External Hard Drive
Oct 26, 2004 at 8:15 AM Thread Starter Post #1 of 28
Judge Crandall

Judge Crandall

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I'm looking to get an external hard drive, but I don't really know much about them. I'm looking for something pretty big, somewhere between 160 and 250 probably. I've heard about problems with external drives, so something that has a reputation for reliability would be preferable. I'd really appreciate any suggestions.

Thanks,

the Judge

Just ordered the Seagate 200GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive and the AMS VENUS DS3 Aluminum Black 3.5" USB2.0 External Enclosure from Newegg. Thanks for all the help.
 
Oct 26, 2004 at 9:23 AM Post #3 of 28
Quote:

Originally Posted by bLue_oNioN
Buy a Seagate or Samsung HDD along with an HDD enclosure from Newegg and you're good to go. This way, you avoid the gross markups with packaged external HDD gimicks.


Any specific suggestions? I really don't know anything about this.
 
Oct 26, 2004 at 1:44 PM Post #5 of 28
Do you need back up software as well or just the drive?

If you need software you might consider Maxtors offerings. I have a 300 gig one (they just updated it) other than the fact that the first one fried my firewire ports on my motherboard and JB3 it works well. Hows that for a recommendation?

The software took a bit of fiddling but it works well in an automated mode.

If you just need a drive the case option might work out well or Simpletech has a 400 gig one for a good price.
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...154-320&depa=1

Hey I just checked they charge less for the external drive than they do for just the Hitachi drive it contains.
I hear the software for the simple trech drive crashes though so you might want to use the OS's software if it has any (XP Home does not have a back up utility).
 
Oct 26, 2004 at 4:57 PM Post #7 of 28
I just want to use the drive, I might use if for back up, but I doubt it. I can buy from newegg, don't see why I wouldn't be able to. My computer only supports usb 2.0, though I guess I could get a firewire adapter.
 
Oct 26, 2004 at 5:22 PM Post #9 of 28
I hope you are just going to use this as a data dump and not to install programs or anything on...

External harddrives are SLOW compared to an internal one. They are only useful for data storage of things that dont require a fast transfer. Like movies/music or just misc backup files.
If you install a program on these it will crawl.
 
Oct 26, 2004 at 5:35 PM Post #10 of 28
Quote:

Originally Posted by ReasonablyLucid
I hope you are just going to use this as a data dump and not to install programs or anything on...

External harddrives are SLOW compared to an internal one. They are only useful for data storage of things that dont require a fast transfer. Like movies/music or just misc backup files.
If you install a program on these it will crawl.


Yeah, I just need this to store my movies, music, etc. on.
 
Oct 26, 2004 at 6:03 PM Post #11 of 28
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...146-306&depa=1
I have that one and I love it. I put a 160gb sata Seagate in it and it works well. I sugguest sticking with seagate drives because they are less prone to breaking. They have a 5 year warranty on them (the baracuda4's anyway) so seagate stands by them.
They are also the only maufacturer of a native SATA drive (samsung *might* have one but im not sure). Everyone else uses a bridge chip from ata/100 to sata.

Heres a decently priced 200gb, unless you want to deal with rebates.
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...148-033&depa=1

Total cost: $151.99

edit:
btw, that external enclosure has bright lights on it but they are not useless. The blue one shows when the drive is powered up and the orange one shows disk access.
 
Oct 26, 2004 at 8:05 PM Post #13 of 28
You won't need a fan. Also, most newer hard drives are much quieter then older ones that make grinding noises. Seagates are known for their quiet operation.
 
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