External Hard drives

  • Thread starter Thread starter Kwaj
  • Start date Start date
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Kwaj

I am wanting an external hard drive to back up information between my laptop
and desktop. I know Maxtor (and others) make a range of external harddrives
but besides these prefabs having great software, do they offer any real
advantges over my simplying buying a kit and building it myself?

Are self-built external harddrives as reliable?
 
Kwaj said:
I am wanting an external hard drive to back up information between my
laptop
and desktop. I know Maxtor (and others) make a range of external
harddrives
but besides these prefabs having great software, do they offer any real
advantges over my simplying buying a kit and building it myself?

Are self-built external harddrives as reliable?
Click to expand...

Why would you use their software? I must admit I've never installed software
for an external drive but can't see any point to it. The hard drive in my
computer didn't come with any software.

Michael
 
Michael said:
Why would you use their software? I must admit I've never installed software
for an external drive but can't see any point to it. The hard drive in my
computer didn't come with any software.

Michael
Click to expand...

Well, for one thing if you buy many external drives, at least those in
the Maxtor One-Touch style, they come with backup software that is
activated by a button touch. If you don't install the software the
button doesn't do anything -- and that button and associated software
seem to be pretty expensive when I compare prices of a bare drive and an
external case and the pre-packaged sort. I've never bought one of the
ready-made drives but I guess if somebody didn't want to make their own,
and was willing to pay the price for the package, then they'd probably
install the software too so the pretty button did something.

Personally I'd rather have a NAS, possibly a Kuro Box with embedded
Linux that can be hacked -- stick a 500gB drive in one of those and then
you've really got something. ;-)
 
Kwaj said:
I am wanting an external hard drive to back up information between my
laptop
and desktop. I know Maxtor (and others) make a range of external
harddrives
but besides these prefabs having great software, do they offer any real
advantges over my simplying buying a kit and building it myself?

Are self-built external harddrives as reliable?
Click to expand...
I have built one myself using a WD Raptor HD and I use Acronis software to
image my C drive.
I can certainly recommend this set-up.
 
I have built one myself using a WD Raptor HD and I use Acronis software to
image my C drive.
I can certainly recommend this set-up.
Click to expand...


Why in the world would you put a hotter-running, expensive
drive into an external enclosure when the external interface
is a bottleneck to even the slowest and cheapest new drives?
 
kony said:
Why in the world would you put a hotter-running, expensive
drive into an external enclosure when the external interface
is a bottleneck to even the slowest and cheapest new drives?
Click to expand...

Because I had a spare one.
 
Why in the world would you put a hotter-running, expensive
drive into an external enclosure when the external interface
is a bottleneck to even the slowest and cheapest new drives?
Click to expand...

My external drive setup takes about five minutes longer to make an Acronis
clone than it did using the same drive in the computer bay. Not a big deal.
Have a cup of coffee or something.
 
My external drive setup takes about five minutes longer to make an Acronis
clone than it did using the same drive in the computer bay. Not a big deal.
Have a cup of coffee or something.
Click to expand...


True, but that wasn't what I was getting at, that the
particular drive was significantly more costly than most,
and lower capacity than contemporary alternatives too, all
because of tuning towards performance that is lost when it's
in an external enclosure.

I was thinking in context of selecting a drive for an
external enclosure rather than reusing a leftover drive.
 
kony said:
True, but that wasn't what I was getting at, that the
particular drive was significantly more costly than most,
and lower capacity than contemporary alternatives too, all
because of tuning towards performance that is lost when it's
in an external enclosure.

I was thinking in context of selecting a drive for an
external enclosure rather than reusing a leftover drive.
Click to expand...

Now I get it.
 
Why in the world would you put a hotter-running, expensive
drive into an external enclosure when the external interface
is a bottleneck to even the slowest and cheapest new drives?
Click to expand...

Probability and off site storage. Both of which are achievable with an
internal drive but with a higher annoyance factor that makes it less
likely that the drive will be removed.

Bubba
 
can any of you recommend a FREE solution for imaging a drive
Click to expand...

While there are free imaging tools, I just bought Ghost 2003 for $11.
I could have got it cheaper but I preferred to use a vendor with some
semblance of a good reputation. Do a Froogle search.

Bubba
 
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