This is not your typical "external hard drive" thread, so have no fear. I'm looking for a few fairly specific criteria, which may not be possible.
It MUST support the full IDE instruction set (some enclosures only handle a limited subset, but I need dd and other support). I would like something that has a fan/ventilation. USB2 is a must, IEEE 1394 would be nice. Ideally, it would be nice if the drives are easy to remove and reinsert.
I do some work for various small businesses and it is very often that hard drive issues must be diagnosed, so I was looking for an external drive that I could hook up to my laptop for data recovery purposes.
Also, if you have models that DON'T work well, let me know so I don't buy one of those either.