help please...

[fzabkar]

Seagate's FreeAgent external drives all appear to use 12V, 2A (24W) adapters. I suspect that the 2.8A spin up requirement is adequately handled by the PSU, after which the power consumption settles down to 9W.

Similarly, Seagate's 2.5" drives require about 850mA during spinup, but function quite OK on most USB ports. USB ports are current limited to 500mA, so they appear to tolerate short overloads.

[DaBombDiggity]

Even if the drive is being for long periods of times? It is gonna be running at 1.5GB/s. I'm gonna be using it as an internal drive on the PS3.

[fzabkar]

I don't think the interface speed has any measurable effect on the power consumption. As for the PS3's power specs, I can't help you there.

Here are the jumper settings, if you need them. I'm not sure if they are ignored in this model, though.

http://qsf5.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/seagate-jumper-setting.gif

[DaBombDiggity]

The hard drive will be connected to the PS3 through the enclosure via an eSATA to SATA cable. The power will be supplied to the hard drive with the enclosure. You think I should go ahead and purchase a 2.0amp enclosure?

[fzabkar]

That's your choice, but since it's good enough for Seagate ...

[DaBombDiggity]

"but since that's good enough for Seagate ..." I should go for it?

[fzabkar]

Sorry, I don't want to stick my neck out. Anyway, here are two tech notes that may help you decide. IIRC, there is one 3A Maxtor adapter, but it may be for a two-drive enclosure.

Identifying Maxtor External Storage Power Supplies [186849]:
http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=186849

How do I identify / differentiate between Seagate External power supplies? [204171]:
http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=204171

[DaBombDiggity]

Just stick your neck out and tell me. Would you go for it?