Computer Drive Bay Caddies
When you're building your own desktop computer , or perhaps upgrading or repairing an old one, you may want to choose one of these computer drive bay caddies to fit the machine you're working on.
The drive bay is an element of a computer that houses some form of hard drive or other mechanism that is essential for the computer to be fully functional. The caddy is the structure that houses the drive, acting like a case for the drive to be stored within.
Drive bay caddies may be used for inserting CDs or other disks into the machine, as well as for general internal components. So you can find spare disk drive caddies if yours has become damaged, enabling you to replace that particular part rather than having to spend more on replacing the whole machine.
Some types of computer drive bay caddies
Drive bay caddies are usually described as being one of a range of standard sizes, from 1.8 inches to 5.25 inches.
The sizing refers to the size of the actual drive component itself, rather than the size of the bay, with the width of the disks that form the drive being 1.8", 2.5", 3.5" or 5.25" in diameter.
Some of the drive bay caddies on offer come with variable sizing, such that, for example, you can fit either a 2.5" or 3.5" hard drive into the same caddy casing.
USB 3.0 drive bay caddies allow you to tether USB compatible devices to your computer whilst benefiting from the high speed capabilities of USB 3.0.
Computer drive bay caddies are available that are branded by one of the many household name computer manufacturers, including Dell, HP and Toshiba, so you can match up the caddy case to the specific brand of computer you're working on. Or there are unbranded drive caddies on offer, which are designed to fit multiple different types of computer.