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External Hard Drives
Evening Forum Members,
This is actually my second question about purchasing an external HD. I asked about it a few weeks ago and was told (correctly) that these drive, like most of the sensitive electronic equipment, must be handled very carefully. All this said, no matter which Ext HD I've looked at, they ALL have terrible records as to the lengh of time they remain in service. Point: I had purchased an Maxtor 360 GB hd about 5 months ago and it just stopped working. No warning. I plugged it into my USB port, the sound beep came on opening a piece of added hardware... Then the disconnected sound beeped telling me that the drive was no longer being read.
My MAIN purpose was to back up photos and music and some account data. Although the accounting is also on disc. Perhaps my expectations are wrong BUT can I simply plug this External HD into my computer, download the data I wish through Windows Explorer, then shut down the Ext HD? I do not intend to keep the drive connected to the computer, since the data I wish to protect is sometimes added or updated weekly. Is my connect/disconnect proceedure wrong and more damaging to the HD? I have looked at Seagate, HP, Western Digital and Omega. All of these drives give the same story. They work for a few months then stop!!!. Perhaps I am asking the inposible... PLEASE Advise!!! This forum is the BEST and I truly trust your judgement... Thanks for the info.. Enjoy your weekend... Art:robotsad:
shesagordie
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Posted October 4th, 2008 19:00
ArtC
I have found that using a powered USB 2.0 enclosures and have internal cooling fans, similar to this enclosure for IDE hard drives and this for SATA drives, has work well for me.
Then you can install your own brand of hard drive, I like Seagate's HDs that have a five year warranty.
Bev.
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Please don't send me questions about your system by DCF Messenger.
Post the issue in the appropriate Board, where they will be answered.I had a Western Digital external go on me after about a year, so I went and got a Maxtor and its been good for almost two years, I started to worry as it held thousans of my photos on it and i didnt want a crash to cause me to lose them so I bought another, newer Maxtor AND backed up EVERYTHING on the drive to DVD's.. (over 50 of them) now i feel safe... then i read about DVD /CD rot.. geeze.. so id say, back up the back up and then back that up!!
shesagordie
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Posted October 8th, 2008 15:00
zacker
Yep, you can create backups ad infinitum and still worry. LOL :)
Bev.
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Please don't send me questions about your system by DCF Messenger.
Post the issue in the appropriate Board, where they will be answered.
PETER345
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Posted October 4th, 2008 14:00
My experience with external HDs is that often the computer won't recognize the drive, but the drive itself is fine. If I plug it into another machine it works fine. Or sometimes, I just try again on the same machine and it will work.
The actual HD is exactly the same whether the HD is external or internal (except smaller external drives use smaller laptop HDs instead of desktop HDs). What is different is the interface and that is where I have found the most problems.
What you should do is try to determine if the HD is bad itself. One way to do that is to mount the drive internally (which might not be that convenient) and see if it works.
External HDs with enclosures can cause the HDs to overheat and lower their lives. Does yours have an enclosure? Does it have a fan? Does it get very hot?
Peter