External Hard Drives: Pros & Cons?

[Keebler Elf]

I saw an Acomdata 160 GB external HD (new) on sale for $125 (after taxes & rebates), 7200 rpm, Hi-speed USB 2.0, 480 Mbps (60 Mb/s), 8.5 ms seek time, 2 MB cache.

Is this a good deal? I've been thinking about getting an external HD to enable me to "carry" my computer data around with me. The one catch that I can think of is that it doesn't have Firewire, but I dunno how important that is (my computer right now doesn't have it either).

Thoughts?

(p.s. maybe this shoulda been posted in Buy & Sell?...)

 

[baltimoron]

The external HD will most likely require its own power supply.

So you'll have to lug around the HD as well its power transformer. If you've got a pretty big laptop bag to put all this stuff in, great! You still have the power brick for your laptop as well. If you've got a strong back, good. If not, you'll get a good workout.

Also, a lot of hotel rooms only give you one lousy power outlet to use. Adding the external HD may also require you to travel with a large surge suppressor as well.

They usually have models available with both USB 2.0/Firewire interface. USB 2.0 is actually faster than Firewire by about 30 MB, so I wouldn't worry about not having Firewire.

I recently purchased the Maxtor 300 GB One Touch II with USB/Firewire.

http://www.maxtor.com/portal/site/Maxtor/menuitem.6adb6b8313633595062e6be791346068/?channelpath=/en_us/Products/External%20Storage

I took it with me on a couple of trips and placed it in my check-in luggage since I didn't want to keep carrying it around with me.

I would recommend buying a carrying case from the manufacturer for portability.

 

[frankcastle]

Is firewire faster than usb? I think that is the case but I am not 100% sure.

I have a friend who went a different route and bought an external enclosure that way he can swap in and out HDs or DVDROMs. This may work out to be cheaper in the long run because you can buy internal HDs and swap them out when you decide to upgrade.

Anyways, an external enclosure equipped with a HD and firewire would be my vote.

 

[alex6]

Get a Maxtor. Our network guy did some reseach on the Acomdata external HDs and was told they where not overly reliable. If your using it for home use go for it. But if you have valuable data then spend the extra cash.

 

[WoodPeckr]

USB 2.0 is actually faster than Firewire.
Older PCs had USB 1.0 which was slower than Firewire.

Talked with a couple salesmen at both Circuit City & Best Buy and they both agreed External HDs are the way to go for the portability they give you. Both said USB 2.0 is faster than Firewire also.

Make sure you get at least an 8 MB cache.

Avoid Maxtor, a buddy who builds PCs say they have a high failure rate presently!

Seagate is best right now and they give the longest warranty, 5 years!

Check em out at:

http://www.newegg.com

 

[frankcastle]

So here's a USB/Firewire external enclosure that supports only HDs for $30 USD.

http://www.meritline.com/meritline-usb-2-5-hdd-external-combo-enclosure.html

Here's a USB/Firewire external enclosure that supports HDs and DVD ROMS for $36 USD

http://www.meritline.com/firewire-usb-external-enclosure-5-25-cd-dvd-drive-hdd.html

Here's a 160 GB 7200 rpm internal HD going for $110 USD.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00008DSRF/103-5892043-5308667?v=glance

Okay so I was wrong about being cheaper, initially but the next time you upgrade your HD you will save money. mind you I didn't shop around I just googled and got the first prices that I found. Also, I didn't read the sites closely so I'm assuming these are USD.

I still like this route because of the flexibility in terms of connection type and the ability to swap drives and roms.

 

[alex6]

Top 10 External Hard Drives

PC-World - November 2004 Test

http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/article/0,aid,117817,00.asp

We have six Maxtor OneTouch 160GB purchased last year in Aug. No issues with them to date. Yet I can't say what will happen in the long haul.

 

[t8rs]

I got a 160GB Western Digital external HD last year and I'm quite pleased with it. Although I obviously don't need one now, I just happened to be looking at the external enclosure/internal drive option out of curiosity.

Check out tigerdirect.ca. They have enclosures for about $30 CAD and a Maxtor 160GB internal HD for $60 after rebate. Given the negative comment about Maxtor, it might be worth shoping around and you'd still come out ahead. Plus, you'll get the versatility to use other internal/cheaper devices with the enclosure.

 

[glaeken]

Lacie has a number of external drives that are powered by the USB/Firewire bus so no power adapter is required.

http://www.lacie.com/products/range.htm?id=10036

 

[Don]

Don't forget that as fast as USB 2.0 and IEEE1394 is, it is still a bottleneck compared to the speed of HD's today. But I still use external drives all the time and they are very handy to have around.

 

[Keebler Elf]

What's an "enclosure" and what is it needed for?

 

[baltimoron]

What's an "enclosure" and what is it needed for?

It's the case, or the housing, which converts an internal HD into an external HD.

It has the interface electronics and the ports, data and power, necessary to interface the HD externally with your PC.

The idea is that you buy the enclosure, open it up, place a cheaper internal HD in it, close it up, and voila! Connect it to your PC and you've got an external HD.

In the future, as your needs grow, you can replace the internal HD in the enclosure with a better model internal HD. This reduces your future cost (i.e. you don't have to buy another external HD).

Personally, I didn't see a need for this, as I don't plan on upgrading the capacity of the external HD for a long time. But, if you anticipate frequently going to larger capacity HD's, then the enclosure alternative may be for you.

Check frankcastle's posts in this thread. He has some links to some.

 

[lickrolaine]

why a hard drive and not a 30 or 40 gig mp3 player? It will hold most anything you want to have,plus you can listen to music,and with some,fm stations.They are portable and have their own power supply.They may seem to be more expensive initially,which they are,but they are smaller and way more versatile.Some are also digital recorders,play movies,show pics,etc.

 

[Keebler Elf]

Ahh, I get it. Thanks Baltimoron.

 

[glaeken]

why a hard drive and not a 30 or 40 gig mp3 player?

One reason would be price. A 40GB audio player will run about $400-$450, a 40GB audio/video player will run about $800 but a 40GB external drive is only about $100-$150.

 

[baci2004]

- Most enclosures have cooling fans, and you can remove the lid easily if extra cooling is required. The is an important feature...heat kills.

- You can put someone elses HD in your enclosure and grab files without having to open up your pc.

- Every computer has USB or USB2, most computers don't have firewire.

- Seagate makes the most reliable drive at the moment. Quantum Fireballs used to be the most reliable and the fastest HD's....Maxtor bought Quantum, nuff said.

- The Western Digital Raptor is the fastest at the moment, and has been for the past 2-3 years.

 

[Keebler Elf]

Is there an easy way to check to see if your motherboard supports SATA vs. ATA interface?

 

[baci2004]

Is there an easy way to check to see if your motherboard supports SATA vs. ATA interface?

If you are thinking external sata there will be an expansion connector at the rear bottom of the pc where the cards are.

For internal, you can check the bios (probably not your thing) or check the manufactures website.

 

[zzap]

Be sure to reformat it to NTFS. Most externals come pre-formatted to FAT32, which is an extremely unreliable file system. Especially for external hard drive, which can be switch off at any time!.

 

[Galahad]

The most inexpensive and flexible way to go is to get a external enclosure case and a internal HDD separate. However, this will also mean more work to set it up. You'll have to set the correct jumper setting on the HDD and then partition/format the HDD. You could do a google search for instructions.

Enclosures are available for different HDD sizes: 5.25, 3.5 and 2.5 (laptop HDD). So if you have any older HDD you want to use, you can get a 5.25 enclosure.

Not all enclosure comes with fan coolers.

If you use the external HDD only with computers running Windows 2000 or Windows XP, then format it to NTFS. If you use it with computers running Windows 98 to Windows XP, then format it to FAT32.

If I remember correctly, the rated speed for USB 2.0 is 480MB/s and firewire is rated at 400MB/s. However, I think Crazy Canuck is correct, firewire is actually faster, because it is a direct throughput.

Back to the original question, $125 for a external HDD is a good deal pricewise. I can't comment on the realiability.

Hope this helps.