I'm planning on getting my friend an external USB2.0 enclosure for his LG GSA-4081B to use with his laptop (Dell Latitude C800). Now I'm enquiring as to which of these enclosures would work best with this drive and laptop combination? I know the laptop is old, but he's only burning 4x DVD-Rs anyway, so it should be fast enough to handle that.

Bytecc ME-320U2 5.25" USB 2.0 External Enclosure
Bytecc ME-340U2 5.25" USB 2.0 External Enclosure
NSpire NSP-511U 5.25" USB 2.0 Black External Enclosure

Quick replies would be appreciated as I have very little time left before I have to grab this enclosure for him. Thank you!

I don't have a 4081B but a 4040B in a Bytecc USB 2.0/Firewire (not sure of the model but it's abount 6 months old) and no problems burning from either USB or Firewire using my Dell laptop or AMD desktop.

If the laptop has a Firewire port, i would recommend it over the USB2.0 one, for many many reasons including lower CPU usage and dasychaining capability.. Anyways, if you get a USB2.0/Firewire enclosure, make sure the Firewirechip used is an Oxford 911. Cheaper bridge chips do NOT support ATAPI DC/DVD drives well. I can testify this as i had bought a noname USB2.0/Firewire case for my 4040B with a crap chip and i had only troubles with it : random lockups, freeze on eject, etc.. I put an HD in it and it's been working fine eversince.

Adi

Thanks for the info folks... so a firewire connection would actually be a better option huh? The laptop does infact have firewire builtin, USB2.0 would be through a PCMCIA card.

Ok, I found out the Bytecc Firewire enclosure uses the Oxford 911 chipset, USB2.0 is Ali, while their combo uses a Prolific chipset. So would the drive work well in all 3 of these cases, or would it only work well in the firewire setup? Thanks again.

My Combo case uses that stupid Prolific chipset. Please AVOID it at all costs ! Get the Oxford911 Firewire case that at least we know supports well ATAPI devices. I have no idea of the Ali one..

Adi

unfortunately, it seems that now all the combo FireWire/USB enclosures are using the Prolific chipset.

perhaps in the past the case makers used 2 chipsets for combo cases - one for USB, the other for FireWire. and thus you could find a combo with Oxford chipset. but nowadays we have these combo chipsets, which is a cheaper solution.

if you want the Oxford chipset you'll have to get a FireWire-only case.

I ended up getting the NSpire NSP-511UE combo enclosure, which uses a Cypress and Oxford chipset, so this should be an ideal solution for my friend's needs... Thanks for the tips again!

this is a combo case, right? do you have a link for it?

You can check the details on the case from www.nspirepc.com there's no direct link to the enclosure really...

thanks

here's a link for anyone interested:
http://www.nspirepc.com/external_enclosures.htm

oh, and of course i was wrong in my previous post. i take it back.
perhaps most cases use the Prolific combo chipset, but obviously not all.