Recommend an External Hard Disk.
Discussion
Girlfriend is running out of room on her Laptop, most of it is pictures from here digi cam and Music for her iPod. I thought about backing them all up to CD, but then I noticed that together they hold 9GB of stuff 
So I thought maybe it would be better to use a USB external HD.
Anyone got any recommendations?
The bigger the better tbh, she doesn't like deleting anything so it needs to last for a while.
TIA
Stuart.
So I thought maybe it would be better to use a USB external HD.
Anyone got any recommendations?
The bigger the better tbh, she doesn't like deleting anything so it needs to last for a while.
TIA
Stuart.
Stay away from Maxtor. I have a Maxtor OneTouch II and it died. The same goes for my brother's OneTouch.
Seagate (who have now bought Maxtor) seem to be the better choice and their internal HDDs have a 5yr warranty. I'm not sure about their external HDDs, but you can always buy a case and install one of their HDDs in it - it's very, very simple.
Seagate (who have now bought Maxtor) seem to be the better choice and their internal HDDs have a 5yr warranty. I'm not sure about their external HDDs, but you can always buy a case and install one of their HDDs in it - it's very, very simple.
If you're concerned about the vulnerability of your data on an external drive with a single hard disk then you'll need to go to a RAID 1 data mirror set up where the identical data is written in parallel to two disks. But for the application you're describing it's probably easiest to back up the photo files onto DVDs. That way you can keep a set of disks at another location to prevent the total loss if someone breaks in and takes all the kit or your visited by an act of god.
roadsweeper said:
Stay away from Maxtor. I have a Maxtor OneTouch II and it died. The same goes for my brother's OneTouch.
Seagate (who have now bought Maxtor) seem to be the better choice and their internal HDDs have a 5yr warranty. I'm not sure about their external HDDs, but you can always buy a case and install one of their HDDs in it - it's very, very simple.
I've had three external SeaGates chugging along for over a year now with no problems. If you buy the full version of the backup software that comes with them, it makes for a very good backup solution...
ErnestM
I've got an icy box which I got from www.bigpockets.co.uk with a 320gig hd in it. I think I paid about £130 for it but the cost may have come down since.
JonRB said:
It's funny how things come and go.
About 15 years ago Seagate were unmitigated shite that had a MTF measured in seconds, whilst Maxtor were rock-solid. Old habits die hard and I've been buying Maxtor for decades with only 1 failure out of, oh I dunno, 20+ HDDs over the years.
I agree whole heartedly, Jon - I also used to feel the same way about Western Digital. Maxtor were the only drives for me, and then I tried the updated SATA offerings from both WD and Seagate and they are turning out to be rock solid (*slight pause as I find an extremely large piece of wood to knock on*)
ErnestM
For plug and go (two disks into the shower?) then Lacie or Terastor
I'd be inclined to get a standard 3.5 IDE of silly capacity and stick it in an enclosure though.
My thoughts on HDD brands
IBM Hitachi or Seagate.
But it really is a personal preference thing, you can be lucky or unlucky whatever you choose.
I'd be inclined to get a standard 3.5 IDE of silly capacity and stick it in an enclosure though.
My thoughts on HDD brands
IBM Hitachi or Seagate.
But it really is a personal preference thing, you can be lucky or unlucky whatever you choose.
to you too mate 
Connectivity is a config issue.
Depends really where you will use the storage.
If its storage of movies to watch on the desktop, say, then putting the disk in the desktop makes sense as the bus speed twixt disk and CPU is much higher than ethernet. If its general network wide storage then a NAS box connected to the router via wire may make sense. Something like the Buffalo Terastation which is 1.6Tb RAIDable which should be 'adequate' in Rolls parlance.
www.buffalotech.co.uk/products/product-detail.php?productid=97&categoryid=19
I didnt mention that initially as I didnt know if you were wireless only.
Plotloss said:
Connectivity is a config issue.
Depends really where you will use the storage.
If its storage of movies to watch on the desktop, say, then putting the disk in the desktop makes sense as the bus speed twixt disk and CPU is much higher than ethernet. If its general network wide storage then a NAS box connected to the router via wire may make sense. Something like the Buffalo Terastation which is 1.6Tb RAIDable which should be 'adequate' in Rolls parlance.
www.buffalotech.co.uk/products/product-detail.php?productid=97&categoryid=19
I didnt mention that initially as I didnt know if you were wireless only.
Wireless is the route i was thinking of. Basically so I can access music and movies on my Desktop or Laptop or maybe oneday my plasma etc.
So is it just a case of attaching an external hard drive to my router or getting a external hard drive with wireless connectivity ie a NAS ? or is that the same thing
There arent any wirless NAS boxes (that I know of anyway) as the throughput isnt quite there yet with Wireless.
If you have a wired/wireless router I'd wire it in with a length of cat5 if you want a central solution
It will still be available to the wireless devices but wont be wireless itself
That Terastation is a little box of electronics full of HDD's with a network port, jobs a goodun.
If 1.6Tb isnt enough, bespoke is available upto 12Tb but thats probably overkill
If you have a wired/wireless router I'd wire it in with a length of cat5 if you want a central solution
It will still be available to the wireless devices but wont be wireless itself
That Terastation is a little box of electronics full of HDD's with a network port, jobs a goodun.
If 1.6Tb isnt enough, bespoke is available upto 12Tb but thats probably overkill
Plotloss said:
www.buffalotech.co.uk/products/product-detail.php?productid=97&categoryid=19
mmmmm interesting that terastation. Looking at Buffalo's products, I guess the best solution for me would be a Terastion and then a Linkstation media player for my TV. Then can access all my files wirelessly and have huge storage ? Bit like Roku or Hush etc,but have the added Computer storage.
Terastion's are ok. They don't make much noise, easy to set up. For me there's a bit of a speed issue. I can get a max read of 11Mbyte/sec and 7Mbyte write. For wireless that's fine obviously, but I'm used to 39-40Mbyte/sec from my server over a 1GB wire.
Still, I think the 1TB version is the cheapest RAID 5 solution out there at the moment, by far.
Still, I think the 1TB version is the cheapest RAID 5 solution out there at the moment, by far.
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