How to... buy a harddrive...

[ihno]

Okay, it's not exactly HOW to buy but WHICH to buy.

I think I need yet another external hardrive. I'm not a friend von CnMemory and intenso. I also have a seagate that often makes noises-

I like Western Digital (silent and stable) and there is an WD-external drive of 2 GB for 129 € but also one for 110 (or so) of Toshiba.

Do you have any experience with Toshiba? Is Intenso better than I think?

Or maybe an internenal drive? I have a 2 GB hd in my computer already. Could the speed somehow be infected with another drive in the system? My external drives are not always attaced and they reduce the speech considerably when windows builds up.

 

[slimjim]

Well I have 4 Buffalo Ministations and I rate them highly... the oldest one I have is about 5 years old and has had data written to/erased many many times and still works fine, as they all do. I prefer to buy several smaller capacity harddrives rather than one huge one as if one goes you haven't lost everything.

http://refhide.com/?http://www.amaz...nics&field-keywords=buffalo+ministation+500gb+

 

[ihno]

Thanks, my helper.

Never heard of Buffalo, is it US American?

 

[slimjim]

HQ I think in Japan :thinking:, but pretty much worldwide... and in UK computer stores

OOpps - I used the USA Amazon site as I thought you had quoted prices in $... I now see it was € here's a/zon.de

http://refhide.com/?http://www.amazon.de/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_23?__mk_de_DE=%C3%85M%C3%85Z%C3%95%C3%91&url=search-alias%3Dcomputers&field-keywords=buffalo+ministation+500gb+usb+2.0&sprefix=buffalo+ministation+500%2Ccomputers%2C199&rh=n%3A340843031%2Ck%3Abuffalo+ministation+500gb+usb+2.0&ajr=0

 

[Stoic]

Seagate for me is worthless, especially the ones made in China. Urgh, the last one I had went kaput after a year. Go for Western Digital. The green ones are cheaper but doesn't have the same performance - although if you're just using it for extra storage then yeah you can go with it.

 

[Jamoo]

i use a Sharkoon 5Bay Raidbox running in RAID5 mode with 5*2TB Harddisks (Samsung and Western Digital) they all silent and running very well.
There you have 7,2TB netto and a backup included for the case that any of the harddisk will die someday
It runs stand alone and no extra software is needed, it shuts all HD's down after 5minutes if they not in use. has USB3.0 and eSata.

 

[Stoic]

Jamoo why not Raid 10?

 

[ihno]

If I only didn't have 4 drives already I might fall in love with your suggestion, Jamoo. That's really cool.

Thanks, guys, that helps a lot. Yes, Stoic, Seagate is a no go. Mine is doing okay but there is nothing expendable on it.

 

[Jamoo]

Jamoo why not Raid 10?

raid 10 needs 50% for backup and is probably more safe than raid 5 and has a better performance in reading and writing datas
but Raid5 needs only 20% for backup if you use 5 same sized harddisks and against some rumors i have a good performance with, up to 70mb/s writing speed in a truecrypt volume , that's ok for me. disadvantage is if you loose more than one HD at the same time then all datas are gone.

 

[ihno]

I found one. 3 TB, western-digital for only 142,- €. Ordered in a store in my vicinity. The 2 TB is 155,- €. The vendor was a little surprised too. This will give me some rest, lol. I'll fetch it tomorrow.

And I have seen Buffalo there too btw. But still does not sound too japanese to my ears.

 

[Jamoo]

Impressive. You're lucky it is silent, usually it runs quite a few noisy cooling fans..

The disks are safe, but the internal RAID controller is your single point of failure. If that fails, you'll need to put all 5 disks in exactly the same disk bay to access your files.
Also, RAID bays are more sensitive to sudden power cuts (can screw-up all 5 disks at once). Does it have a little battery of some sort to do a clean poweroff ?

A.

thats why i numbered my hardisks with a permanent marker

system doesnt has a battery for safe shut down or something but i never had problems yet.



i use two of these Raidboxes now

one 5x2 TB

and one 5x3 TB

both truecrypted

i made a test with rebuilding a 3 TB HD, it took only 3 hours which is really quick. And as i said. you don't need to run your Pc for it, it's completely stand alone



i really can recommend this system

 

[theo]

Jamoo, that is really neat. I'll for sure buy one when I can afford it.

 

[tonka]

These external hard drives are getting crazy cheap. Newegg just ran a sale of a Western Digital 3T for $79!!!
I think it's over. But it shows you the market.

 

[gb2000ie]

These external hard drives are getting crazy cheap. Newegg just ran a sale of a Western Digital 3T for $79!!!
I think it's over. But it shows you the market.

Even if you miss these kinds of sales, 3TB got $100 is totally normal.

My approach was to build my own hard-drive server by buying a big case with 10 drive bays, a cheap motherboard, i3 CPU and some RAM. Works like a charm, and massively flexible. I'm running Ubuntu server on it so I can make it do just about anything I want or need.

B.

 

[cranston]

Hi guys please don't laugh at me TOO MUCH , you can laugh at me a lot but not excessively, I am still using dvd-r's, was finally considering stopping being a luddite and making the leap to a external hard drive, but some of your comments about an external hard drive breaking down and thus losing everything are scaring me. At least with a dvd-r , if it doesn't work, only a little bit is lost, as opposed to tons. Does my reticence to make the big leap have any validity?

 

[ihno]

Well, everything breaks down eventually. DVDs will have dataloss eventually as weill have external hard-drives. Do you mean rewritable DVDs? I don't trust those.

I can only suggest: Whatever system you prefer, make a backup of your important stuff and keep it actual. There are tools that help with it, that can compare folders and update them. I use one called filesync.

edit: and if this all doesn't work, maybe the NSA has a copy of it.

 

[syko2d4]

agree about Seagate...used to be good, but the newest one I have only lasted a couple months then kept "ejecting" itself unexpectedly and had to reboot computer to get it back until finally it wouldn't even show up on desktop, only in DiskUtility [yes, I have a Mac ]! had to use DiskRescue to get data off it, then erase it - Seagate said I could send it back, but not too sure about what they'll do with it and any data that may still be left even after I zeroed it out with DiskUtility...BUT had WD HDs before, too, and it's like you said inho, everything breaks down eventually

 

[ihno]

My Seagate still works. It's from 2008 but it makes this clicking-sound, like when searching for a sector. This is not only annoying but also reduces my confidence in the device to a minimum. I use it for storage of the least important stuff.

I have four or five externals, two are usually connected to the computer, three normally not. I connect those once or twice a year, so they don't get rusty.

 

[syko2d4]

My Seagate still works. It's from 2008 but it makes this clicking-sound, like when searching for a sector. This is not only annoying but also reduces my confidence in the device to a minimum. I use it for storage of the least important stuff.

I have four or five externals, two are usually connected to the computer, three normally not. I connect those once or twice a year, so they don't get rusty.

when they start making those sounds, that's when I start to worry :worried: and when I usually get a new one and transfer all my data...but this latest one didn't make any strange noises, just did the self-eject thing - Seagate has a firmware update that's supposed to fix it, but even the updater couldn't find the HD *smh*

well, good luck! hope you get a good one!!! and let us know which and how it works!

too bad you're not in USA - they sell for around $100 for 2 TB when they go on sale -both WD & Seagate - which is around 77€ I think...

 

[ihno]

Yes, that's a bad sign. But I guess the clicking sound in my case has to do with my old fashioned operating system and the even older picture viewer I use.

I got a new one since three months now. 3 TB for 142 €, Western Digital. It's okay...

only one thing: It's almost full. Cannot understand that, I just moved one or two films there... I swear!