Good HDD

amity

Covkid wrote: »

I think so....

My laptops only have USB 2.0, i think- the normal USB not the new USB 3.

The USB 3.0 cable won't fit into my laptop which has only USB 2.0.

Thanks

Covkid, I gave you the list of avg. retail prices figuring you'd pick a price/capacity point you were after.
We've established you're interested in any robust, transfer rate isn't so critical since you're ok with your USB2 transfer rates which will cap at 32MB/s, portable HD - you've also not stated a preference for colour or finish. But which capacity / price you interested in? Look at the list


Intel have cunningly designed USB3.0 plugs to be physically the same as USB2.. that is the plug that goes into the computer, the *other* end of the cable, the one that is shaped for the drive is physically different... it carries a couple more data lines and a couple more voltage lines.
So a USB3 bus external HD will connect to your USB2 ports, but as your USB2 ports have USB2 bus controllers they HD will be restricted to 28-32MB MAX throuput read AND write. Not the end of the world, but when a drive can do 100MB+ read and 75MB+ write, it is a shame to know you are hanging round because your computer's ports can't keep up...

However unless you're certain you won't ever be plugging in the drive into a USB3 port on some newer device at some point, OR you're never in a rush for data to copy across... OR you don't have more data than say 25GB to copy across at a time, then you may do with a USB2 bus on your HD drive.


I'll see if I can gather some images to illustrate the different USB2 and USB3 connectors
To help differentiate USB3 and USB2 Standard-A plugs on cables, which have, physically, the same dimentions, the USB3 ones are coloured a cyan blue. Under the Pantone colour management system that is numbered 300C blue. See the colour here:
http://www.mindstarhk.com/image/color/300C.jpg

spike7451

Stay away from Seagate,I recently had one crash on me & on researching a possible fix,found out they are notorious for it.

Notmyrealname

Covkid wrote: »

The USB 3.0 cable won't fit into my laptop which has only USB 2.0.

Thanks

Yes it will...

Notmyrealname

spike7451 wrote: »

Stay away from Seagate,I recently had one crash on me & on researching a possible fix,found out they are notorious for it.

No they're not. They are no worse or better than any other brand. You'll probably find out that Seagate are owned by whatever brand you do think is decent. Over the last half decade, everyone bought everybody else out.

amity

As I understand it there are now just three.
Three separate companies controlling all the manufacture of HD units in The World:
WD
Seagate
Toshiba

The last 'consolidations' were,
WD - Western Digital - bought Hitachi GST (Global Storage Technologies), if I remember rightly Hitachi had bought the HD development and storage arm of IBM.

Seagate bought Samsung's Hard Disk division.
You can now buy totally unlikely named products like,
Seagate SpinPoint Barracuda F3 - where SpinPoint and F3 were Samsung model/ brand trademarks and Seagate has integrated them into their Barracuda hard drive line

Notmyrealname wrote: »

No they're not. They are no worse or better than any other brand. You'll probably find out that Seagate are owned by whatever brand you do think is decent. Over the last half decade, everyone bought everybody else out.

You're right about there isn't a more realiable brand of hard disk.
To all that don't grasp this yet... ALL hard disks, WILL fail - that is guaranteed.

Again,
ALL hard disks *WILL* FAIL THAT IS GUARANTEED
How so?
Being mechanical devices and therefore exposed to friction, metal stresses and erosion, their end is certain: some part will fail, something will get out of line by a fraction, something will blow, something will malfunction.

The tricky bit is: you don't know, and can't predict when.

So backups are essential if you want to avoid data-loss being *CERTAIN*.

Covkid_2

Hi all,

Thanks for the above discussion, so in summary:

I can get a HDD with USB 3.0 as it will be compatible with USB 2.0 and then i can use it, when i buy a new laptop, with a new device.

Thanks

debitcardmayhem

Covkid wrote: »

Hi all,

Thanks for the above discussion, so in summary:

I can get a HDD with USB 3.0 as it will be compatible with USB 2.0 and then i can use it, when i buy a new laptop, with a new device.

Thanks

Yes indeed, I have a USB3 drive which works perfectly well with my new Laptop USB 3 and netbook USB 2

Figment

amity wrote: »

As I understand it there are now just three.
Three separate companies controlling all the manufacture of HD units in The World:
WD
Seagate
Toshiba

The last 'consolidations' were,
WD - Western Digital - bought Hitachi GST (Global Storage Technologies), if I remember rightly Hitachi had bought the HD development and storage arm of IBM.

Seagate bought Samsung's Hard Disk division.
You can now buy totally unlikely named products like,
Seagate SpinPoint Barracuda F3 - where SpinPoint and F3 were Samsung model/ brand trademarks and Seagate has integrated them into their Barracuda hard drive line
You're right about there isn't a more realiable brand of hard disk.
To all that don't grasp this yet... ALL hard disks, WILL fail - that is guaranteed.

Again,
ALL hard disks *WILL* FAIL THAT IS GUARANTEED
How so?
Being mechanical devices and therefore exposed to friction, metal stresses and erosion, their end is certain: some part will fail, something will get out of line by a fraction, something will blow, something will malfunction.

The tricky bit is: you don't know, and can't predict when.

So backups are essential if you want to avoid data-loss being *CERTAIN*.

I think there's a subtle message hidden in your post, but I'm struggling to find it.

amity

Covkid wrote: »

Hi all,

Thanks for the above discussion, so in summary:

I can get a HDD with USB 3.0 as it will be compatible with USB 2.0 and then i can use it, when i buy a new laptop, with a new device.

Thanks

How much space where you after Covkid?
Or what's your budget?

I can do some hunting then, now knowing what kind of HD you're after.


If you can find an external HD that is only USB2 at a price 20% less than the avg. prices I listed for you, then you might consider getting that for now. You should have two copies of your data - on two separate drives - at all times. To do this you may have to buy 2 HDs, I don't know. In other words if you are considering taking data off your laptop and having one copy on an external HD, then this data is backed up *only* when there is another copy of it on another HD.

I'm not claiming I'm great at backing up. I've learnt all this the hard way, from data-loss and setbacks

Gazza1964

What about this 2Tb Hitachi for £75

http://www.ebuyer.com/320104-hitachi-2tb-touro-desktop-hard-drive-usb-3-0-black-0s03398