[jonathanjong]

I'm shopping for a USB 2.0 portable external hard drive (i.e., does not require power adapter), and I'm not sure:
(a) What the brand/model options are.
(b) What capacity offers best bang for the buck (in terms of space/price)

More specifically, I'll be using this on my MacBook (running 10.5.5) and I'd like it to be pretty.

Any ideas? The first that comes to mind is the WD Passport. Anything else?

Edit: Anyone know anything about Lenovo Dataslims?

 

[Teraflame]

Just look at Seagate and Western Digital drives.

 

[hear_the_sound]

Hooray! I can help here!

Western Digital. I have a 100 GB portable hard drive. It's never given me any problems - just plug and play. Nothing to install. Computer recognizes it right away. Fast transfer rate. Never freezes up. I got a great deal on ebay.
I'd rather get two smaller hard drives than one big one so you can back up your back up! Unless you really do have 320 gb of...material..... : )

 

[jonathanjong]

Is that the WD Passport? I don't see a 100GB model. And you're running Mac OS X?

 

[jonathanjong]

Seagate FreeAgent v. WD Passport v. WD Elements?

 

[TheAzhrei]

I make my own. You can get an external enclosure for under $20. You can put whatever size drive you want in it. I just upgraded my new PS3 and I put it's drive into a Rosewill enclosure. It's USB powered and works with both my PC and my Mac. You can get 2.5" laptop drives pretty cheap. The 500GB drive I bought to put in the PS3 was under $140.

 

[appophylite]

The SimpleTech portables are fairly durable little drives. I have a 40 GB one that has been beaten and bruised and still work. Most of the people I work with as well as my sister have higher capacity ones ranging up to 500 GB and no one I can think of has complained yet.

 

[ozz]

We use WD passports at the shop so far so good and they are on sale
right now I believe the ones we choose were the firewire/usb if we had
to boot then thats a plus at least on older Mac's.

 

[ambrosecarr]

Last time I had a look at external hard drives, it came down to a contest between western digital and seagate. Those are the only two companies which offer 5-year warranties, and their prices are competetive (whereas lenovo is a bit inflated in terms of $/GB) I don't think you can go wrong with either company.

 

[silverstonettl]

Just thought I'd add I'm also looking for another external drive (likely 1TB) and am looking for a Western Digital one. I've had an older drive from them and have never had any issues with it so I don't think I'll risk losing my data with other brands which seem to have so-so reliability records.

 

[Al4x]

just dont get any of the cheapee ones on ebay, i had 2 fail on me,

[now my second hard drive sits inside my laptop in the cd/dvd drive spacewhere it wont overheat]

 

[Moocher]

Go to Newegg.com - Computer Parts, PC Components, Laptop Computers, Digital Cameras and more!, and look at externals and at bare drives with separate enclosures. Read the reviews, they are very helpful. It is an excellent site and they have a terrific reputation. I recommend 320 GB as an excellent bang-for-buck size.

If you want quick and easy, try Costco.

Mooch

 

[garthfluff]

I really like the WD passport models. I've got two of them for back up and they are fantastic.

 

[GreatDane]

I have a 200 GB WD portable that has been good. I need another and its between this Seagate 500 GB @ Newegg & a WD 500 GB @ B&H. The Seagate is $5 cheaper.

 

[vagarach]

I think this one looks really sweet, and is also relatively cheap, ($70 at futureshop...the canadian best buy):

LaCie - Little Disk, Design by Sam Hecht - Hi-Speed USB 2.0

It comes in 60GB and 120GB versions, which I think are basically iPod drives in an enclosure, given how small it is. This is portable in every sense of the word, you could even pocket it!