Best External Hard Drive?

book

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 6, 2008
Messages
368
I need 250GB + Storage. I'll prefer if it has firewire but usb is ok. I acn't really make up my mind since lots of hard drives on amazon and new egg have low ratings. So I'm clueless on what to buy.
 
I have a Westen Digital My book essential edition 2.0 500gb and im happy with it. Its usb 2.0 though but they do make firewire
 
My suggestion:

1. Buy a decent internal HD
2. Buy a decent external enclosure

From what I have seen for prices of "external" drives, my suggestion above is the cheaper and better way to go.

Just my 2 cents.;)
 
not really I got an ext. 500 GB for 89.00 very hard to beat. also starting to see 500GB ext. drives drives right at 99 bucks as a normal price.
 
I have been using a WD Passport 250G drive for a while now and really like the convenience of not needing any external power for the drive. Makes it very easy to transport and leaves a small footprint for when I am taking it with the laptop where one may not have access to external power. Fairly quick considering as well. It's USB2 only though. You didn't really mention what the main purpose for the external drive was, but there's my 2 cents. I guess I probably would not chose this as #1 if it was solely for the purpose of providing a backup at home for example, more appropriate drives for that (and larger).
 
same boat as the OP.

whenever I see user reviews for external drives they are pretty much all bad lol.

Personally I am looking for an external storage solution for my large media files like pictures, movies, and music. My biggest priority is the data itself, I'm gonna try to back it up elsewhere also BUT I dont want something with a poo reliability rating either. Next would probably be speed/performance, size? ect?

Something in the neighborhood of $200, I have been strongly considering the internal drive/external enclosure route but figured I'd check with some others first.
 
My suggestion:

1. Buy a decent internal HD
2. Buy a decent external enclosure

From what I have seen for prices of "external" drives, my suggestion above is the cheaper and better way to go.

Just my 2 cents.;)

I'll second that emotion.
 
The external hard drive business is very competitive. To keep up with the ever dropping prices, it's my opinion that the hard drives place in these units are not of good quality. My reccomendation would be to buy a good enclosure and spend the money for a good quality drive and, assemble your own. I've all ready had one WD unit fail on me and it makes sense to place your valuable files where they will be safe.
 
ok then

any suggestions on interface, drives, enclosures? Would I see much of a difference between 7200rpm drives and 5400rpm drives over usb 2.0?
 
i have a freecom 250gb external hard drive it uses either usb 2 or ethernet connection for local network it cost i believe £89.99 from pcworld and its excellent
 
Would I see much of a difference between 7200rpm drives and 5400rpm drives over usb 2.0?

Does this mean you are only looking for 2.5" (laptop) drives and enclosures? Unless you're looking at one of those "Green' drives, AFAIK, there are no 5400rpm 3.5" drives. :confused:
 
Does this mean you are only looking for 2.5" (laptop) drives and enclosures? Unless you're looking at one of those "Green' drives, AFAIK, there are no 5400rpm 3.5" drives. :confused:

not at all. Just a quality solution that will get the job done. Thinking some sort of 500GB seagate(yet to have a seagate go bad so why not) internal drive and one of the cheaper better reviewed enclosures from newegg.com
 
I do not buy any hd other an Seagate. Too many bad experiences with others, especially Maxtor and HD.

I have my internal hd (Seagate), and my external 500 gig (Seagate) and love it.

Goes to sleep after a few mins of non usage, works great. Quiet. Fast startup. No complaints.

Has all the connections that I would need. Think im using USB 2.0. But there are other options.
 
I have one of those small 250 Western Digital and love it. no power cables I bring it everyone and have never had a problem, it takes a good beating were I work also (utility companies) and it still works perfectly.
 
My current favorite enclosure is the Antec MX1.
This is just a "PS" for my link above. I'm not sure how the two lowest sellers (Lagoom.com and ExcaliberPC) are included in that list, but that's not the enclosure I'm recommending. Start at 48.41 and go up.

Antec MX1 + Your favorite HDD = Quality, Roll Yer Own, External Drive. :)
 
I had an external WD drive that died, well, the enclosure died, and it was a royal PITA to rip it open and yank the drive out (those things are NOT made to be re-opened)... Turned out the drive was perfectly fine (been using it for 2+ years). The enclosure only had a 1-year warranty tho whereas most internal drives have 3-5 year warranties...

That's basically the main reason why I'll roll my own in the future regardless of pricing... You can get some pretty nice external enclosures that'll do both eSATA/USB anyway (my Venus DS has held up quite well), and they're probably better than most of the WD/Seagate ones, for a fast standard 3.5" 7200rpm drive anyway...

If you want something smaller like a laptop drive then something like those WD Passports is probably a better bet. It'll be more compact/solid than most DIY enclosures and the newer ones will run off USB power alone I think.
 
If you want something smaller like a laptop drive then something like those WD Passport drives is probably a better bet. It'll be more solid than most DIY enclosures and the newer ones will run off USB power alone I think.

The smaller (2.5") pre-built external units still have the same major concerns as the 3.5" units. Warrantys are usually shorter for the pre-built units, and you can't troubleshoot without voiding the warranty.

There aren't any 2.5" external cases with a fan, and heat is usually the major concern with the 3.5" drives and cases.

USB only powered units have always been YMMV when used with lappys on battery power. HDD size and power usage, combined with variable USB output voltage while on battery power, has always made that an iffy combination.

Everything's usually OK if the computer is plugged into the wall.

When buying a 2.5" external case, the smart money's on buying one with the optional power supply.....just in case.;)
 
Yeah, that makes sense, USB ports on many laptops can be pretty finicky even if the drive itself is solid... It's still pretty convenient being able to use it w/o a power brick though...

Myself, I just have the one Venus DS enclosure for my backup drive at home and a 2.5->3.5 IDE + molex adapter for when I need to pull stuff out of a laptop drive and BartPE + jumpdrie won't do... I saw a Sunban 3-way adapter that would do 2.5 IDE, 3.5 IDE, and 2.5/3.5 SATA to USB the other day but I wasn't quite sure how you supplied power to it (dunno if it came w/an external brick or if it still required a molex connection).
 
My suggestion:

1. Buy a decent internal HD
2. Buy a decent external enclosure

From what I have seen for prices of "external" drives, my suggestion above is the cheaper and better way to go.

Just my 2 cents.;)

I for one know that the drive specification and reliability is priority.

So I Third this solution.
 
Back
Top