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    Portable Hard Drives vs HDD

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by mortalcombat, Apr 3, 2015.

  1. mortalcombat

    mortalcombat Notebook Consultant

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    Why can't you put a "portable hard drive" instead of an HDD in a laptop in order to avoid the spinning sound?

    Is it a problem with data integrity or keeping it plugged in or is it something else? I noticed you can get the same performance from a USB3.0 portable HDD as you can from a 7200RPM HDD
     
    mortalcombat, Apr 3, 2015
    #1
  2. Starlight5

    Starlight5 Yes, I'm a cat. What else is there to say, really?

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    mortalcombat, in USB3.0 portable HDD they use space-age technologies mere human culture is not yet developed enough to comprehend. =/
     
    Starlight5, Apr 3, 2015
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  3. Ramzay

    Ramzay Notebook Connoisseur

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    Most portable USB HDDs are the same as what you find inside your laptop (a spinning HDD). Therefore, in theory, they should make roughly the same amount of noise.
     
    Ramzay, Apr 3, 2015
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  4. TomJGX

    TomJGX I HATE BGA!

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    Indeed.. The only difference is that they connect to your computer by a USB3.0 interface instead of a internal SATA connection (which is slightly faster in case of HDDs and much faster in case of SSD's)... I in fact have my old WD 500GB 7200rpm drive in a external hard drive case connected to my computer by USB3.0 for some extra storage..
     
    TomJGX, Apr 3, 2015
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  5. Starlight5

    Starlight5 Yes, I'm a cat. What else is there to say, really?

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    To be perfectly clear, many if not most external hard drives have native USB interface, thus are impossible to use as standard internal drives, are more likely to fail and harder to recover data from, compared to external drives with usb-sata bridge.
     
    Starlight5, Apr 3, 2015
    #5
  6. octiceps

    octiceps Nimrod

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    Examples?
     
    octiceps, Apr 3, 2015
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  7. Starlight5

    Starlight5 Yes, I'm a cat. What else is there to say, really?

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    octiceps, last time I checked it was almost all WD and many Toshiba portable drives, and some others.
     
    Starlight5, Apr 3, 2015
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  8. octiceps

    octiceps Nimrod

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    Never had experience with those. All of the Seagate mobile external drives use standard Samsung Spinpoint 2.5" 7mm/9.5mm laptop drives.
     
    octiceps, Apr 3, 2015
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  9. Starlight5

    Starlight5 Yes, I'm a cat. What else is there to say, really?

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    octiceps, I was looking for 1TB+ drives for quite some time, and performed a research, which resulted in consequentially purchasing 4 more Seagate&Seagate-Samsung drives to compliment my 0.75TB Momentus XT. =)
     
    Starlight5, Apr 3, 2015
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  10. octiceps

    octiceps Nimrod

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    Then you know that the Seagate Backup Plus Slim and Expansion Portable both use the 2TB Spinpoint M9T
     
    octiceps, Apr 3, 2015
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  11. Starlight5

    Starlight5 Yes, I'm a cat. What else is there to say, really?

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    octiceps, sure, I have 2 of those. =) However, that's Seagate. With WD and Toshiba, the situation is very different. And I read some Seagate models (not 2TB, thankfully) come with native USB interface as well.
     
    Last edited: Apr 3, 2015
    Starlight5, Apr 3, 2015
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  12. HTWingNut

    HTWingNut Potato

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    Yes many do not come with standard SATA interface. There are many exceptions like that Seagate, but unless you know for certain, not necessarily good idea to buy an external expecting to rip it open and have it be a straight connect to your SATA slot.
     
    HTWingNut, Apr 3, 2015
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  13. Seanwhat

    Seanwhat Notebook Evangelist

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    This conversation is dumb, please stop having it.

    The moving parts (and therefore the sound-making parts) of a hdd have nothing to do with the connection it uses or whether it's in a laptop or enclosure.
     
    Seanwhat, Apr 8, 2015
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  14. HTWingNut

    HTWingNut Potato

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    What are you saying, exactly? The question is whether you can open a portable hdd and just use that hdd in a laptop. They don't all use SATA connections.
     
    HTWingNut, Apr 11, 2015
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  15. Seanwhat

    Seanwhat Notebook Evangelist

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    Unless I'm misinterpreting the op, he's wanting to use a portable hdd in order to avoid the spinning sound; I was just saying portable hdds spin too.
     
    Seanwhat, Apr 12, 2015
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  16. HTWingNut

    HTWingNut Potato

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    Oh, ha! Yeah, there's no way to circumvent that other than to get an SSD.
     
    HTWingNut, Apr 14, 2015
    #16