Which hd for backing up

laz111 wrote on 7/14/2002, 5:46 AM

I wonder if anyone can help. I've got a lot of training videos on my 2 hd's and thought I'd better back them up in case I ever have to reformat them due to os problems. Does anyone know the best way to do this and which would be the best external hd to use. I've heard the term firewire external hd - is this type better? I guess as both my hd's equal about 100gb so 120gb external would be best?

Comments

Kalvos wrote on 7/14/2002, 7:45 AM

I'm not sure of the cost of Firewire drives. If they're cheap, probably a good idea.

But you might consider removable drive trays, since the cost of drive space is dropping. I have kept my older drives in trays and use them for backup on an older computer, via a small LAN. (Eventually -- when the price is right -- I'll archive to larger media than CDs.)

Keeping the second machine around had been a really big improvement in my work with big files!

Dennis

laz111 wrote on 7/17/2002, 5:01 AM

Thanks for the input, Kalvos. I'll probably go for the firewire hd, but the removeable option sounds good too. Cheers.

Simmer wrote on 7/17/2002, 2:09 PM

1394 (Firewire for the MAC fans) would be a good choice since it is now supported natively in the later Windows OSes (98SE and later).

The fact that it is a hot-pluggable interface and has the capability (at least at the spec level) to transfer up to S400 or 400 Megabits/second makes it a good backup alternative.

Good luck

-Mike

Labatt50 wrote on 7/17/2002, 3:28 PM

Here's two more cents worth...I bought a Western Digital 80 GB firewire hard drive at Fry's for $147 (after a $100 rebate.) I'd actually had a Maxtor 120 GB firewire in the basket at $397, but put it back when I saw the WD deal. Then the problems started...the drive wouldn't work and was judged faulty by the tech I dealt with. A replacement drive arrived a few days later, but it was an internal drive. After more time on the phone, I arranged for and received the correct replacement. A few days later, ANOTHER internal drive arrived by courier. Then the old story...help promised to sort out all the RMAs required, but still waiting for the phone call. More time on the phone ahead. As for the drive, it works fine once you get it working, although not as fast as internal drive. I started storing video clips on the new drive, but it slows down the operation of Video Factory to some extent so will reorganize. Also it's stressed in the manual that firewire drives are not to be considered portable storage devices.

brian

BillyBoy wrote on 7/17/2002, 5:19 PM

I don't know about any other external drive, but I had endless troubles and two replacements of my Maxtor "external" firewire which as you mentioned is not meant to be a portable due to its cheesy interface card which with repeated inserting and removing of the firewire and power cables led to repeatedly failures. You're much better off with a removable drive tray.

1. cheaper, accepts any IDE drive
2. runs under the PC's internal power supply
3. truly portable, much more rugged, no cables to mess with
4. Faster, note the fine print: 400 Mbps (megabits per second)

Since there are 8 bit to a byte that means at best a firewire drive can only
get up to at best 50 megabytes, so slower than today's IDE drives. The firewire externals are fine if you just leave it sitting on your desk. If you intend to move it around, forget it, they really aren't designed for it, yet that's how they are marketed.

laz111 wrote on 7/18/2002, 3:25 AM

Thanks simmerheli, Labatt50, BillyBoy for your replies. Someone once said 'A wise man learns from other's mistakes, a fool from his own.' How true that is I don't know as I always seem to take ages to learn from mine :o) Anyhow, it sounds like the drive tray system is probably the best option.