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☖ Forums → Discussion Forum → Good external hard drive?
Good external hard drive?
2008-06-24, 11:21 PM #1
I'm looking for a decent external hard drive for around $100 that I can put my games on. It seems like every hard drive I look at has a few very negative reviews, so I'm hesitant to make a final decision.

I'll be using it a lot, so I don't want something that's just going to overheat and 'splode on me or something.

I came very close to buying this one, but some bad reviews on newegg made me stop: http://www.buy.com/prod/seagate-500gb-freeagent-usb-2-0-7200rpm-external-hard-drive/q/loc/101/204110102.html
2008-06-24, 11:24 PM #2
Buy hard drive

Buy enclosure

win win win
2008-06-25, 12:18 AM #3
And if the use of a screwdriver scares you, LaCie is the way to go from my experience. They're more expensive, but they do make good quality externals.
Stuff
2008-06-25, 1:52 PM #4
Would it be better to have 7200rpm with USB 2.0, or to have 5400rpm with firewire in trying to keep game loading times as low as possible?
2008-06-25, 1:53 PM #5
Loading games off an external is bound to create fail no matter what you do.

The best thing to do is to move media to an external, and keep your games on your main drive.

PS, look and see if you have any extra sata slots. Even if you don't have any space on your case, some enclosures will accept a sata plug for great win. Thus solving your firewire/USB not suitable for games problem.
2008-06-25, 2:01 PM #6
Well, it's for a laptop. I found a 500GB LaCie hard drive that is 7200rpm with firewire, usb 2.0, and serial ATA. It looks like a winner.
2008-06-25, 4:38 PM #7
Originally posted by Axis:
Would it be better to have 7200rpm with USB 2.0, or to have 5400rpm with firewire in trying to keep game loading times as low as possible?

7200
Bassoon, n. A brazen instrument into which a fool blows out his brains.
2008-06-25, 8:24 PM #8
Originally posted by Axis:
Well, it's for a laptop. I found a 500GB LaCie hard drive that is 7200rpm with firewire, usb 2.0, and serial ATA. It looks like a winner.


Get a bigger laptop hard drive.
2008-06-25, 8:32 PM #9
My advice. Avoid the seagate free agent at all costs. Had mine for a month and it died. Luckily I used the program that came with it to make a backup on another internal HD.

like rob said, just get an enclosure for an internal ftw.
"They're everywhere, the little harlots."
-Martyn
2008-06-25, 8:34 PM #10
Typical laptop these days usually come with atleast 100+ GB of space. You must loading that harddrive with alot of stuff if you are considering running games off an external device.

I say, keep the money and start deleting.
SnailIracing:n(500tpostshpereline)pants
-----------------------------@%
2008-06-25, 8:44 PM #11
Originally posted by Onimusha.:
Avoid the seagate free agent at all costs. Had mine for a month and it died.


Sucks for you, my FreeAgent works perfectly fine.
$do || ! $do ; try
try: command not found
Ye Olde Galactic Empire Mission Editor (X-wing, TIE, XvT/BoP, XWA)
2008-06-25, 8:58 PM #12
Just get a bigger internal drive for your laptop...

By the way, 7,200 RPM drives don't consume a significant amount of power versus 5,400 RPM drives.
Bassoon, n. A brazen instrument into which a fool blows out his brains.
2008-06-25, 9:15 PM #13
with user reviews always check the number of bad reviews and the number of good reviews

a few bad reviews thrown in with a mountain of praise is expected... same can be said about the opposite the most reliable brand/model can have a few that will fail after a month while at the same time the least reliable brand/model can have some out there that will last for many years
eat right, exercise, die anyway
2008-06-26, 12:26 AM #14
Originally posted by Rob:
Loading games off an external is bound to create fail no matter what you do.


Quoting for emphasis.
You can't judge a book by it's file size
2008-06-26, 2:59 AM #15
Make sure the Lacie is a model designed by Porsche. It's the looks that count, you know.
Frozen in the past by ICARUS
2008-06-26, 6:46 AM #16
I ordered the LaCie one, plus, yes, it looks really really sweet. I'm glad I didn't go with the Seagate FreeAgent, especially if someone here on massassi had trouble with it.
My laptop is a Dell with an 80GB hard drive, but Vista takes up a ton of space, plus games for some reason are way bigger than I remember them.
2008-06-26, 6:50 AM #17
if by external hard drive you mean "good place to dump your stuff" then i'm going to have to say freesmom
gbk is 50 probably

MB IS FAT
2008-06-26, 7:12 AM #18
and you so should have just upgraded your internal drive. it would have probably been cheaper, and it would have been much more convenient.
gbk is 50 probably

MB IS FAT
2008-06-26, 7:15 AM #19
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148307

$150, 200gb, and not made of fail like running your games from an enclosure.
2008-06-26, 10:57 PM #20
I had a 500 GB Western Digital SATA 3.0 that I bought earlier, and then went on Newegg and bought:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817173040
Enclosure

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16839200006
eSATA Express Card

And now I am full of win. All my games are stored on the external drive, so I can still be portable with my laptop, and when I'm actually gonna play a game, I'll be at a place that I can plug it in.

^^ This is on a MacBook Pro, btw, so it works in both OS X and Windows.
A computer's worst nightmare:
0010111010011110210011010001

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