reliable external drive?!

...Do they exist?

I need a large capacity drive (500GB+). I've been researching for a long time now... I have yet to find a good drive that scores high all across the board. Every drive I look at (and I think I've looked at them all) have many many complaints written by people who've used them. Isn't there a company that makes Hard Drives that actually last (as they are supposed to)?! Seems like you'd be hard pressed these days to find one that lasts longer than 1 year. It definitely seems like that's the direction technology is heading... everything is getting cheaper and failing quicker! Anyway, maybe someone here knows of a solution for a hard-drive. I thought about building my own, but I don't know how of course... They all look bad to me, especially western digital and seagate (which happen to be 2 of the biggest names).

 

i like the western digital. i have the my book 500 gb and its pretty good. I have the maxtor 500gb as well and its nice too but a lot bigger (but could land a drop off the roof)

 

yeah, you can get massive external HDD's, 2TB+ if you want. 500GB is now reasonably priced. Go for a well known hard disk brand. I would recommend western digital, maxtor (quite ugly though), or Lacie.

 

I love western digital. Reliable, decently priced, and cool looking. The My Book line is a good option.

 

Seagate is great. They have the external HDD's that require an adapter and those that do not.

 

I have a Western Digital 400 Gig. It works great. And solidly built, as well as compact.

 

I need a One Terra byte drive in my future, as I am getting allot of media recorded. Does anyone know which brand has the most reliability and longevity for these types of things?

I was thinking of going internal, but it's probably nicer for organization purposes too have an external.

 

I'm obsessed with Lacie drives. They're excellent and they look great. I have a 250gb one attached to the Xbox 360 for hi-def videos, and a 320gb one attached to the laptop for backups.
Never a single problem with them.

 

Are the firewire ports on the vostro 1500's 800 speed? if they are that would be gr8 for external drives!

 

No. FW800 uses 9-pin firewire to achieve that bandwidth, although they are backwards compatible with FW400 with a 6-pin cable to a 6-pin FW400 device.
Our Inspiron 1520's though, they're 4-pin. So that means they are FW400 with no bus provided power.

 

Does any external drive have a warranty over 1 year long? I'm thinking no, so I'd rather get an internal Seagate with a 5 year warranty and put it into an external case myself, and boom, external drive with a 5 year warranty.

 

Why not get an enclosure and buy a standard HDD? This is what I've done, and I've had no problems, and saved about 30% in costs.

I have an Akasa 'Integral' 3.5 inch enclosure and a seagate 250GB HDD. They can be stacked too, and it looks pretty neat.

 

As far as i know, Seagates are known for their reliability, while Maxtors for the exact opposite

 

I've broken 2 seagates in the past month. I'm really pissed off. One time I dropped one from about 1 foot above soft carpet, and the other time I accidentally tripped on the powercord and knocked over the drive on a wood floor. Both of them done. So, if you are looking for something that can withstand small accidents, avoid seagate! I think I'm gonna try western digital.

 

Meh.... everyones got a horror story about one drive maker or another, just read what the reviews are for that specific model and go with it. See if people say whether its cool or not, hot drives dont last as long as cool drives.

 

I guess the Western Digital would crash too if you were to drop it on the floor.

If your looking for HDD's that survive a drop on the floor, you need to be looking at HDD's enclosed in Rugged Enclosures.