By David Miles Huber
Part2's CA-805U2 external drive cases in action in my studio.
It's common knowledge to computer-based digital audio geeks (like myself) that USB is the latest, greatest thing since sliced humble pie. For those who are new to the scene, the "Universal Serial Bus" is a protocol for easily plugging external hardware devices into a PC or Mac. Its plug-n-play sophistication often (but not always) makes installation a breeze and the fact that devices can be plugged/un-plugged without rebooting the 'puter is an absolute miracle.
Not all's peaches-n-cream in USB-land, however, as bandwidth limitations can be a problem if you don't spread the data flow over several bus connections and not thru a single port. But with common sense, it can make your techno-life a lot easier, portable and powerful.
Having said that, I just have to tell you about my latest, greatest find. The CA-805U2 from part2.com (MSRP $89.00... I got mine from tigerdirect.com for $79.00) is an IDE drive case that can accept any 3½" fixed hard drive / 5¼" IDE removable drive bay, CD-RW, DVD-ROM or RW device... and communicate the data to/from the computer via USB 2.0 (a new high-speed protocol that's faster and is already superceding Firewire... I predict in a few years it'll be "Firewhat?")
OK, so what's all the fuss about? For me it means that I can put my computer in a special alcove on the other side of the room, so I don't have to hear the drives & fans. It's completely silent! With the Part2 case, I can have my handy-dandy CD-RW sitting on my desk at arm's reach (don't forget to unplug the box's internal fan during assembly, as the CD-RW won't need it).
In addition, I have an identical case that can jump through an even more impressive hoop! This one houses a 5¼" removable drive bay that lets me swap removable drives without having to reboot the computer. That's right, you heard me... just plug in the drive, turn the Part2 case on and the computer auto-recognizes the drive. No multiple reboots, no resetting the bios several times... just quick-n-easy access to any drive you want.
I use the removable drives as backup media (the removable and box fan noises are more than I like during production, but that's not a biggie during backup). Since the USB 2.0 bus seems to be about 2/3 the speed of an Ultra-DMA IDE drive, you probably still could use it on most multitrack sessions.
Ah, yes... Since only the newest computers come equipped with USB 2.0, you'll probably have to buy a multi-port 2.0 PCI card. Mine cost about $30.00 and Windows XP installed it instantly... In fact XP saw both the card and the drive case instantly and I was up and running in a brave-new world in a matter of minutes!