Buy An External Hard Drive

By Phillip L. Burnsen

Info backup is an essential part of PC upkeep, whether you are a home or office computer user. The method that you use to backup your information is truly up to you, but most home computer users select a low cost external disk drive, instead of using remote backup systems or other strategies.

Doubtless the largest reason folk use an external drive, is for backup purposes. Although it's beginning to change, as many are finding that external hard drives are superb for portability. A portable drive, means you can cart around all of your music, photos and films where ever you go.

I like to save money, but you really do not want to buy a generic hard drive. First of all, they are of sub standard quality unless you set one up yourself with a store-bought hard drive, as the generic firms truly don't have the capacity to produce high quality info products. The measurements and equipment wanted to make good drives is simply too exclusive right now. They'll regularly omit data backup programs, too, making them unsuited for the utilization of backup.

Generally, the users of external disc drives fall into one of 2 camps. Those that attached external drive permanently to one machine, and those that move their external drives from one machine to another. The permanently attached drives, are often employed in a RAID configuration. If you plan on using an external drive for failover purposes, you want to ensure that the necessary software is included with your external drive. Not all external drives include software for RAID implementations.

You shouldn't get a used hard drive. Hard drive life is usually rated around 7 years, but this is reduced significantly when you purchase used drives, as you can't be sure whether the previous owner ran it in a too-hot or physically aggressive environment, and the amount of money you can pay to get a new drive as opposed to an old drive is really not that much considering the improved trustworthiness of new backup external disc drives. Do you've got any other tips for selecting an external drive for info backup? Post in our comments section below. - 30431

About the Author:

Sign Up for our Free Newsletter

Enter email address here