• Some users have recently had their accounts hijacked. It seems that the now defunct EVGA forums might have compromised your password there and seems many are using the same PW here. We would suggest you UPDATE YOUR PASSWORD and TURN ON 2FA for your account here to further secure it. None of the compromised accounts had 2FA turned on.
    Once you have enabled 2FA, your account will be updated soon to show a badge, letting other members know that you use 2FA to protect your account. This should be beneficial for everyone that uses FSFT.

Looking For A New HDD Array.

M

muaddib

n00b
Joined
Jul 12, 2005
Messages
41
Hello everyone :)

Since my current drive's (160GB WD Caviar) capacity is getting minimized, I would like to buy a new drive. I buy it solely for BACKUPS, and my number one concern is RELIABILITY.
I have been wondering what route I should go for:

1) Buy one or two (depending on size) external backups drives.
2) Buy 2x250GB/300GB internal drives and RAID1 them.
3) Buy 1x500GB internal drive, and another one in the very distant future.
4) Buy one or two (depending on size) internal drives, and put them in an external enclosure.

External enclosures will be made from a good heat spreading material (e.g. aluminium) and cooled by fans, I hope.

Further more, I have a couple of quick questions:
1) Solely for backups, what's better - internal/external, or internal converted to external?
2) What types of interface does the external drives offer? Aside from the standard USB/FIREWIRE, can they be connected through IDE/SATA?
3) Can you RAID external drives?
4) What about removing external drives from their enclosures and convert them to internal? Is it possible/recommended?

Thanks A TON in advance.

Regards,
muaddib
 
Something to consider is the newer drives you mentioned will likely outperform your current 160. No reason to use a faster drive for backup only imo. Maybe grab a new 300GB for your C: and use your 160 as the target for windows backup.

As to the second series of questions, there is no difference between internal and external drives. External is just internal in a housing routed through a slower interface (the exception being e-sata). Its not really a question of "better", rather one of requirements. Will you need portability of the data on the drive? If not why pay more for an external setup if it never leaves your desktop.
 
I would not recommend doing a RAID for something like personal backup. I don't know of any way you could do an external RAID (using SATA drives), unless you somehow snaked the cables out of the case and into external drive enclosures.

I think a single 400-500 GB drive is more than good enough. Like the previous poster said, the newer drive might be a better option for you to run your OS and software, and the 160 could be the backup.

In an ideal situation, It would be nice to get an external USB 2.0 drive for backups, so that you can power it off when you're not using it. That way, any possible data corruption from viruses or anything else wouldn't affect your backups. You could probably buy the internal drive and enclosure separately and save a couple bucks.
 
Thanks A LOT guys! That was very helpful. :)

Dirtydr - You suggestion is acceptable, and I've actually thought about it in the past. However, I have came to a conclusion 160GB is barely enough. I won't bother buying another 160GB one, it's a special opportunity; and in this case i'll spare for a larger drive.
BTW, portability is the least concern for me, as the HDD will not move from my case (however, turning the HDD off from time to time is a good idea, so external storage in this case can be useful. Buying an internal one and putting it outside sounds very tempting).

Rocco123 - What you've said is quite surprising. I thought RAID 1 was the best for backups; however, if you say otherwise, I'll have to agree (I'm a noob). I don't care about the storage type/route/assembly I'll be going, as long as it's the best for backups and the most reliable. I will be backing up extremely important data - music, family pictures, family pictures, documents and more.
So, your suggestion to me is to spare for a large and reliable, 1x500GB drive? 500GB is within my budget, and the Hitachi one looks very tempting. If I'm going enternal, the WD 400GB looks good also.

Thanks in advance again.

Good day :cool:
 
RAID 1 is considered redundancy, not backup. There is a HUGE difference between backup and redundancy. Sure, you could put a backup volume on a RAID 1 array, but it's more complex than you want a simple backup to be. RAID 1 would be more ideal for your main drive (with a slight performance hit), and then you could have a single drive for backup purposes.

Just my 2 cents. Good luck!
 
Sorry to answer the other question. Yes I think a large, external HD would be the best method of backup. And like I said, you can buy the external shell for it and save a couple dollars. And since it's portable, in case of emergency you could plug it into another PC without having to take your case apart.
 
Thanks man, sounds beatiful. I think I'll go single external drive.
Now, however, I should choose a model... :confused:
 
I like seagate a lot. I've owned several seagate IDE's, and I've never had any issues with them. They stay cool, and they are VERY quiet. There are faster drives out there, but they might not run as cool and silent. Speed really shouldn't be an issue with backups. I run a ton of seagate drives at work, and they have considerably less failures than other drives. Given, these are SCSI disks and built to last, I have generally found the same high quality in their consumer level drives.

From newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822148109 - 400 Gig SATAII, 250 USD.
Tack on 30-70 bucks for an external enclosure and you have yourself a nice simple little backup system.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top