Any advice about buying an external storage drive

[King Crimson]

for my computer.....i've got too much music and video but i don't want to dump it. a buddy says he's had good luck with Western Digital drives. i'd like to get 160 G....

4600 or 7200 RPM? does it matter that much?

[Scott D]

the best thing I was told to look for with a HD is the cache size.

[Beano's Fourth Chin]

If you won't be running software off of it, I wouldn't worry too much about the RPMs. If you're just moving your porn and pirated songs, it'll be fine.

I have a Western Digital external drive USB 2.0 connection and it's good. It's probably a couple years old. I back up all my work files every night and all the family photos once a week.

For some reason, I think there's a limit to the size of file that can be moved to it, though. Maybe something like 5 gigs. You can't put a whole football game on there from the replayTV. That's my only complaint. I never did any research on how to get around this.

[Beano's Fourth Chin]

Maybe the speed doesn't matter because maybe you can only get 7200

http://microcenter.com/search_results_e_compare.phtml?coordinate_group=HF 3B&search_id=2cca63e3c1f7446a43dbee12c511ef83

I can't believe externals are less than a buck a gig now.

[King Crimson]

thanks Beano. there's a Western Dig i've found on-line that's 160 G for about 130$. free shipping. i guess i'll jus' pull the trigger.

[SicEmBaylor]

Along these same lines, is it possible to install a program onto a thumb drive?

[TopDaugIn2000]

they are so cheap now, go for at LEAST 300 Gigs

Seriously.

[TopDaugIn2000]

here is a 300 for $130

here (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822154626)

[TopDaugIn2000]

I had a Lacie 1TB External at my last job. That's about the ONLY thing I miss from that place.

DAYUM that thing was awesome.

[King Crimson]

here is a 300 for $130

here (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822154626)

interesting. i bought a couple things from newegg and everything was cool. some of the negative responses are a bit troubling in the reviews of the Fantom drive.

additionally, open question, how important is it to have backup software that comes with the drive? for instance the Western Digital drive i was looking at doesn't come with backup software....but the more expensive Maxstor model does.

for instance: http://www.itp.net/reviews/details.php?id=2856&category=

can't i just back up using XP?

[OUinFLA]

Best Buy had the Maxtor 300G drive on sale for $199 last week. I dont know if it was for one week only. Normally $279 with instant $80 rebate. It comes with backup software in the package.
I bought it, but have not hooked it up yet.

[BajaOklahoma]

I have a Maxtor 200 gig. It's been great for 2 years.

[slickdawg]

http://www.mwave.com/mwave/skusearch.hmx?SCriteria=3927995&CartID=done&nextloc=

YWIA

Seagate is the best drive made, period.

[BlondeSoonerGirl]

Seagate is the best drive made, period.

I respectfully and whole-heartedly disagree with a pretty smile on my face.

:twinkies:

[slickdawg]

I respectfully and whole-heartedly disagree with a pretty smile on my face.

:twinkies:

:les: BIASED!


If you worked for someone other than an OEM...... :D

[skycat]

If you won't be running software off of it, I wouldn't worry too much about the RPMs. If you're just moving your porn and pirated songs, it'll be fine.

I have a Western Digital external drive USB 2.0 connection and it's good. It's probably a couple years old. I back up all my work files every night and all the family photos once a week.

For some reason, I think there's a limit to the size of file that can be moved to it, though. Maybe something like 5 gigs. You can't put a whole football game on there from the replayTV. That's my only complaint. I never did any research on how to get around this.

The file size restriction is probably due to how the HD was formatted. I just got a WD drive about a month ago to store digital video and to use as a backup. The drive was formatted at the factory, but wouldn't let me put my videos, that consist of my son sleeping for 30 minutes, on it. I reformatted to NTFS, and voila, problem solved.

Are you sure that the WD drives don't come with backup software? My 250G did.

[King Crimson]

Are you sure that the WD drives don't come with backup software? My 250G did.


the WD MyBook Essentials do not (the lower price range)....and the other WD MyBook series Prestige (or something like that) do....come with backup software.

this is a kind of short to mid-term solution for me...so, i'm not looking to spend more than about 150$. but i don't want to put alot of tunes and video on a drive and then lose it. about 10 years ago, i already lost over 1500$ worth of CD's due to a friend of mine not paying the bill at a storage space we shared when i was out of the country.

i'm not going through that again.

[BlondeSoonerGirl]

:les: BIASED!


If you worked for someone other than an OEM...... :D

We're an OEM for a reason, yo.

:D

[BajaOklahoma]

I don't remember if I formatted the Maxtor from the disc or from XP......
I have a couple of shows that I saved on the external drive - no issue with moving them from the computer to the external drive.

[skycat]

I think the filesize limit for FAT is something like 4 GB. So either your files or smaller than that, or the drive was formatted using NTFS.

[skycat]

the WD MyBook Essentials do not (the lower price range)....and the other WD MyBook series Prestige (or something like that) do....come with backup software.

this is a kind of short to mid-term solution for me...so, i'm not looking to spend more than about 150$. but i don't want to put alot of tunes and video on a drive and then lose it. about 10 years ago, i already lost over 1500$ worth of CD's due to a friend of mine not paying the bill at a storage space we shared when i was out of the country.

i'm not going through that again.

You can probably find some software on the net that will do the backup thing pretty well. I wouldn't worry about it too much.