Need help in picking an external HDD for backups

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rsnellma

Gawd
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Jul 17, 2002
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I need some advice for a cheap, but reliable (can even be 5400RPM speed) external HDD for backups at home. I have 80GB HDDs on my 4 systems at home. I am just looking for a cheap method to backing up my valuable data. I had thought about purchasing a HDD then purchasing an enclosure case. What are your thoughts? Thanks in advance.

Bob2001
 
rsnellma said:
reliable....external
Click to expand...

thats damn near an oxymoron
closest Ive seen wiould be a 1" MicroDrive (1>4GB)
how robust a HDD is, is closely tied to how rigid the arm\head to platter distance can be held and thats with a fly height of 2 microns, as you scale down that gets better, which is why you see 2.5" form factor HDDs in laptops, but the utility value of normally fixed internally mounted 3.5" HDDs for their huge capacity is what is driving the market. And while they are better than they used to be, thats still damn fragile if your not extremely careful, especially when in operation, but even when just being transported

Which Brand of HDD is most Reliable?
SR FAQ Reliability Survey
MTBF
Seagate Proper Handling Guide
HDD Form Factors


and then there is the performance capabilities of the typical external interface
the specs are generally very deceptive, for starters the typical ATA HDD is going to have an internal performance of around 50>30MB/s, so any clqaim above that is wasted, then the actual implementation of USB and Firewire has alot to do with how fast it is in reality.
 
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