Questions about portable hard drives

[Maidrite]

Who all uses a portable hard drive? How do you like it? And what kind is it? What size is it ?
Inquiring minds want to know ?



Have a "MAIDRITE DAY" !

 

[SierraCook]

I use a portable hard drive at work. It is a Maxtor drive. I love it. My coworkers and I have hauled it all over the place. It is plug and play, so no downloading of software needed. I cannot remember what size it is. All I know is that I have store alot of pictures and other large files on it and have not made a dent in it storage capacity.

 

[GB]

Well I use an external hard drive for my laptop. I do not bring it anywhere though, but I could. It is about the size of one and a half paper back books. It is a 330 (or 340 maybe) gig Seagate Free Agent drive. I love the thing. I bought it about 6 months ago for just under $100. Now the 500gig goes for around the same or less. I think around Black Friday I saw them for about $80. I will never again be without one of these. This way I have all my important files backed up if anything were to happen to my laptop.

 

[urmaniac13]

Hi ya James!! (((hugggggsssss)))) it is a very handy tool, if you use your portable PC a lot. As the portable notebooks have limited storage capacity, this sort of hard drive, just about the size of your wallet or even smaller, can be a life saver. The capacity varies, anywhere from 80gb to something much bigger these days, I can't exactly remember without asking Cris, who always carry a couple around for his job. Prices are coming down almost daily due to the demand, just like many gadgets of this sort. As GB pointed out, it is also a great device to keep a backup for precious files not to be lost!! I highly recommend it!!

 

[AllenOK]

I've been thinking about getting one. I'm currently using a couple Flash Drives (one 128 MB and a 1GB), as well as a 2 GB SD card to back up files. I have a CD-RW in the desktop, and a DVD-RW in the laptop, but rarely actually burn a disk.

 

[GotGarlic]

I will never again be without one of these. This way I have all my important files backed up if anything were to happen to my laptop.

I'd suggest using a non-magnetic medium for important backups, like CDs or DVDs. External hard drives can fail just as internal ones do, but unless they get scratched, CDs and DVDs don't.

 

[buckytom]

good advice, gg.

all of my pictures get burned to cd twice, as well as backed up to swappable scsi drives in trays.

we use everything from usb memory sticks and portable hard drives to network terrabyte storage at my job.

i've found if you want reliable memory, you can't go cheap and buy knockoff products from ebay. i mean, your risking losing your data if the device fails.

 

[GB]

I'd suggest using a non-magnetic medium for important backups, like CDs or DVDs. External hard drives can fail just as internal ones do, but unless they get scratched, CDs and DVDs don't.

While I agree that external hard drives are not the ideal for backups they are certainly better than nothing. The chances of both my hard drives failing at the same time are very small so I am not terribly worried. My most important files (my photos) are also backed up online and a good number of them are burned on cd or dvd.

CD's and DVD's are not good archival media though. Even without getting scratched they can and do break down over time.

 

[buckytom]

gb, i've heard that cds and dvds will begin to break down in as short as 10 to 15 years, which is why i keep the scsi backups as well. i've definitely begun to see my magnetic tapes, hi-8mm, degrade.

i guess i'll have to reburn the cds every decade or so.

 

[GB]

I just use my etch-a-sketch. As long as no one shakes it I should be all set.

 

[GotGarlic]

I just use my etch-a-sketch. As long as no one shakes it I should be all set.

 

[Fisher's Mom]

I have external usb drives on all of the home desktop computers which are portable to an extent - you can easily move them from one computer in the house to another, but they have a separate power supply and are about the size of a paperback book - like GB's.

I also have some small thumb drives and then a couple of larger flash drives drives - 8 gigs. These are great. I keep them in my camera bag so that when we travel with my notebook, we can all empty the sd cards from our cameras onto the flash drive and all the pics are in one place. But they are noticeably slower than an IDE or SATA drive.

I did just order a truly portable usb hard drive - 160 gig that doesn't use an external power source (Western Digital, I think). It's about the size of a deck of cards. I know these are somewhat slower than the ones with a separate power supply and also they will definitely drain your notebook battery much quicker but the reviews I read say that even with those issues, these drives are excellent. I'll let you know when it gets here.

 

[Chief Longwind Of The North]

I just use my etch-a-sketch. As long as no one shakes it I should be all set.

Etch-A-Sketch ! Be careful, your'e dating yourself here. Personally, I use the wax writing pad, you know, the one you used to get for 25 cents at Woolworth's that had the transparent plastic sheet with a dark wax-covered sheet behind it, and a plastic writing stylus to write with. By lifting the sheet, all is erased and ready to be written on again (volatile memory, precursor to RAM memory).

I lost a whole novel when I my cat payed with it, lifting the plastic sheet, and erasing 3 years worth of work.

Seeeeeya; Goodweed of the North

 

[LT72884]

I'd suggest using a non-magnetic medium for important backups, like CDs or DVDs. External hard drives can fail just as internal ones do, but unless they get scratched, CDs and DVDs don't.

You should go solid state media. Samsung has a 30gig flash drive. i cant wait till carbon based HDD's come out or even the "Shaw fugi kawa" its the light drive in Halo that cortona is in charge of.. Man im such a nerd... LOLOLOL

 

[Barbara L]

I just commit everything to memory. That way it is always with me.

Wait a minute... Why did I just come into this room?

Shoot! Now I'm going to have to go back in the other room to remember!

Barbara (who has discs and drives and flash-drives and fly-drives coming out of her ears because she's lucky to remember her own name with her little pea-brain!)

 

[GotGarlic]

You should go solid state media. Samsung has a 30gig flash drive. i cant wait till carbon based HDD's come out or even the "Shaw fugi kawa" its the light drive in Halo that cortona is in charge of.. Man im such a nerd... LOLOLOL

Maybe when the price comes down. I think my DVDs will last that long

 

[Aurora]

When you do finally purchase a new external drive make sure to format it even if it is already partitioned and formatted. I recently read that a Chinese company that is providing the external drive assembly for Seagate has been shipping drives which contain a virus which collects information written to the drives and passes them to a Chinese website in Beijing.

Read more . . .

Infected Seagate Hard Drives

 

[NAchef]

I missed out on the BF deals and I REALLY need one of these to backup all my stuff. Should have one by the end of the year, looking for a good deal on a 500gb or a 1tb. I have WAY to many pictures and songs to loose. I may try for the larger because I may start putting movies on it.

 

[buckytom]

nachef, you need a terrabyte?

holy crap! that's a lotta data. we have weeks worth of shows in high def video stored on servers with less capacity.

remember everyone, if you lose even a few bytes of data from damage or degradation, the entire txt, jpeg, mpeg, or what have you is lost as well. so make sure you have multiple copies of important stuff.

 

[NAchef]

I dont NEED it but I can see myself closing in on the 500gb within a year or two. So rather than buy something now that may not be good enough later I'll buy the larger one and be done with it. Have to see prices to tell if it will be cost effective. Most likely I will end up with a 500gb or 2 just for security, 2 is better than 1 right.

I have friends that have four 1tb drives filled. Now thats some crazy stuff!!!! hahaha