External Hard Drives - Recommendations/help please!

C00kie_2

My computer has packed up... well, system error and so doesn't boot up into Windows anymore. With formatting my only option and resulting in lost data I'm now scowling and cursing and planning how best to back up in the future.

Since it isn't really practical to keep burning CDs/DVDs each time I have more photos or whatever to save, I'm thinking of getting an external hard drive which I can archive all the crap on in future.

Am I right in assuming this would work in the same way as burning files to discs? If there's an error and future formatting was required, (unless a specific error with the hard drive, much more unlikely than a microsoft error...grr) then would data be saved safely and untouched by the curse of XP?

Looking around, the prices seem to be quite varied, I'd not be looking specifically for a portable one, which means I can get more storage for my money. Can these be unplugged and swapped to a different machine easily if need be, effectively meaning the portable ones are just a bit more "pocket sized"?


Lastly... is £69.99 a decent price for a whopping 320Gb Iomega Hard Drive? Staples will have them in their 7 day sale which starts on Boxing Day (Was £99.99), seems like a fantastic deal to me but like I say, I'm a bit clueless and can't seem to find it listed on the Staples website at the moment to get the model number or anything....

Please help!

barneydog

It is a good price, nothing special but fair.

As to backing up, it's more like copying via drap and drop on your PC. I would recommend you get a proper back-up program so you can completely back-up your whole computer in case you have the same problem.

There are free ones on the web.

C00kie_2

Ta for that. It's infuriating, of course all good intentions with back ups disappear after the first few months, so although some early pics and files are saved, I'd adopted the usual "it'll never happen to me" attitude, and now the blasted thing is kaput and formatting seems the only way out.

New Years resolution: back up properly ALL year round...

waterstar

If your existing hard drive has crashed in some way it can either be a "software system screw-up" or a physical problem with the hard-drive.

If it is a physical problem with the hard drive they tend to "corrupt incrementally" rather than completely fail. The point I am making is that much of the data may still be recoverable, the same would also apply if it is a software screw-up.

Hence a suggestion

1) Buy a new hard-drive to put into your pc, then reload windows etc

2) Buy an "external hard-drive case" (Icy Box is one brand I have used and found reliable) and put the existing (corrupted) hard-drive into it (takes all of 2 minutes to do). Subject to some playing around with "master/slave configuration" on the drive, upon plugging in the external drive via USB socket it should be recognised by Windows as "D" Drive or similar.

3) The data on your old drive can then be transferred to your new drive (in the PC)

4) If the old drive is physically corrupted then scrap it and replace, if it is still Ok then you have that "external drive" to use for back-ups etc.

The cost of an "external hard-drive case" and a OEM hard-drive should not be significantly different from the cost of a pre-built external hard-drive and you have gained the benefit of having a new and probably larger hard-drive as your main drive in your PC.

Merry Christmas

alanobrien

You can mirror your main drive, do a selective backup or a compressed image. Lots of software around to do this.

I prefer an image backup of the main system as its easy to locate and restore.

As regards the backup drive, you can get a lot of data on those drives and of course they can and do fail.

My advice would be with things that are irreplaceable like digital photos of the family to also copy them to DVD.

ukbandit

go to forums.overclockers.co.uk, there are loads of people there playing round with raid, backup etc, and can give plenty of advice...

im getting a synology box, as i may as well use my extrernal drive as a print server as well

gaming_guy

its always best to back up very important data onto a cd/dvd as well as on external hdd's as extenal hdd's may fail in the same way internal ones do

Shawz

waterstar wrote:

If your existing hard drive has crashed in some way it can either be a "software system screw-up" or a physical problem with the hard-drive.

If it is a physical problem with the hard drive they tend to "corrupt incrementally" rather than completely fail. The point I am making is that much of the data may still be recoverable, the same would also apply if it is a software screw-up.

Hence a suggestion

1) Buy a new hard-drive to put into your pc, then reload windows etc

2) Buy an "external hard-drive case" (Icy Box is one brand I have used and found reliable) and put the existing (corrupted) hard-drive into it (takes all of 2 minutes to do). Subject to some playing around with "master/slave configuration" on the drive, upon plugging in the external drive via USB socket it should be recognised by Windows as "D" Drive or similar.

3) The data on your old drive can then be transferred to your new drive (in the PC)

4) If the old drive is physically corrupted then scrap it and replace, if it is still Ok then you have that "external drive" to use for back-ups etc.

The cost of an "external hard-drive case" and a OEM hard-drive should not be significantly different from the cost of a pre-built external hard-drive and you have gained the benefit of having a new and probably larger hard-drive as your main drive in your PC.

Merry Christmas

Completely agree with waterstar.
Don't waste money on special external hard drives use what you already have. Much better and cheaper

C00kie_2

I've got the issue where it won't boot into Windows on this drive... will that be an issue at all if i try slaving it to another?

I'm not very tecchie, but I'm not clueless... this is all a bit of a grey area with me though. It's £99 for the first Gb for PC world to try and save my data, but they couldn't do it locally for a cpl weeks as their system set up has broken (confidence building there...!!!) so if there's a way to do it myself I'll try. All advice is appreciated, thanks guys

barneydog

This depends on what option you have gone for.

If your computer is working now & you have gone for a new external drive I would make an image back up of your total drive and a second back up of all your data, drivers, any other stuff you think you might need. Hopefully your drive would have come with a program to make a disc image.
This would allow you to re- install windows fairly safely.

If you have gone with the solution provided by waterstar do exactly as he has recommended.

All this depends on the hard disc in your computer being salvagable, if not there are programs that will extract data from corrupt drives. If this is needed pm me and I will point some out.