External Hard Drives

Rocket

Rocket

New member
I need to buy an external hard drive to back up my computers. Is there anything special I should look for or anything to consider?
 
Look at online backups. I have an external hard drive as well, but I am not diligent about backing up info, and by the time I do I don't always remember what hasn't been backed up since the last time. Online backups can do automatic updating.
 
The latest and greatest is USB 3.0. I would go with that so you can future proof it a little. This will save you time when you're saving or exporting items. Portable HD are more expensive but more convenient when carrying it around. If your plan is to plug it in and leave it somewhere then the bigger external HD that you plug into the wall for power will be cheaper and larger storage.
 
Seagate is normally the cheapest, yet they are great. I've had my 1.5 Terabyte one for two years now and it's about full and it has not crapped out or broken on me yet. It's a great unit that I picked up on Black Friday in 2010.

If you want the cheapest and have the most space it will be an external hard drive that needs a wall outlet to power. More expensive but more convenient is the one that uses a USB to power and transfer data.

Mine was the one with the wall outlet.
 
Nth Degree said:
Look at online backups. I have an external hard drive as well, but I am not diligent about backing up info, and by the time I do I don't always remember what hasn't been backed up since the last time. Online backups can do automatic updating.
Click to expand...

Who do you use for online storage?
 
dc52nv said:
The latest and greatest is USB 3.0. I would go with that so you can future proof it a little. This will save you time when you're saving or exporting items. Portable HD are more expensive but more convenient when carrying it around. If your plan is to plug it in and leave it somewhere then the bigger external HD that you plug into the wall for power will be cheaper and larger storage.
Click to expand...

I would like a portable unit. I was thinking a 1TB would handle what I need for a while.
 

I have WesternDigital. It works well and does my backups automatically.

The big thing is to make sure it has the software to do the auto backups. This makes it simple and pain free...
 
I have a 500Meg Seagate External and use for my pictures. I've had it a couple years now and only half full. Pictures take up alot of space. Good luck.
 
I have had good luck with Western Digital. Right now I have three of their Element drives and have never had a problem. Stick with the 3.5 inch drives over the 2.5 inch for backup. I also have a few of the 2.5 inch passport drives for carrying data with me and those work great for that purpose. Amazon has the 2 tb Element with USB 2.0 for $120.
 
been awhile since I shopped for an external so I can't comment on the latest and greatest

haven't shopped in awhile because my seagate 500gb is problem free (2.5in). I actually own 2 for all my music (one is the primary 'libary' and the other is a backup - just have to remember to copy to the backup from time to time)
 
Another option you can consider is getting an enclosure of your choosing and putting whatever sized drive you want in there. For instance, I have an Antec enclosure with a 2TB WD Caviar Green in it. No problems.
 
I got my 760 GB hard drive the other day and now I have a new question:

Do I need to set up partitions? I've never done it before but I know I've seen it suggested
 
For what it's worth, if you decide to try Carbonite, go through a site called techguylabs.com, it's run by a tech radio personality named Leo Laporte. You'll get and extra two months plus a 15 day free trial. I know, sounds like a plug, but I've been looking into online backup and a friend of mine who writes books, uses Carbonite extensively and definitely recommends the service. I wanted to add in that the reason my friend was looking for off-site backup, was that he was doing a lot of writing on the road and was having file storage and laptop crashing issues.
 
Rocket said:
I got my 760 GB hard drive the other day and now I have a new question:

Do I need to set up partitions? I've never done it before but I know I've seen it suggested
Click to expand...

Only if you want to. I have a 1.5 TB external with no partitions, and my desktop computer has a 3 tb hard drive with no partitions.
 
Rocket said:
I need to buy an external hard drive to back up my computers. Is there anything special I should look for or anything to consider?
Click to expand...

How many computers?
What is the combined HD capacity on these computers?
Do these computers have USB 3.0 capability?
Would you rather use a thumb drive than a mechanical drive?
 
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