No need to check your LCDs, folks -- this is happening. This is this week's rendition of Ask Engadget, and if you'd rather your own question be in this space next week, shoot us a good one at ask at engadget dawt com.

"Like any good geek, I have upgraded my MacBook's hard disk many times, and have all the old 2.5-inch SATA disks sitting in a pile. I'd like to put them in a case, but the enclosures I see are either very expensive or look hideous and unreliable. I'd love to get some recommendations for dependable, fairly-priced portable enclosures; USB's a must, but FireWire 400, then FireWire 800 then eSATA would be bonuses, as would any extra features."

So, HDD upgraders -- what kind of case (or cases) did you procure in order to keep using those displaced drives? Any great stories of success / failure? Let us know, would ya?

So yeah, the easy part about getting the SSD RAID setup of your not-so-lofty dreams is the acquisition of A-DATA's newest XPG Dual SSD RAID enclosure. The tough part is smuggling enough cash in through untraceable means to procure a few 256GB SSDs. For those who don't mind living dangerously, the aforesaid chassis is compatible with twin 2.5-inch SATA SSDs and / or HDDs mounted on a standard 3.5-inch form factor drive cage. Users can connect it to a PC via SATA or USB once those drives have been acquired and installed, but you'll have to wait until the end of this quarter to see it ship.

[Via Slashgear]

We're still torn on whether we'd have this or one of those always-evolving HDD Stage Racks at our desk, but really, you can't go wrong either way. Brando's 2.5-inch SATA HDD Enclosure with Multi-Function Dock pretty much explains itself, but if you struggle with piecing things together, we're here to help. The unit holds any 2.5-inch SATA drive you care to insert, and the base doubles as a 2-port USB hub and multicard reader. The whole thing is just $25 -- the tough part is choosing between red or black. Hmm.

If you're a proud portable media player owner, or you've got some fancy schmancy streaming media setup in your living room, the Onkyo MP-1000J might not do a whole lot for you, but if you're searching for a simple way to get content from PC to TV, you may want to listen up. The MP-1000J is a sweet new middleman, designed to store your fav shows, clips, etc. on its 2.5-inch hard drive (which you're responsible for providing), and then play them back (presumably hassle-free) on your living room set, in-car LCD, or dusty hotel television. The trick here is the self-contained GUI that shows up on your monitor, allowing you to select the file you want to see; it's akin to having a (very) "light" version of Windows Media Center Edition running the show within the relatively small device. With native support for DivX, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, AVI, VOB, XviD, MP3, WMA, OGG, and a few more, this thing will play back just about any file you toss at it. The unit gets a plethora of extras, including a USB cable, AC adapter, 12v car adapter, a trio of display connectors (including support for 1080i over component and Dolby / DTS passthrough), and a svelte remote control to manage the action from afar. While we can't adumbrate just how much this little hard drive / screenless PMP hybrid will cost, the MP-1000J will add yet another alternative to getting PC content to the TV (sans any confusion) when it drops on September 1st.

[Via Impress]