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after reading that thread about backing ur shit up, i realised its time to invest in an external harddrive. could i possibly have some help and opinions on a cheap 500GB hardrive?

i was gonna get this:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/review/product/ ... Descending

but read the reviews and thought that may not be a good idea.

has anyone got any other recommendations?

ive heard good thing about them Western Digital external harddrive, but i would see what everyone has got to say, harddrives aint my specialty

I'v got Western Digital MyBook Studio I edition, 500 GB, open case, it has USB2.0, eSATA, FW800 interfaces and an external power supply. Ideal for data backup. It is my first external drive and i'v used it about 1 month. But WD has good reputation and i'v also read that there is much more problems with Seagate drives than with WD.

Looks like this Elements 500GB USB 2.0 is also open case, so cooling should not be the problem, as the heat is the main data killer. But it has only one interface and the drive is supplied via usb cable. It is comfortible but not sure how reliable.....

Carefull where you put it, all it takes for an external is to be knocked off the desk and its fucked.

id rather buy a secondary hard drive or run multiple harddrives in RAID 6/4 or 1. But thats only beacuse i'm 100% sure where my computer is that its not going to get kicked or knocked. And i'm also 100% sure that if I do have to move my computer the drive bay is secure enough to withstand casual knocks anyhow.

But aye, moral of the post - dont get a false sence of secuirty cause you have an external. Virtual threats (Virii or whatever) are eliminated in most cases but they are far far far far more prone to physical damage - and trust me hard drive needles are WEAK.

Do some research if you are serious about backup, basically.

Yeah, took a recent close call to scare me into getting one. But I have now procured a 1TB lacie and I'm lovin it. Looks like the monolith too.. all black n minimal n shit. Runs super quiet. And because I'm running leopard, 'Time Machine' back up system just runs in the background mirroring all the folders and files necessary. Only down fall, as mentioned above, would be drop-damage. Or power surges. Or electromagnetic pulse.

The_Dza88 wrote:ive heard good thing about them Western Digital external harddrive, but i would see what everyone has got to say, harddrives aint my specialty

They are a solid manufacturer.


When buying a hard drive make sure you get a good one. Cheap ones tend to fail and you lose your data.

Btw, DO NOT MOVE HARD DRIVES WHEN THEY ARE ON! they are spinning disks and they do not like being moved. Also keep magnets away;)

doesnt matter what you buy - its going to have as much chance of failing as the HD your trying to back up

best bet is to buy a solid internal drive and use an external case for it

what ever u get be effking careful with it

i knocked my over while pulling a cable and i'm look at between £500-£1000 data recovery!

be warned they;re fragilee

Retinoise wrote:Yeah, took a recent close call to scare me into getting one. But I have now procured a 1TB lacie and I'm lovin it. Looks like the monolith too.. all black n minimal n shit. Runs super quiet. And because I'm running leopard, 'Time Machine' back up system just runs in the background mirroring all the folders and files necessary. Only down fall, as mentioned above, would be drop-damage. Or power surges. Or electromagnetic pulse.

I have a Lacie 500 gigger, it was like 100 bucks. I can't complain. It's not all trendy looking like the ones you get at Best Buy but it looks great with my all black set up.

I bought my first external about 4 years ago or so. 160 gig. Pretty big one at the time. It did me solid for about 3 years. I dropped it quite a few times, I have a little kid running around, it is tough keeping shit from getting broke. It finally died on me. I haven't heard of many people people keeping externals alive much longer than that.

I bought the new one before I bought my new computer. If I had it to do over I wouldn't buy an external. My house is set up on a network, I don't really need to move the external around, it just sits there. If you really need something portable I would suggest using USB mem sticks or a solid state drive would be ideal if you have the $$$.

Stay the hell away from Segate. Their hard drives are poor. I've had them, and I had to get them serviced 3 times - all within a few months of each other - before I said fuck it and got something else. And these are their all in one brand drives. To save money, just buy an internal hdd, with an external case. Make sure the case supports your hard drive. Then you can just get new hard drives if you need too, or you can install the one in the external case in your machine if you want. Loads of options. If anything, go for speed. 7200rpm, or 10,000 rpm are good.

Do you ahve to buy specific ones for Apple Macs?

my western digital one hasn't failed on me once had it now for 4 years i think, its lived in a smokey enviroment on nearly all day everyday been dropped from height (many times), trodden on, spilt stuff on it lol you name it it's happened

been abused and its still going!