OWC's ThunderBay 4 is designed to house your biggest data files. Even though each unit supports up to four hard drives, the inclusion of dual Thunderbolt 3 ports on each ThunderBay 4 means that you can daisy-chain multiple enclosures today for massive amounts of storage. When maxed out, that means you can max out your storage needs with up to 24 drives spread across six ThunderBay 4 units. This is a great storage solution for videographers, photographers, or those wishing to run their own media server. You might run into a situation where you're working with more than one hard drive that you’d like to put into external drives. Whenever that’s the case, it makes sense to get one large external drive for all of them. This model can support a maximum of four 3.5-inch SATA drives, up to 16TB per drive, or 2.5-inch SSDs up to 12TB per drive. It also includes a built-in Raid controller that provides six configuration variations. Both USB-C and USB-A 3.1 will operate well with this enclosure, making it great for a wide selection of drives. For starters, the enclosure can work with Windows 10, 8, and 7. It can also work with Linux, Visa 7 and 8, and Mac OS 9.1, 10.2 and higher. The enclosure is also great as it works with the vast majority of SATA I, II, and III HDD. Alternatively, it will also work with SSDs too. So long as your SATA HDD or SSD doesn’t exceed 12 terabytes, you’re good to go!

Hard Drive Enclosure, USB 3.0 to SATA HDD Caddy for 2. UGREEN Hard Drive Enclosure, USB 3.0 to SATA HDD Caddy for 2.

Another thing that you need to think about is the transfer rate of the hard drive enclosure. This will usually be measured in gigabits per second. Essentially, this means if it’s an 8 gigabit transfer rate, you’re looking at around 1 byte. If you want to see the transfer rate in megabytes, then you need to divide the gigabit by 8.

Why you should buy this: The Mediasonic Raid 4-bay is a network drive that supports a maximum of four drives for all your storage needs. Looking for a high-quality external hard drive enclosure to help you out in your home or at the office? Look no further than the Sabrent 2.5 inch SATA to USB 3.0 Tool Free External Hard Drive Enclosure. This is a great choice since it will work with pretty much any SATA II hard drive measuring 2.5 inches. All you need is to connect it to a USB 3.0 port that you have set up to your computer and you can reap the benefits. This comes down to logistics more than anything. The size of the external hard drive enclosure that you need is largely going to depend on the size of the overall hard drive. You can usually get either 3.5 inch hard drives which tend to get used in desktop computers, or there are significantly smaller 2.5 inch hard drives and these are the ones that you will usually encounter in notebook laptops. Of course, the larger option is significantly faster and cheaper, but if you are just looking to upgrade your laptop then the 2.5 inch hard drive will be better. Price

Hard drive enclosures - Currys DYNAMODE Hard drive enclosures - Currys

Why you should buy this: The Asus ROG Strix Arion M.2 SSD Enclosure is designed for fast gaming performance and comes with the company's signature design to complement ROG laptops and desktops. When paired with an Asus gaming rig, the ROG Strip Arion benefits from the company's Aura Sync lighting effects with the built-in RGB lighting. The drive relies on the USB 3.2 Gen 2x1 for data transfer, and you can connect the external SSD to your laptop via a USB-C cable for speeds up to 10GB per second, according to the company. The connection type of your hard drive enclosure is important. The vast majority of external hard drives will sync up with your PC through the use of a USB 2.0 and USB 1.1. Sometimes the hard drive will connect to your computer using FireWire. You should make your decision on the type of connection based on the ports you have already on your PC.Why you should buy this: The OWC ThunderBay 4 can accommodate four drives, but the Thunderbolt connection allows up to six ThunderBay 4 enclosures to be daisy-chained together to house a total of 24 SSDs or HDDs! In general, a USB 3.1 enclosure will transfer around 10 Gbps, but the issue is that SATA limitations will usually prevent you from getting up to that speed. For a SATA transfer you won’t get a great deal of improvement – 1 Gbps at best – if you get 3.1 instead of 3.0. There’s no use in getting it really unless it’s available for an affordable price. If possible, it’s usually best to look for a hard drive enclosure that can give you up to 10 Gbps. This will give you the best performance for your money. Durability