Recommendation for robust external hard drive 1

[paulajune]

Greetings.

Our brand new LaCie hard drive took a dive when someone expressing herself non-verbally knocked it over by mistake. That's pretty fragile.

I'm looking for a dependable, high-capacity, (1 1/2 tarabyte) desktop, external hard drive, and also a good portable hard drive.

Please give your best recommendations.

Thank you so much,
PaulaJune

 

[wahnula]

paulajune,

What's your budget? Are you looking to purchase an enclosure and populate it with drives or are you looking for a pre-built NAS box? For a good portable hard drive you can't beat buying a 2.5" drive and installing it in a case. I have several that I use for SBS backup, one is always in my bag, getting jostled about, no problems since purchase in 2005.

Tony

Users helping Users...

 

[G0AOZ]

You didn't say, but assuming the drive was spinning at the time, I'm afraid hard disk drives just can't cope with that kind of treatment. It also probably couldn't cope even if it wasn't spinning, if it was "knocked over" on the desktop down onto the floor!!

I personally don't like external hard drive cases that stand vertically on one side, for precisely this reason - all too easy for it to be accidentally knocked over. Hard drives are high precision devices and need to be treated with respect.

ROGER - G0AOZ.

 

[Sympology]

You could take a look at this

http://www.pcw.co.uk/personal-computer-world/hardware/2148784/buffalo-ministation-hd-phs40u2

There are a few other out there, search for Shock Protection Hard drives.

On a lot of laptops now the drive "locks" if it senses sudden movement.

Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004

 

[gbaughma]

Buffalo makes a nice NAS (Network Attached Storage) device, HOWEVER, if you are in an environment with a large network running Active Directory, in my opinion, it's not a good match.

Read my review here:

http://www.epinions.com/content_239200145028

Just my 2¢
-Cole's Law: Shredded cabbage

--Greg

http://parallel.tzo.com

 

[ceh4702]

Well you could purchase a low end computer and put a few 500GB drives, or two 750GB drives in it and use it like a backup server. Doesnt take a lot of horse power to just back up data, but you want to have some good air circulation to protect the data. You could just buy a cheap Dell for the price of a NAS box. Might still need some backup software.

If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.

 

[wahnula]

Another suggestion would be to build a Windows Home Server box with 3,4, or 5-drive mobile rack, the reviews I've read have all been good (since they got the Office bug out!). Or use FreeNAS to setup a NAS on cheap or recycled hardware. I've been drooling over this eSATA rig from Norco:

http://www.norcotek.com/DS-500.php

...but be warned it has a 2TB limit. You can buy (5) 500GB drives and run it in RAID 5, redundancy is always a plus. This configuration would result in an external 2TB drive for <USD$1K.

Tony

Users helping Users...

 

[LawnBoy]

Greg,
You just saved my butt with that review. I owe you a beer.


"We must fall back upon the old axiom that when all other contingencies fail, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." - Sherlock Holmes