Backup drive conundrum........

Monkey34

Monkey34

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I really want to stop tempting fate, and go get a backup drive. I was going to go external - and saw a good deal on a Maxtor(its really a Seagate barracuda 7200.10) 500gig for $114. THEN I saw a bunch of people who have big problems with them - until they open the enclosure and use it as an internal or use a generic/their own enclosure.
I then went to see info on a Western Digital external - only to find some issues there too.....and I have had an awesome history with WD - which I CANT say for maxtor.....but then again, maxtor is now seagate - and seagate is a brand I have liked also.

Problem: I can't seem to find any good comparative/reliability/etc reviews of externals.

Question: Do you think I should just buy a internal, make my disk clone, and unplug it from the motherboard for safety? (I was basically going to do this with the external anyway - make clone, store safely until next backup).......or maybe buy an internal, and a basic external enclosure? Or can I put some faith in the HDD manufacturers, and buy a ready product off the shelf, and file the product complaints under "these are just the exception"?

Maybe I could buy the maxtor - crack it open to use the 500gig as my system drive, and drop my 120 gig system in the enclosure as the backup! :D heh just kidding.
 
or maybe buy an internal, and a basic external enclosure?
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If you are really concerned about saving your data, that's the only way to go. Most premade externals come with a one year warranty. What's that tell ya?
 
ya buy internal hdd and good enclosure and call it a day, i like the antec mx-1, but there are few good external enclosures, make sure to buy something with active cooling.
 
Old Hippie said:
If you are really concerned about saving your data, that's the only way to go. Most premade externals come with a one year warranty. What's that tell ya?
Click to expand...


Well. this one has a 5 year warranty, but I don't know if that makes me feel any better. The price helps though.
 
You know, I wonder if the maxtor/seagate enclosure WOULD accept another hdd.

I don't know. I might just buy an internal, and screw the external altogether...if I want to isolate it, I can just unplug the cable.

There's too many options. I f I get the hdd and enclosure, I'm pushing 200 bucks after shipping - too much. Cheapest way out is try the maxtor.....grr.

If I knew the maxtor enclosure would take any hdd (who knows if they've set it to only accept seagate's or a certain model hhd or something)....I would get it, and use the 500 gig in it as my system drive, and drop another one in it like I was joking.
 
within the last week both my brother and I have had our externals die. I know we both babied them. I think the problem is just that they are bound to get bumped around a bit more just by the fact that they are external. The best bang for the buck backup option available, by far, is to buy an internal and just keep it safe somewhere -- preferably in an enclosure, and minimize its usage.
 
If I knew the maxtor enclosure would take any hdd (who knows if they've set it to only accept seagate's or a certain model hhd or something)....I would get it,
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I've never heard anything to the contrary.
What are these externals you're looking at? Links?
 
Just because you put data on an external drive doesn't mean it's safe. We recently had a lightning strike and it came in throgh the phone line, killed my printer and everything else that was hooked up to a USB plug....Inc. a 250gig hard drive that was in an external USB housing. It just happened to be the only drive I have that was also backed up on CD's from years ago. If it had been any other drive I would have just lost the data.

I now have about 5000 gigs of data stored (mostly photos) and all of it is on two drives (too much data for DVD disk), one cope on a drive in the computer or external enclosure and one copy on a drive in a drawer that I can access with a IDE to USB adapter.

Just remember to disconnect your external drive when you are not using it.

Russell
 
I'd just go with an internal drive and your own enclosure... Unless you're buying a really extravagant enclosure it should end up being cheaper than most all-in external drives from the likes of WD, Seagate, etc.

I had a 250GB WD external drive die on me and it turned out it was just the enclosure that crapped out, the drive itself has performed flawlessly for years now inside my PC... But it was a royal PITA to rip that drive out of their enclosure (which wasn't made to be opened, had to carefuly break it appart basically). I couldn't just warranty it either because it only had a 1 year warranty, like most external drives seemed to 'till recently perhaps.

The name of my enclosure is in the sig, it's barely audible and the metal case itself gets pretty hot (I assume it's a good sign that it's conducting heat away from the inside), I've carried it around to repair jobs and haven't had any issues. The USB side of it has performed flawlessly, haven't tried eSATA. Power brick's small if you care about that (and not at the end of the cable IIRC).

As an aside, when I bought it I did a fair bit of research into the USB controllers some of these external enclosures used... And there seemed to be one brand which was a lot more hassle-free than the rest, and the Venus used that controller... I'm not sure if it uses the same brand controller for eSATA tho, and there wasn't much info on those at the time, I'm sure that's changed.


Edit: I guess looking at the prices of 500GB drives ('bout $100-ish), that external drive you were looking at is a pretty good deal... Drive + enclosure would run you maybe $30-60 more depending on the specific drive and the enclosure (+shipping), I'm just sour on buying external drives after that WD. If it's got a 5 year warranty I wouldn't hesitate though, just don't bank on swapping drives in it, unless you know for sure that it can be opened without tearing the thing to shreds. Not being able to open it easily seems more likely than the enclosure not taking any regular drive.
 
If it's got a 5 year warranty I wouldn't hesitate though,
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Even if it has a 5 year warranty (it does), what are you going to do when it quits working next year? Any troubleshooting that involves removing the drive from the case, will void the warranty. More power to ya if you think you can avoid Maxtor's "Warranty Voiding Nazis".
Returning the drive for warranty repair will result in the loss of your data.
If your plan is to just rip the 500 gigger out of the enclosure and run it internally, sounds OK....if you can keep the 5 yr. warranty intact on the drive.
Even if you could, it looks like the USB interface is very problematic/unreliable/junk. I wouldn't use that case for any data I valued.
Here's some USB chipset reviews for reference.


Keep on buying these bargains, the data recovery people love ya!
 
Well, he did say he plans to use it as a backup drive... So one assumes that if the drive dies and it's within warranty he can just send it back to Maxtor for a new one and re-do his backup once he's got it back. Obviously he'd have to use it as-is for that.

I mean, baring anything catastrophic (or user error), it's unlikely that both his external drive and his main drive inside the PC would both die, taking all his data AND the backups with them. It's not like you're any better off with a regular drive + enclosure in that regard, you'd still wanna warranty a dead drive, only upside is you can swap in a different one in the meantime I guess.

Not really a big upside unless he's doing some critical work, in which case he should probably be thinking of a more advanced backup scheme than a simple external drive. ;)

It's definitely worth doing some research into the chipsets that drive the enclosures either way though. I think Cypress was one of the decent ones (for USB) when I bought my enclosure but I really can't recall, it seems to lag a bit in performance on that link posted above... But the link doesn't really speak to the reliability or stability of any of them, save for the fact that the ALi one died and took a drive with it (big surprise there, not).

I doubt the vast majority of people make use of data recovery services when drive dies too... They just cry over their loss and buy a new drive I imagine, so in that case I guess it's the drive manufacturers who love 'em. :p
 
Thanks for the input guys. I think what I'm going to do is buy an internal drive, transfer my OS to it (if I can... I kind of fragged it this weekend - figures I had to screw with it right before getting the drive), and use my 120gig as the one to store the disk image. Then I'll just unplug it from the IDE and power untill I re-image. Maybe in the future I'll get a decent external enclosure. I'm sure if I open the Maxtor, theres no warranty...they probably have all those drives numbers tracked, and at least the internall's warranty will be intact.
 
So one assumes that if the drive dies and it's within warranty he can just send it back to Maxtor for a new one and re-do his backup once he's got it back.
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For most, that will be the only back-up.

You can dream all you want. The facts are...
1. Most people have no back-ups
2. The reason for buying premade externals are two fold. Most people have no idea premade external drives are the exact same drives as internal units and just placed in a case, AND the "OMG this is sooooo cheap I can now afford a large backup" user.
3. If you buy a premade unit and it screws the pooch, your warranty claim will include losing your data.
4. A quality back-up solution will cost more. Not a ton, but $30-$40 dollars.
5. People will continue to think they are protected by their 500GB, 19.95 dollar bargain.

As usual, you get what ya pay for.
 
I'm not sure what all that has to do with this specific case though... Clearly he's a little more informed than the typical joe, and he wants an external drive for backups, and just backups (from the looks of it). The drive he quoted was a decent bargain, if the USB controller wasn't crap... I'm not sure which one it has, you seemed to allude to it but I saw no specifics.

In any case, if that drives dies he didn't lose anything, just backups of stuff he already had, y'know... On his main drive, the stuff he's backing up? I don't see what's the issue w/the warranty either way but whatever. Now if he's using the drive for something OTHER than backups then that's an issue.

It sounds like he made a good choice based on his budget and current needs anyway... Just gotta be careful handling that drive 'till he decides to put it in an enclosure!

Could always get a SATA/IDE -> USB adapter too, which is probably somewhat cheaper than an enclosure... Altho, unless your case is a mess inside, the benefit vs swapping the drive in is debatable.
 
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