Hi guys, well i've decided to get a external harddrive. Somehow Im tired of moving around my files when I get a new computer. Plus it feeld saver to have my projects stored externally. Now ive never gotten such a thing and I am trusting it with my lifes work (I have cd backups but still) so I thought Id ask you guys for recommendations. Basically the following is important: 1.) Realiability! Preferably it should work a lifetime but 10-20 years will do I guess. 2.) Portability. I will want to be able to take it with me in a bag or such. This doesnt mean it has to be small just robust. Im fine with with something the size of a book as long as its robust and doesnt weigh a ton. 3.) Im willing to pay more for 1 and 2 especially if it holds many years. 4.) Reasonably fast would be nice since I will want to work on the external drive when I develop apps. Not important: 1.) Storage space doesnt have to be outrageous. I can live with say 4 gigs. 2.) I dont want a usb stick. Too small, gets lost and im skeptical about realibility, I want very reliable. Thanks in advance guys. Never regreted asking for advice here so far. -CProgrammer

For pocket-sized drive, the Western Digital Passports are nice. They come in various sizes from 60GB to > 100GB. I've had a 100GB variant for about 8 months now with no problems. The nice part about Passports is they power themselves from the USB's power (it's worked fine on my laptop, too). I carry it to work *every day* in my car or in my seat bag on my bicycle.

Apparently there's a newer, black-colored Passport that's slightly more compact than the silver/blue one I have.


My roommate has had a couple of 500GB external USB hard drives by WD for a few months now.

Quote: Original post by CProgrammer
Hi guys,

well i've decided to get a external harddrive. Somehow Im tired of moving around my files when I get a new computer. Plus it feeld saver to have my projects stored externally.
Now ive never gotten such a thing and I am trusting it with my lifes work (I have cd backups but still) so I thought Id ask you guys for recommendations.
Basically the following is important:

1.) Realiability! Preferably it should work a lifetime but 10-20 years will do I guess.
2.) Portability. I will want to be able to take it with me in a bag or such. This doesnt mean it has to be small just robust. Im fine with with something the size of a book as long as its robust and doesnt weigh a ton.
3.) Im willing to pay more for 1 and 2 especially if it holds many years.
4.) Reasonably fast would be nice since I will want to work on the external drive when I develop apps.

Not important:
1.) Storage space doesnt have to be outrageous. I can live with say 4 gigs.
2.) I dont want a usb stick. Too small, gets lost and im skeptical about realibility, I want very reliable.

Thanks in advance guys. Never regreted asking for advice here so far.

-CProgrammer

You are never going to find a disk of any sort that will guarantee 1 or 3.

What, exactly, are you trying to accomplish? It sounds like you want both a primary backup and a portable drive to take large files around with you. External disks are not a wise long-term backup solution. I don't care who you know that has used one for 8 years without an issue.

why would a usb stick be unreliable? I thought solid state was less fragile.
if your afraid of loosing it get a big key ring.

Quote: Original post by RivieraKid
why would a usb stick be unreliable? I thought solid state was less fragile.
if your afraid of loosing it get a big key ring.

how does less fragile equal reliable?

the real question is what exactly do you expect from this black box you want to place your data into?

I second the Passport drive. I just bought this one on Amazon, and I've been thrilled. It's small, very light, runs silent, and holds 120GB.

Well im not exactly looking for something to carry around everywhere. Basically the ideal situation would be I get home, plug my laptop into the external harddrive and work. If I want to set this up somewhere else it should be easy, I dont want to carry a desktop around. So basically Im not carrying it around with me on a daily basis. If I dont work for a while then I have a place where my data lies safely. If its on the laptop theres always a risk.

Kordova: Im guessing youre saying there is nothing reliable. Well how reliable is it compared to a cd? Plus im sure its pretty reliable for at least 5 years.

Love the passport drive. I think we may have a winner. Thanks!
The device is a little small. I must admit in this matter I prefer it not to fit in my pocket but oh well.
Plus an ethernet connection would be nice.
Are these created by other companies as well?

Quote: Original post by CProgrammer
Well im not exactly looking for something to carry around everywhere. Basically the ideal situation would be I get home, plug my laptop into the external harddrive and work. If I want to set this up somewhere else it should be easy, I dont want to carry a desktop around. So basically Im not carrying it around with me on a daily basis. If I dont work for a while then I have a place where my data lies safely. If its on the laptop theres always a risk.

Kordova: Im guessing youre saying there is nothing reliable. Well how reliable is it compared to a cd? Plus im sure its pretty reliable for at least 5 years.

Love the passport drive. I think we may have a winner. Thanks!
The device is a little small. I must admit in this matter I prefer it not to fit in my pocket but oh well.
Plus an ethernet connection would be nice.
Are these created by other companies as well?

Hard disks die all of the time. What I am saying is use it to store unimportant data like movies and other junk that you could survive losing. If you want this to sit at your house and "safely" store your data, look into RAIDing some disks in a spare computer.

There is no single hard disk solution that will guarantee the integrity of your data for an hour, let alone 5 years.

My question for you is, if your external hard disk started making scraping noises a month from now and then died an hour later, would you be ok with it?

Ok I hear you. But what medium would be saver. I mean this will never be the only backup. The idea is to use an external harddrive and every few month burn some cds. Just using the laptop shouldnt be safer. It also uses a harddrive and it gets thrown around a lot more. Plus computers that are used die more often. Getting the data then is a pain. Also moving files from computer to computer and to cds and to computer again seems to be a much larger risk of having a bad copy at some point. Using the external drive data is added but archives arent removed.

So what is your recommendation?