I have a five year old desktop (MOBO is shot) that I would like to access the hard drive from, and transfer files to, a new laptop. The power supply is good in the old computer so I would use that to power the drive, also good, after I remove it from tower. The old drive is a Maxtor Diamond 160 GB SATA drive. I have found a couple of web sites that are selling a "cable converter" that will take the SATA cable from the old drive and output it via a USB connector to the laptop. You can buy them with or without a power adapter. My question is has anyone actually bought one and what were your results? If anyone has a different solution other than buying a new MOBO I would be glad to hear it. Thanks.

If you are talking about hard drive enclosures with USB connectivity...old news.

Yes, they work just fine...make sure you get the size which is appropriate for the drives you intend to use (2.5 inch for laptop hard drive, 3.5-inch for desktop hard drive, 5-inch for optical drive).

Example follows: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/ca...t=0&Recs=10

You definitely want a model with a power supply of its own, I've not seen any other kind.

Louis

For desktop hard drives (3.5") an external power supply is needed. For 2.5" laptop drives, you don't need an external power supply. Don't forget to make sure that you get a SATA drive enclosure (rather than an IDE one).

Thank you both. I am off to order a SATA enclosure.