Reliable External Hard Drive

Marwood_2

Hi there,

I am moving abroad soon and I need to buy a reliable external hard drive, I plan to back up on DVD as well, but I wanted something quick and easy as well.
I only need around 120GB and I am hoping to save some money, but reliability is the most important feature.
Can anyone help with any suggestions?

Thanks in advance,

Marwood

motorguy

Stick to the main brands - i'd recommend Western Digital, Maxtor, Freecom, Seagate, etc. I'd also recommend you look for a 2.5 inch drive as they dont need an external power supply and are much smaller and lighter.

Aim to pay from about £45-£60 for something between 120GB and 160GB. Check out amazon and pcworld as a starting point. Search for '2.5 external'. If you use pcworld you can pick up in store, if you use amazon, you can specify next day delivery. No doubt a host of people will tell you they've never had any problems with Ebuyer and dabs and postage, but i've found them woefully unreliable in the past - taking anything up to a fortnight to deliver, sometimes not at all. Not so good if your flight is booked for a specific date...

Hope this helps

isofa

Never had a problem with Western Digital external drives. The MyBook ones are large, the passport type are very portable and don't need a power supply, a search on Amazon will bring up good prices.

Some batches of drives by manufacturers have longer life spans than others, it's a widely discussed issue in the tech press. Sometimes you are lucky, sometimes not. I've only had a drive fail once in 20 odd years, which is a pretty good stat considering how many machines (Macs and PCs) I have!

Zagu

isofa wrote: »

Never had a problem with Western Digital external drives. The MyBook ones are large, the passport type are very portable and don't need a power supply

Doesnt that mean that they use a 2.5" laptop drive? Id suggest that desktop drives are more reliable.

bookduck

All drive go faulty, just some more quicker than others, and it also depends how unlucky you are too.

If 2 drives of similar price/spec are advertised a 5 year warranty is better than a 3 year one.

The questions you want to ask: Will moving out of the uk make the warranty void? If the drive goes faulty will you be able to get it repaird/replaced in the other country, or must you send it back to the UK dealer, or UK manufacturer and will they pay shipping to the new country?

isofa

Zagu wrote: »

Doesnt that mean that they use a 2.5" laptop drive? Id suggest that desktop drives are more reliable.

All portable drives of a small form factor use a 2.5" drive, in my experience I've not found these to be more or less reliable than 3.5" desktop drives, many 2.5" drives have advanced shock protection built-in, over and above their 3.5" desktop counterparts, but they aren't as fast or large in capacity - but they have the portability edge, you can't slip a large desktop enclosure with PSU into a shirt pocket!

The WD MyBooks are all 3.5" desktop drives, but not as portable. Been running one now wince it was released many years ago, with no problems over Firewire.

As bookduck says, go for ones with a longer warranty.

motorguy

Zagu wrote: »

Doesnt that mean that they use a 2.5" laptop drive? Id suggest that desktop drives are more reliable.

I'd suggest you're wrong.

Zagu

pgilc1 wrote: »

I'd suggest you're wrong.

Obviously its hard to compare a 2.5 directly with a 3.5, but taking two of the most reliable makes....

Toshiba MK1637GSX 160 GB - MTBF 300000 hour(s)

Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 160GB -MTBF 700,000 hours

Of course, if you've actually got any evidence to rebuke my assumption, Id like to hear it. Furthermore, given that the OP was "hoping to save some money", the 3.5" seems the obvious choice.

motorguy

Given you didnt originally give any evidence to back up your assertion, why should i have?

Why are you listing two bare drives as a comparison, and what comparison is being made here, given you've plucked two reviews here that favour 3.5 inch drives? Do you want me to pull out another two that make the 2.5 inch drive look better? :rolleyes:

In my experience - and thats managing around 800 computers for the current company i work for, and also previously running my own business selling and repairing laptops and pcs, like the other responses here, i've seen no compelling evidence that a 3.5 is more reliable than a 2.5.

Also, for reference, you can get a 2.5 120GB external for £45-£50, external 3.5 inch drives tend to be £55+ (albeit for bigger capacity which the o/p says they dont need), so there isnt any money saving to be gained by buying a 3.5 drive.

Also, my thinking would be that the 2.5 externals are more likely to have better shock resistance, given there is going to be a lot of travelling involved for the drive.

If the o/p thinks they might prefer a 3.5 inch drive then cool - everyones advice around warranty, brand, etc fully applies either way.

Marwood_2

pgilc1 wrote: »

Stick to the main brands - i'd recommend Western Digital, Maxtor, Freecom, Seagate, etc. I'd also recommend you look for a 2.5 inch drive as they dont need an external power supply and are much smaller and lighter.

Aim to pay from about £45-£60 for something between 120GB and 160GB. Check out amazon and pcworld as a starting point. Search for '2.5 external'. If you use pcworld you can pick up in store, if you use amazon, you can specify next day delivery. No doubt a host of people will tell you they've never had any problems with Ebuyer and dabs and postage, but i've found them woefully unreliable in the past - taking anything up to a fortnight to deliver, sometimes not at all. Not so good if your flight is booked for a specific date...

Hope this helps

Many thanks for your advice, the 2.5 external sounds like what I need and I also had some bad experience with Ebuyer and a shoddy MP3 player so I will avoid them at all costs, and dabs.
Once again thank you, it is much appreciated and a Happy new year!

Reiki_Sue

Avoid Maxtor One touch 4 - had mine a year and half and only did about 6 backups and now the cable & plug doesn't work and nothing registers on my main pc or my laptop. So tried another universal cable & plug and that too doesn't work. Lights are on on Maxtor but no ones at home - unless anyone has any suggestions?

Thanks
Sue