Calling all Bargain Hunters! ...or just nice people w/ time...

I have an external enclouser for $50 with a western digital 250gb drive I got for $200.

I'm in the same predicament, and I'm actually looking at the Speeze 5.25" USB2.0/Firewire enclosure. About $50 I think. As for drives, I've found Seagate to be the most reliable. I was able to find a really nice sale a few months back for a Seagate Barracude 7200RPM 160GB for $80 after rebate at CompUSA. I've had problems with many other major brands (Maxtor and Western Digital, Quantum if they're still around). Let me know if you happen to find any other good deals on reliable enclosures. Thanks.

I got a nice Bytecc External Enclosure from Newegg about 6 months ago. I love it, it hasn't given me any problems since. When I looked I couldn't find the EXACT model I have, but they have ones VERY similar. This one is the closest...

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...145-316&depa=0

It has a spot to plug in an audio cable, which mine doesn't have, and the AC Adapter is a little different, but everything else is the same.

That has a couple firewire and a usb 2, but you can save yourself money if you dont need the usb 2 connection at all. I opted for it just in case i needed to hook my drive up to someone else's system and they didn't have FW, but if you know you're not in need you can check this one out. Same thing minus the USB and a few bucks...
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...145-315&depa=0

It is designed to support up to a 250 GB HDD. I have a 250 7200 Western Digital I got for $150 at a Day After Thanksgiving Day sale (It was worth going to circuit city at 6 am, but JUST BARELY!! Those crowds were insane )

Anyway, this enclosure is a nice looking plastic, but very durable and supposedly has "shock-protection." While I have never dropped it, it does appear to be built to save your drive from damage if you did. It gets slightly warm, but I have run my 7200 drive for hours on end and never felt discomfort, not that you're going to have this thing sitting on your lap. It fits the drive nice and snugly, so it isn't huge, but it is big enough to hold a standard 3.5" HDD, so it's not small either, if you are worried about extreme portability. Overall I'm glad I bought it. Easy to put together and really good design/features. The best $200 I ever spent on tech stuff making this External HDD!!