rtr Posted April 4, 2006 Share Posted April 4, 2006 I need an external hard disk, USB interface preferably, to backup some files from my laptop and fiances laptop occassionally. Something that will last and not lose our data. Doesn't need to be huge, 20G or so is fine. Any recommendations? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lynn jones Posted April 4, 2006 Share Posted April 4, 2006 funny you should mention this need. i just purchased a western digital 80 gig usb exteral hard drive for $120 from costco. it's about the size of a pda. lynn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NewRacer Posted April 4, 2006 Share Posted April 4, 2006 Maxtor is used extensively at our company for years now. Never one issue. (dont get the One-Touch unless you want it to do your backup for you) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cuz Posted April 4, 2006 Share Posted April 4, 2006 I need an external hard disk, USB interface preferably, to backup some files from my laptop and fiances laptop occassionally. Something that will last and not lose our data. Doesn't need to be huge, 20G or so is fine.Any recommendations? The reliability of an external hard drive is inversely related to the importance of data stored on it. Do you really need 20 gig? For backups you may want to consider a 2 gig memory stick. Since it has no moving parts it may be more reliable. Or how about a DVD burner? You can put up to 4 gig on a re-writable DVD or up to 8 gig on the dual layer versions. -Cuz. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Putty Posted April 4, 2006 Share Posted April 4, 2006 Seagate is noisy, just put one in a build, bugs the crap out of me........WD quiet, good drive. Did Maxtor buy Quantum? I have an old Quantum Fireball that still rox, way past its prescribed dead date. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nik Habicht Posted April 5, 2006 Share Posted April 5, 2006 I need an external hard disk, USB interface preferably, to backup some files from my laptop and fiances laptop occassionally. Something that will last and not lose our data. Doesn't need to be huge, 20G or so is fine.Any recommendations? In my albeit limited experience, swapping one external drive between multiple computers has always produced bad juju. I now prefer to run dedicated back-up drives..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Posted April 5, 2006 Share Posted April 5, 2006 The Maxtor One-Touch series are the most robust ones I have found. The full size drives are the best value but they are bigger and do not power from the USB/FireWire bus but from a wall wart transformer. I routinely swap USB/FW drives from machine to machine because making backups of files and moving them to other machines is what portable drives are all about. I see no issues with doing this unless you have virus corrupted files on one machine and you transfer them to another. Of all the external drives I have been through in many years of heavy use/abuse, the Lacie bus powered pocket drives and the Maxtor full size AC powered ones have hung in the best. For only 20GB storage size, USB will be cheaper, albeit slower unless it's USB 2.0. Most drives nowadays are in the 40-60GB+ size in bus powered and 80-120GB+ size in AC powered. You may have to look used to find anything that small. Just get a larger one and partition it, that way you won't have to constantly write over the only copy of a backup copy ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NewRacer Posted April 5, 2006 Share Posted April 5, 2006 Just get a larger one and partition it, that way you won't have to constantly write over the only copy of a backup copy ;-) Excellent point George!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
D.Hayden Posted April 5, 2006 Share Posted April 5, 2006 We have a few of the Maxtor 300Gbs.. I switch them around all the time, and my backup script always makes a new directoy by the date, so I can have many backups on one drive. 300GB only sounds big now... in a couple years... it'll be nothing I've also taken regular dirves and put them in external USB cases. They work good, but the cooling isn't great. As soon as the backup is done, unplug it. But this might be a cheap way to recycle an old 20-40GB drive into something useful (especially if you limit what directories/folders it backs up) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nik Habicht Posted April 5, 2006 Share Posted April 5, 2006 I routinely swap USB/FW drives from machine to machine because making backups of files and moving them to other machines is what portable drives are all about. I see no issues with doing this unless you have virus corrupted files on one machine and you transfer them to another. I tried that on PCs and kept having issues with drive letter incompatibility. My systems have been (knock on wood) Virus and spyware free for the last seven or eight years. Dedicated drives work for me --- a great big AC powered one one for the desktop; a 40gb firelite drive for the laptop. When I need to move files these days I grab a 1GB compact flash card --- my zips are a thing of the past.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Posted April 5, 2006 Share Posted April 5, 2006 Yeah, you really gotta' love flashcards and usb thumbdrives for moving a couple files around fast! I keep a couple FW drives (Maxtor 250 One-Touch) formatted NTSF (reads on PC or Mac that way) for general uusage at events when you never know whats comin' at ya'. I have never experienced any issues in bouncing them from machine to machine all de' day long. Most of the folks I work with do this too. We transfer a lot of files to and from a lot of disparate hardware in the environments I work in (live event video work) and we never see any issues except for bunk content, but that's another story ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lynn jones Posted April 5, 2006 Share Posted April 5, 2006 here's what the western digital looks like: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BrianH Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 Did Maxtor buy Quantum? I have an old Quantum Fireball that still rox, way past its prescribed dead date. Yeah, they did. Quantum stopped making drives around '96...they just bought them from MKE. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AzShooter Posted April 6, 2006 Share Posted April 6, 2006 I vote for the Maxtor also. I have a 200 gig for backups. Since I'm a photographer I use a lot of disk space and although I erase the shots that aren't worth anything I do save a RAW file of the good ones before I do any work on them. 200 gig doesn't seem to last long. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LJE Posted April 7, 2006 Share Posted April 7, 2006 When I need to move files these days I grab a 1GB compact flash card --- my zips are a thing of the past.... Nik, if you ever need to transfer larger quantities of files to another computer, don't forget about the MP3 players. I have a 20 Gig MP3 player with 15 gigs free space on it. I use that to take files with me to my friends house and tranfer them to his computer. Larger capacity than a flash card, and relatively fast. With Windows XP, just plug it in and go. Larry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
galt11 Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 Another idea to consider is an external enclosure. THis is just the case, not including the hard drive. This way you can swap out hard drives and use specific ones for different projects. I have one from AMS called the venus ds3. It is an aluminum shell with a built in cooling fan. It comes in usb, firewire, SATA, and I believe SCSI. Adam Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 All FW/USB external drives are just "Enclosures". From the pocket ones to the larger AC powered ones, they are all the same inside. Crack one open and all you are gonna find is a controller card with an interface chipset on it and either a 2.5" notebook drive or a 3.5" fullsiize drive. Most are ATA, but a few are starting to use SATA. I have been using a lot of different ones, but the real mark of quality when shopping for a FW drive enclosure is the presence of an Oxford 911 or later version controller chipset. The Prolific chipset is crap and I would avoid it like the plague. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Patrick Sweeney Posted January 7, 2007 Share Posted January 7, 2007 I was at the local Office Depot when they had a closeout sale. Picked up a Maxtor 200G external for backups, $71. It doesn't use the USB for power, it has a cord, but who cares? Now, once a month I just backup my photos and text files. Now if I can just figure a way to archive my emails from Mozilla.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Posted January 7, 2007 Share Posted January 7, 2007 If you are using POP mail in Mozilla (not webmail/IMAP), then you just have to find the folder on your HD named "Mozilla" and inside it there willl be a folder for users and inside that one with a cryptic number/letter name and that baby has your browser and POP mail database and pref files. It's in different places on Mac's versus PC's but it works about the same on both platforms. Archive that whole "Mozilla" directory and you have it backed up. Youcan even migrate it to a new system with a drag-n-drop replace if the installed Mozilla version is the same (not across different OS versions though) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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