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external hard drives

S

Speed_demon

n00b
Joined
Sep 29, 2006
Messages
4
Hi there, i own a dell 8600 laptop and looking to expand the storage space as its only 55gb at the moment. I am thinking about buying the 320 Gb Western Digital Essential external hd because of the large gain in storage and its ability to turn on/off whenever the computer does.

My question is, are external hard drives just as reliable as internal ones as I am looking to shift all my music, videos and video editing files over to it and therefore use it every single day.
 
Same type of drive in both, just make sure it's cooled well and won't get dropped or anything.
 
aren't solid state flash drives a viable alternative? or are they too small/expensive still?
 
External drives like the one you mentioned are just a regular desktop drive in an external enclosure.
However, performance will be severly limited by the USB or FireWire connection.
Isn't a big deal, depending on what you're doing, but if you want fast access to the disk, look into eSATA.
 
but for him, its a viable solution. Look into buying an external enclosure..with a fan included...then find a cheap HDD here in our forums or wherever u want...you'll appreciate the mobility that's for sure.

btw, I picked up an enclosure at CUSA for 29 bucks....nice silver enclosure that works with my setup theme. So that's another benefit IMO when you DIY/BIY. GL.
 
These external hard drive enclosures and huge hard drives are some of the best things ever. Same goes for the flash media thumb drive things.

I picked up a WD 320 and an external case about 6 months ago. It's got a fan and just sits on my desk. It isn't really fast, but I'm not storing things I need really fast access to. MP3's and software installers and such.
 
i was using an external enclosure and hard drive for well over a year straight with no problems.. everything it did was fast enough for me.. sure it took slightly longer to copy large files, but i just didn't do that often..

i ran it 24/7 for months on end.. as i only shut off or restart my computer that often..

recently the enclosure just kinda crapped out on it.. i have since dropped the hard drive in a spare comptuer and stuck it in my closet..

if you use your laptop as an actual laptop (ie. you travel and carry palces with you) then you should look into a 2.5inch drive.. i made myself a 60gb one about a year ago, and its great.. i can just throw tons of stuff on it and take it with me where i go.. those cost per gb is about twice that of a 3.5 inch drive / enclosure, but its way smaller, like 1/4th the size.. and runs completely off USB power
 
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