external hard drive recommendations

Hey guys, I just bought a new hp hdx 18 and i'm looking for a good external hard drive to back up my data.

I've been reading quite a bit and I can't seem to find a good consensus on a certain one. I've been looking at the western digital my book and my passports? Do any of you recommend or use these either of these 2? And what is the main difference? obviously size and seperate power supply, but are there any speed or reliabilty issues with either one?

I'm open to suggestions so those are not the only ones that I would consider, those are just the ones at the the top of the list right now.

I plan on backing up the laptop as well as my home pc with this device, so I'm going to want atleast 500gb or 1tb. I'd like to do a full system back up on my lap top as well as backing up my music and homework documents as well.

And one more final question, I was going to try using the vista tools for backing up and full pc back up. Are those sufficient, or should I look at something else?

Thanks for all your help

Ryan

 

I think if you run the drive via USB it won't really matter what you choose.

2,5" is portable, 3,5" is a, let me say, "home drive".

I think most people like the "my passport drives" - but you could also make your own.

I have a Maxtor (now owned by Seagat) 1TB drive - I have 1 500GB drive and another 250GB drve (I think that oe is a WD) - all 3,5" all run well.

(they were bought in order of size - with time )

...an some 110GB 2,5" drive - all run well.

About backing up - I don't think you can shedule the Windos Software, so you have to back up manually, and that's limited by USB for example - so is not very fast - but I'd say its OK/enough, you need Vista Business or Ultimate for that though.

 

is calvary a good brand? I think i'll try to utilizie the esata for faster speeds. I see a few reviews say the my books fail after about a year and a half?

I also see a fantom brand 1tb drive.

At work I used an older maxtor (probably 4 years old) its worked great, no problems with it at all.

 

I never heard of the two - calvary and fantom.

But sometime its difficult - I have two "Medion" drives - the device name suggeests one is actually a Western Digital.

My mother has a "Targa" HDD, the actual HDD is a Seagate.

So - the name on the casing doesn' always equal the name of the actual drive.
I know some people had trouble with the Maxtor, others hadn't.

Western Digital and Seagate are the two big ones.

Fujitsu makes many internal drives, I think Toshiba does too.

Maxtor is another big name - now owned my Seagate - its Seagat drives nowadays.

 

I actually have the Calvary 2 TB drive, and it is very good. It's even setup in RAID 1 already, which is nice in case one of the drive's were to fail. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822101091
I happen to think the price is very good too.
Also, I think there are actually 2 1 TB WD drives inside.

 

Personally, I would go with the Western Digital solution as I've never had a problem with WD drives. There really is no difference between the WD and Seagate external HDD's aside from their bundled software, which is most likely pre-installed on the hard drives themselves. These software "bundles" will be very basic in nature, covering the most general tasks such as encryption, back ups, restores, and providing Help documentation.

Given a choice, I would forget buying a pre-made external HDD solution, and make my own. Most times, you can put together an external HDD cheaper than what it would cost to buy a pre-built one. My recommendation? Buy a Western Digital 1TB 7,200RPM 32MB cache HDD and a NexStar 3.5" external enclosure with USB and eSATA connectivity. Pair the two together and you've got yourself a really nice setup.

If you want 500GB of external storage, and want it to be portable, look at 2.5" external HDD's. Be warned, however, that these drives max out at 500GB. If you want sheer capacity, then go with a 3.5" 1TB external HDD, but this comes at the cost of being much larger and require an external power source (AC brick for example).

Technically, you could use Vista to do that, but the software already installed on the FreeAgent and MyBook should be plenty robust for what you want to do.

 

I've always had good luck with WD. Currently I have this: Studio II

...and I love it. RAID1, 3 partitions. Use it for both os x and vista.

 

I have a white seagate 500gb got it for around 90 awhile back and if i recall correctly, Circuit Citys online site is selling a 1tb for a 100

 

I currently own both a seagate and westernal digital external. The WD is dead now, or just about after a year or so. The computer just can't detect it anymore, and after reading a couple reviews it seems quite a few people have this problem.

As for the seagate, it is still running at the moment, its been a couple months. There's a minor problem though, the computer won't boot up as long as the external drive is on.

Both of them run quite hot, as at times they don't know when to spin down for reason. In size, the seagate is about half the size and weight as the WD has more vents for cooling.

That's all I can remember for now.

 

My External Portable HD is a Western Digital..and I really like it.

This is mine!
Western Digital My Passport Essential 500 GB USB 2.0 Portable Hard Drive WDME5000TN (Midnight Black)
http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digital-Passport-Essential-WDME5000TN/dp/B001F9LY14

Nice and small, and ultra-portable! I got this when I did a clean install on my lappy, and everything went very smoothly with it!


Cin

 

i would stay away for the wd passport the enclosures tend to break and fail often. a lot of them broke at my work and the one i bought and i took good care failed.. i just bought the wd my book office edition..

 

I've had mine for several months now, and no prob's whatsover (no breakage, failing)..etc.

I take great care of mine, also.

As always, it comes down to personal preference!


Cin

 

And luck - my Vaios battery failed after 2 weeks - others had no problems.
(still love Sony though)

The same happens with any electrical appliance.
May it be HDDs, mobiles.. anything.

 

In my opinion WD is the best in external hard drives and Toshiba too.

 

well i took very good care of mine and it failed.. the ones at work failed as well but understandable since they got some heavy use and drops

 

I was looking at one of those new maxtor blackarmors... are they worth it??

 

well i settled on the western digital 1tb external hard driver. The software that came with it, Memo Autobackup is terrible.

Does anyone have a quality suggestion for backup software?

 

I think a lot of people recommend some form of Acronis - I never used it though.

 

I know what I would recomend *smile*.

 

I was doing a little bit of research on the acronis 2009...it seems pretty decent, I'm wondering if anyone has ever used it before and what their thoughts are?

I've looked at various reviews for different programs...there doens't seem to be any where everyone agrees upon a certain program.

 

well second day of my western digital my book....wouldn't start up. Bought it at newegg, got the RTA, and they are charging a restocking fee of 18 dollars, gonna have to get that taken cared of. I was gonna buy another one thru them, but the restocking fee is just ridiuculous for an item that didn't work. Anyways, back in the market for software and another external harddrive...stuff like this is frusterating.

 

I have used an internal laptop 500GB 5400 RPM 2.5 Sata drive inside of an external USB caddy without any problems before. Has anyone used an internal drive that is 7200 RPM inside of one of these?

I wonder if the increased RPM speed might cause USB power issues or whether it will work just as well as the 5400 RPM ones. Thanks for any feedback.

 

i bought the wd my book 500gb around 2years ago and its still going strong

and its mostly on 24/7.

i always go for wd because i never had one fail

i even got one thats a 20gb 7200rpms in one of my dells desktops that i got in 2000 and its still going and working good

 

I have the same question. I had my eye on a 1TB Seagate FreeAgent drive but the reviews are hot/cold. Anyone care to comment on these?

As far as backup software I have seen recommendations for
Microsoft SyncToy but have never used it.

http://social.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/synctoy/thread/e9324abe-4b66-4ae8-931f-ce4b99109b77

 

Does anyone know the difference between these two Western Digital drives besides looks?

WD My Book Essentials 1 TB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136186


WD Element 1 TB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136321

 

My Book faster and cooler than elements but they have a same failure rate.

I recommended to buy element or my passport since they're cheaper than my book, I'm using both of them and they keep well my data.