Want to get an Exterior HD 500GB or 1TB - What is a good brand?

[Chaotic_Warlord]

I'm looking into getting an exterior HD to save all my music, pictures, and my important files to. Right now I'm torn between what Western Digital, Seagate, and HP have to offer, but at the same time there are others out there that have what I want, but I don't know which one to go with. I'm looking at either a 500GB or preferably an 1TB model. I'm on a tight budget so I don't want to spend more the $180 on it, as I know there are model out there that have what I want but are in the $200+ price range.

I really like the western digital model, it's small, attractive, and if I get more in the future and put them on a bookcase, people will just think they are books. But I've read some bad reviews. Same goes with the Seagate models, they have mixed reviews.

I don't have a a USB2.0 Firewire connection on my PC.

[nnorton44]

You don't have USB 2.0 or Firewire? Or just firewire?

If you have USB 2.0 you should go with either Western Digital Elements 640GB $80, or Western Digital Element 1TB $120. I have read good reviews on both.

[szh]

Lots of actual drive tests (and a chart!) here: http://www.tomshardware.com/ch....html

Z

[Chaotic_Warlord]

Lots of actual drive tests (and a chart!) here: http://www.tomshardware.com/ch....html

Z

I'm a little rusty on my PC speak and am embarrassed to say that I don't know how to read any of those charts or even what any of it means.

I just want to know which one is a better deal, has the best performance (upload/download speed) and will allow me to load it full of music and pictures and not have to worry about it taking a crap on me.

The ultimate goal is to rip all of my CD's (250+) onto a drive convert them all to MP3's and keep my gf's pictures on it while still having the room to download more music and keep important large files on it. I have multimedia/video editing/3d Graphics software that I need to get back into and the files aren't small.

I intend to replace my internal hd with 1TB HD as well, but would like the external for when I need to go somewhere my desktop is not.

Ultimately I plan to completely rebuild my PC as it is 10yrs old and hasn't been upgraded since the day I got it. Do we have a resident computer geek that can help me when the time comes as I am completely out of the loop on anything computer related.

[szh]

Okay, I understand better now.

The big questions: does your old computer have a USB 2.0 interface? Or a Firewire interface? In those days, these were not common ... I will not even ask about eSATA (the external SATA) since those did not even exist at the time.

If not, then you have to deal with that issue first ... before you can use any of the external drives available today. Yes, you can get plug-in USB 2.0 cards or Firewire cards or eSATA cards. For best performance, eSATA will be fastest, but there is (currently) less available external drives with eSATA as standard. These cards will need to be the PCI version today, so I hope your computer bus is at least has some PCI slot free (it may also have the older ISA slot, but don't waste money on a plug-in card for those!)

And what is the OS? If you are not running anything recent - like Windows XP onwards, then drivers for the older operating systems will have to be installed too. Else, you may need an upgrade to the OS too. Plus, ripping music or editing video needs a decent processor and lots of ram.

So the real question to you: is it worth it? By the time you get everything figured out, it might end up having been less of a pain to get an inexpensive replacement computer! Some of the deals out there (at Newegg, TigerDirect, Dell Outlet store, etc.) are well under $350 to $400 for a reasonably fast, "last-generation" machine, with big enough disks and memory to do what you want.

What is your current configuration (processor, memory, disks, ram, etc.) on what you have right now? That way, we can offer some recommendations as to whether it is better to get a plug-in USB/Firewire/eSATA card, or to bite the bullet and get an inexpensive new system.

Z

[Chaotic_Warlord]

I currently have a Dell Optiplex GX150, here are the specs...

Processor Intel Pentium III 933 MHzChipset Intel 815EInstalled Memory 128 MB (SDRAM)Processor Intel Pentium IIIProcessor Speed 933 MHzProcessor Manufacturer IntelProcessor Upgradability UpgradableInstalled Qty 1Max Processors Qty. 1MotherboardBus Speed 133 MHzVideo Output Interface Direct AGPMemoryRAM Technology SDRAMInstalled RAM 128 MBMax Supported RAM 512 MBNumber of Memory Slots 2 x DIMMsSupported RAM Speeds 133 MHzInstalled Cache Memory 256 KBTechnical FeaturesIntegrated Input/Output Ports USB 1.1 x 2 • Serial Port x 2 • RJ45 Lan Port x 1 • PS/2 Mouse x 1 • PS/2 Keyboard x 1 • Parallel Port (ECP/EPP/SPP) x 1 • Floppy Port x 1Security Features Slot For Cable Lock • Setup Password • Administrator PasswordHard Drive 20 GBController Type EIDE

The Video Card is a Nvidia 64MB video card from 2001 and the sound card is a SoundBlaster Audigy. I have replaced the CDRW drive with a DVD R/W drive, besides that nothing is different than how it came from the factory.
Modified by Chaotic_Warlord at 8:50 AM 5/9/2009

[natabit]

Seagate is good ...I have WD, and it's pretty good too. I think you should look into the RPM, the higher the better (i guess?)

[MinisterofDOOM]

With those specs, you're not in the best spot for external drives. USB 1.1 is slow. Pick up a cheap USB 2.0 card or Firewire (aka IEEE 1394) card for it if you want tolerable file transfer speeds. If you go with USB, you may just be able to replace your current USB 1.1 depending on whether it's motherboard integrated or not. Either way it shouldn't cost you more than $20.

[szh]

I currently have a Dell Optiplex GX150, here are the specs...

Processor Intel Pentium III 933 MHzChipset Intel 815EInstalled Memory 128 MB (SDRAM)Processor Intel Pentium IIIProcessor Speed 933 MHzProcessor Manufacturer IntelProcessor Upgradability UpgradableInstalled Qty 1Max Processors Qty. 1MotherboardBus Speed 133 MHzVideo Output Interface Direct AGPMemoryRAM Technology SDRAMInstalled RAM 128 MBMax Supported RAM 512 MBNumber of Memory Slots 2 x DIMMsSupported RAM Speeds 133 MHzInstalled Cache Memory 256 KBTechnical FeaturesIntegrated Input/Output Ports USB 1.1 x 2 • Serial Port x 2 • RJ45 Lan Port x 1 • PS/2 Mouse x 1 • PS/2 Keyboard x 1 • Parallel Port (ECP/EPP/SPP) x 1 • Floppy Port x 1Security Features Slot For Cable Lock • Setup Password • Administrator PasswordHard Drive 20 GBController Type EIDE

The Video Card is a Nvidia 64MB video card from 2001 and the sound card is a SoundBlaster Audigy. I have replaced the CDRW drive with a DVD R/W drive, besides that nothing is different than how it came from the factory.

Your specs are for a very old computer and processor (and memory size of 128 MByte is very low too). I am surprised that you are able to do any video editing with any reasonable speeds ... or is this more of a "want to do" rather than a "doing currently"?

And, yes, you definitely do not have a USB 2.0 or Firewire ports that would support a decent speed external drive. The USB 1.1 is simply too slow to work well with a hard drive - the read/write speeds would be impossibly long.

As mentioned above, your choice is to add in a USB plug-in card for an external USB drive - which drive you get will not matter much per se. Seagate and Western Digital are the logical choices.

Personally, with the above system, I would rather recommend that you spend a bit more (than the price of a large extrernal drive) and buy a computer first - even a two generations old processor will be much better than what you currently are running. With a changed comouter system, you can get a decent size hard disk drive (like about 320 to 500 to 750 Gbytes or so).

You can get these computers for under $300 to $400 from places like Newegg and TigerDirect, or used systems from Geeks.com. Plus, Dell often has sales that make it worth your while.

Hope this helps somewhat!

Z

[PoorManQ45]

^^^ Agreed. For a couple hundred bucks you can either purchase an OEM system or build one.

Check out slickdeals.net and fatwallet.com

They have some pretty good deals.

[Chaotic_Warlord]

I'm trying to decide on a motherboard/CPU bundle right now.

This is one that I'm putting serious consideration in:

Asus M3N78 PRO Motherboard CPU Bundle - GeForce 8300, HDMI Socket AM2+, AMD Phenom II X4 940 3.0GHz Black Edition Quad Core Retail Processor

Specifications Form Factor: ATX Processor Socket: AMD CPU Type: Desktop Processor Class: Phenom II Processor Interface: Socket AM2+ Processors Supported: AMD Athlon AMD Sempron AMD Phenom FX AMD Phenom Processor Interface: Socket AM2+ Cores: Quad Additional Technologies: HyperTransport Technology DirectX10, GeForce Boost Multi-GPU Support: Hybrid SLI Cache Size: 4 x 512KB L2 L2 Cache: 2MB L3 Cache: 6MB HyperTransport Bus: 2600MHz (5200 MT/s) Bus Speed: 1800MHz (3600 MT/s) Processor Speed: X4 940 / 3.00GHz Wattage: 125W Additional Technologies: MMX Enhanced 3DNow! Cool'n'Quiet HyperTransport 3.0 Instruction Set: SSE SSE2 SSE3 SSE4a Unlocked Multiplier: Yes Fan: Included Number of Slots: 4 Number of Pins: 240-Pin Maximum Memory Supported: 4GB - 32bit 8GB - 64bit Memory Type: DDR2 Memory Supported: ECC non-ECC 667MHz DDR2 800MHz DDR2 1066MHz DDR2 (AM2+ CPU Only) Max. Memory Supported Per Slot: 2GB Channels: 8 Channels LAN Type: 10/100/1000Mbps Gigabit RAID Modes: 0 0+1 1 5 JBOD PCI Slots: 3 PCI Express X1 Slots: 2 PCI Express X16 Slots: 1 - (PCIe 2.0) PS/2 Keyboard Connectors: 1 USB Ports: 12 USB Rear Panel Ports: 6 USB Onboard Headers: 3 - (expandable to 6 USB ports) FireWire Ports: 1 - 1394a LAN Ports: 1 IDE Headers: 1 FDD Headers: 1 Serial ATA 3.0Gb/s Headers: 6 ATX Power Connectors: 1 24-Pin Connector PC Power Connectors: 1 - 4 Pin S/PDIF Connectors: 1

http://www.tigerdirect.com/app...=3586

I also intend to upgrade my video card to something that is 512MB, want to keep my sound card, and would like to run Vista Ultimate 64 bit. I know that with this new motherboard and with a gaming video card I'm going to need to upgrade to a bigger PSU, looking at a 700Watt unit to get the job done. Hopefully I can keep my old Dell case, but I'm not sure the motherboard will fit, will have to wait and see. Plan on getting these in the next month or so.

[PoorManQ45]

That's too expensive for that bundle.

Watch http://www.slickdeals.net .

They have bundles with the 940 and motherboard for like $180 every so often.

[szh]

Here is a good complete bundle kit - don't know how long it will last:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/app...email

BTW, the problem with Slickdeals is that real deals tend to be there and gone pretty quickly. Unless you keep an eye on it carefully - which is not easy - it is tough to get anything of value from there.

Z

[Chaotic_Warlord]

That's a really good deal and it would give me a case large enough for future upgrades. But what do I do with my current system?

[C-Kwik]

FYI, Costco is selling a 500GB WD Passport Elite for $100.00. AS far as I can tell, the price will be that until the end of the month, but its a while supplies last offer. It may also require a coupon but they usually have the coupon books available at the door. If you don't have a membership, find a friend who does and offer to buy them a costco hot dog for taking you. Or you could get them to order it for you online.

http://www.costco.com/Browse/P...en-US

[PoorManQ45]

That deal is a pretty good deal.

I'm using that same motherboard in my gaming system. It's a pretty good board, includes an onboard SAS controller

That is a good basic gaming system.

I'd throw in a 4850 or 4870 for $80 or $120, respectively, for graphics.

[PoorManQ45]

FYI, Costco is selling a 500GB WD Passport Elite for $100.00. AS far as I can tell, the price will be that until the end of the month, but its a while supplies last offer. It may also require a coupon but they usually have the coupon books available at the door. If you don't have a membership, find a friend who does and offer to buy them a costco hot dog for taking you. Or you could get them to order it for you online.

http://www.costco.com/Browse/P...en-US

I'd go with a Desktop drive if it's going to be stationary. You can get 1TB drives for $100

[szh]

I'd go with a Desktop drive if it's going to be stationary.

Agreed. They will be faster (usually 7200 rpm) and larger for less money than a "portable" USB drive.

Z

[slipnfall]

I vote western digital. Good warranty, nice size:

http://www.wdc.com/en/products...D=517

[slipnfall]

Sorry, 'didn't read thoroughly before posting.

For 'desktop' storage, there are a few levels to go with. The first is just a plain-jane 3.5" (or 2.5") USB2.0 adaptor. I suggest finding one with a ethernet and USB printer support though: plug it into your router and have network printing and storage. These enclosures can be found on ebay for $60-100.

Don't cheap on the drive itself though unless you plan to make backups of all that 500-700Gb... that's a lot of storage to lose.

Cheers,Jamie

[PoorManQ45]

SlipnFall:

Go check out fatwallet.com and slickdeals.net I think they'll open your eyes up to a whole new world of rediculously cost efficient purchases.

You can regularily find NAS(Network attached storage) drives in the 1TB+ range for like $120

[slipnfall]

Thanks - this is indeed the first I have heard of either.

The last time I was *seriously* into building rigs was back when pricewatch.com only had PC hardware... WTF happened - now I see they have *jewelry and clothing*??

[C-Kwik]

I'd go with a Desktop drive if it's going to be stationary. You can get 1TB drives for $100

Agreed. They will be faster (usually 7200 rpm) and larger for less money than a "portable" USB drive.

No disagreements from me that a desktop stationary would be faster. But, I have to wonder what people are buying these desktop drives for? Most people have space in their computer cases to fit another HDD. While, they can be portable, most require separate power which can make it cumbersome to use. Perhaps someone can shed some light for me on why people prefer this over an internal drive as the only real application I see for it is when the cases are too small (HP slimlines as an example) or hooked up to a laptop/docking station. Perhaps even in cases where someone already filled their PC with HDDs and still need more space.

And outside of the above cases, the only types of external storage I see as logically useful are NAS and portable drives. Perhaps its limited by what I consider useful, so feel free to enlighten me.

[PoorManQ45]

From a pure backup standpoint if the internal power supply were to fail and direct current and voltage improperly all devices inside the computer would fail.

More then likely the external drive with it's seperate power supply would be spared.

Other then that, I personally prefer internal drives for the reasons you mentioned.

[szh]

No disagreements from me that a desktop stationary would be faster. But, I have to wonder what people are buying these desktop drives for? Most people have space in their computer cases to fit another HDD. While, they can be portable, most require separate power which can make it cumbersome to use. Perhaps someone can shed some light for me on why people prefer this over an internal drive as the only real application I see for it is when the cases are too small (HP slimlines as an example) or hooked up to a laptop/docking station. Perhaps even in cases where someone already filled their PC with HDDs and still need more space.

And outside of the above cases, the only types of external storage I see as logically useful are NAS and portable drives. Perhaps its limited by what I consider useful, so feel free to enlighten me.

Mostly I agree with you. Internal drives are definitely faster in most ways (usually SATA nowadays). However, external eSATA drives work just as fast too.

Think of an external drive as a convenience:

1. You don't have to open the case to put it in. No concerns about power supplies being too small, etc. Easier for people who feel computer challenged.

2. The drive can be moved to a different computer pretty easily. At home, I tend to cart a small drive around from computer to computer backing them up (don't have a NAS yet ... will do that someday soon).

3. My primary computer is now a laptop (I use a docking station at home and work and take the computer back and forth every day), so getting more storage for it is only possible with an add-on drive. I use an external Firewire unit for backups - it is a 7200 rpm unit from Seagate and works well for this purpose.

Z

[C-Kwik]

From a pure backup standpoint if the internal power supply were to fail and direct current and voltage improperly all devices inside the computer would fail.

More then likely the external drive with it's seperate power supply would be spared.

Other then that, I personally prefer internal drives for the reasons you mentioned.

Agreed...but I don't think most people who bought such a drive would have used that kind of reasoning. Hell, I've never seen or heard of such a problem occurring so I doubt many would ever consider it.

Mostly I agree with you. Internal drives are definitely faster in most ways (usually SATA nowadays). However, external eSATA drives work just as fast too.

Think of an external drive as a convenience:

1. You don't have to open the case to put it in. No concerns about power supplies being too small, etc. Easier for people who feel computer challenged.

2. The drive can be moved to a different computer pretty easily. At home, I tend to cart a small drive around from computer to computer backing them up (don't have a NAS yet ... will do that someday soon).

3. My primary computer is now a laptop (I use a docking station at home and work and take the computer back and forth every day), so getting more storage for it is only possible with an add-on drive. I use an external Firewire unit for backups - it is a 7200 rpm unit from Seagate and works well for this purpose.

Z

I can buy #1. Probably doesn't to most of us in here though.

2. I guess that's subjective and perhaps dependent one one's usage. We have a 320GB USB drive. It uses a full sized HDD so its a bit bulky, but aside from that, like most stationary drives, it requires its own power supply. That alone has been exceptionally frustrating. The GF actually got it years ago while she was still in school as she had to keep a very large amount of her data on it and transport it between school and home. Home was not as big of a deal, but at school, she had to crawl under the desk every day to plug it in.

While I haven't used it at my own school, I have taken my laptop when the class was working in the computer lab. Instead of using the lab computers, I used my laptop since I was already lugging it around at the time and I didn't have a thumbdrive to store my work on. I had to unplug a component of the system at my station to plug in the laptop as they were all filled. I'd have had to do the same if I lugged our external around.

3. I provided that exception already, but we totally agree here.

[nnorton44]

http://www.ibuypower.com/

http://www.cyberpowerpc.com/

[szh]

I can buy #1. Probably doesn't to most of us in here though.

True, but not all!

2. I guess that's subjective and perhaps dependent one one's usage. We have a 320GB USB drive. It uses a full sized HDD so its a bit bulky, but aside from that, like most stationary drives, it requires its own power supply. That alone has been exceptionally frustrating. The GF actually got it years ago while she was still in school as she had to keep a very large amount of her data on it and transport it between school and home. Home was not as big of a deal, but at school, she had to crawl under the desk every day to plug it in.

Ah. I use a USB-powered drive to cart around the house and do backups, so no power cable is needed for that. It is a slower drive at 5400 rpm, but good enough to do unattended backups. A small Western Digital model ... I forget the size.

Inre the crawling under the desk, why not use a small power strip with the drive so the switch in a handy location? Albeit not as interesting a sight, I suppose!

3. I provided that exception already, but we totally agree here.

Yes, you did mention it ... I overlooked that part of your post. I think we are in agreement for sure.

Z

[C-Kwik]

Sorry for the late response. I had finals over the last week.

Ah. I use a USB-powered drive to cart around the house and do backups, so no power cable is needed for that. It is a slower drive at 5400 rpm, but good enough to do unattended backups. A small Western Digital model ... I forget the size.

We ended up picking up that WD Passport model I linked to. Uses USB Bus power as well. Except it doesn't appear to be working with a retractable cable. Either the cable is bad or just not thick enough to carry power (however small the power requirements are).

I also have an HP pocket media drive on order as I also recently learned that my Media Vault's 1.2 TB limit also includes external drives that are attached to it via USB as it "mounts" the drive. If it tests out ok as a portable external, the WD goes back. Since it would have to be plugged into the desktop directly anyways, we might as well make use of the included drivebay and save space.

Inre the crawling under the desk, why not use a small power strip with the drive so the switch in a handy location? Albeit not as interesting a sight, I suppose!

Well at the time, she would not necessarily get the same workstation twice (at school).We have it set up pretty handily at home, but its still a bit combersom compared with just plugging in a single USB connection. We would have opted for a single USB connection back then, but they were much more expensive with the size that she needed (300 GB).

[slipnfall]

We ended up picking up that WD Passport model I linked to. Uses USB Bus power as well. Except it doesn't appear to be working with a retractable cable. Either the cable is bad or just not thick enough to carry power (however small the power requirements are).

I likely have a similar model - mines a Passport Elite, and yes they are all 5200rpm.

7200rpm doesn't make much sense in a USB portable drive anyway, as USB2.0 is limited to 480Mb/s... which is roughly 1/2 of what you'd expect out of a SATA/150 controller.

I strictly use mine for backups, which is normally a "set it and forget it" operation anyway (so the speed isn't an issue for me). YMMV.

BTW C-Kwik, mine doesn't work with any other USB cable either. If you want to know what any one particular USB device is requiring (500mA MAX for USB spec', but the device has to *request* that amount - it defaults to 100mA I believe for 'dumb' devices), you can check this in the control panel.

Under XP, go to device manager, expand USB controllers. Go to the properties of each item, and you should see one that lists whatever device you're looking for w/the power requirements.