Community Newsletter: Q&A: External hard-drive buying advice and backing up data
- 8/8/08 10:24 AM
Seagate Free Agent
by lennyremington - 8/2/08 8:09 AM In reply to: FreeAgent drives are rock solid performers, simple, and BIG by shimshaiI have a 500GB Free Agent external drive by seagate. When I bought and installed it. Seagate wanted to sell me storage space with them. Then they sold me a programe for a year called Memeo. I have no idea what this program does. It it gives access to addition back up programs by installing DVD, CD or other disk? Vista'a backup program allow you to do this. I bought the exteral drive a few months after I accidently wiped by hard drive and was unable restore my information. I thought I would be safe just with the external drive. Are all these other programs necessary?
External Hard drives are important: choose carefully
by newscientist_Au - 7/25/08 9:17 PM In reply to: External hard-drive buying advice and backing up data by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Hi Ben
I am a researcher and most of my data is electronic and hence it is crucial for me to keep it safe.
I recently bought a seagate FreeeAgent Pro 500GB and since I bought it I decided I should only buy FreeAgents from now on. I love their software too. Part from it being silent and aesthetically pleasing (I wasnt really bothered about these two factors while choosing it) it is fast and has been working smoothly for months now.
My 2 cents worth:
1] Before I bought my hard drive I did a lot of research asking people/techies around for their experiences. I figured that everyone swears by their favorite one. I was finally suggested to choose between Samsung and Seagate. The only negative experience was with Maxtors (but I also know people who are happy with them).
2] I was reading on one of the threads that we shouldn't bother too much about the warranty (of course its ALWAYS important but don't rely too much on it) - some had their data corrupted and the manufacturer said they can swap it but cant do much about their data.. while the customer was very sure that it was just a connection problem and that he can fix it by opening the case (and hence voiding the warranty). No options there if HDD fails either pay money to data recovery experts or lose it and get it swapped over.
3] SOFTWARE: Yes some suggest that you shouldnt rely on their native software but I really love the software FreeAgent comes with (FreeAgent Tools and Memeo Autobackup). You can ask it to do back ups on the fly if you like, it keeps track of files changes since last sync and will update accordingly. You can even choose file types, folders locations to back up. Either put it on Freagent Pro or USB or any other network drive. Pretty powerful program. I also use Microsoft SyncToy to create a second back up of my data into another HDD at my home. I have only recently being trying it but will let you know soon. Looks simple and good.. the best bit is that SYNCTOY is free!!
4] If your DATA is important, pay some good money and get a decent hard drive. I would recommend Seagate Freagent Pro or similar. At my home though I do have a CoolerMaster Case and 400Gb Samsung Hard drive. Seems to be working fine so far! It was a cheaper option at that time and I dont regret it either as I was not interested in fancy software that come with retail External HDDs.
5] Fact of life: Hard drives do fail. Be prepared to have some other sort of back up of a back up. This is where I get annoyed! I think there is no end to the vicious circle. I compensate by writing crucial data to DVDs for archival storage. I do fully acknowledge the fact that nothing is forever! It all depends on how deep your mind can plunge in fear and how deep your pockets feel.
TO sum it up: Invest in a Good Hard drive for back up of crucial data/ work files etc. Your music can go into another hard drive which you can buy a little down the track which can be used as a storage medium to access regularly than a back up. Ideally you want your back up safe and away from your PC in case both get destroyed at the same time. If you think it is too expensive to buy two - just buy one Seagate FreeAgent Pro 1TB (the prices are falling by the week). You can back up files into a separate folder and do not touch it. Store Music/Videos in another folder. Its also worthwhile to check the hard drive health regularly.
Oops. Just figured the mail has gotten a bit too long. My Apologies. Hope it helps Ben. All the best!
SH
externel hard drive
by willems60 - 8/2/08 1:10 AM In reply to: External Hard drives are important: choose carefully by newscientist_AuI use only Lacie externel hard drive works wiht windows,linux and mac.
Seagate Customer Service Sucks
by rixnet - 8/6/08 2:17 PM In reply to: External Hard drives are important: choose carefully by newscientist_AuI've been looking at external hard drive's for a while now and decided to check out Seagate's FreeAgent Pro series 1000GB drive. I went to their online site and found the drive for $264.99 but right after ordering it I went back to the site to check out a specification only to find that the price had dropped by $55.00 now down to $209.00. I immediately notified Seagate via their online customer service email submit and asked if they would sell me the drive for the reduced price. I also asked them to cancel my order if they could not sell it to me for that price. Well I waited for a response and when I did not hear anything from them I send another request. Still nothing! So, I sent another request. Still nothing! So I sent another request! Still nothing! It is now day 4 and I still have not received anything from Seagate! (other then the automatic email reply from the server) I have to tell you that I really expected more from Seagate. I am very disappointed with their lack of communication. Just checked my credit card and they billed me for the full amount. Nice, huh? You live and learn!
External Hard Drives
by sdmagic - 7/25/08 9:19 PM In reply to: External hard-drive buying advice and backing up data by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Ben,
I'm a huge fan of Western Digital external hard drives. My boss (IT Director) just bought a 1TB (1,000 Gigabytes) My Book Home Edition hard drive at Costco for less than $200US (it's the same price on their web site: http://www.costco.com). He used it to replace a 320GB Western Digital that he moved to another machine. I have a 250GB Western Digital portable that travels with my laptop. In addition, I have a 500GB WD external I use for backups (I'm a senior software developer) and a 120GB WD external (bought in the dark ages - about 2+ years ago - for about $179US) used for pictures, music, etc. -- All attached to my main home computer. My girlfriend stores her pictures, music and videos on a WD 320GB external. We're all very happy with our purchase decisions.
As for separating drives for backups and normal use. I have to say, "Yes!" It's my policy to keep the hardware for those functions very separate. In addition, my 500GB backup drive is not used for audio / video backups. I use DVDs for that.
For software, I use Acronis Home 11 and my boss uses Symantec's ghost for imaging hard drives. With large hard drives, it's easy to take an image, once a week, while you're out and about on a weekend day. Just rotate the images (I keep last week's and this week's on the drive). For incremental file backup we both use software we've written for the purpose (I code in C#, he codes his in VB). We don't use each other's backup code because of, well, ego (mine's better but I can't get him to see that). For my precious source code, I have it in the images and I copy significant changes to DVDs and copy those on to my work computer (code written at work makes its way to my home computer) and they're also zipped into a file on the corporate network and they're in the repository on the corporate network. The two versions on the corporate network are backed up to tape twice a day. Paranoid eh? When you lose 2 weeks of work, you see the light! The corporate code on all the drives and DVDs is stored in encrypted form.
Hope this helps (and didn't put you to sleep by being too long winded).
Steve C.
My b'up philosophy
by runf - 8/1/08 8:51 PM In reply to: External Hard Drives by sdmagicI built my last computer with 2 identical 500 gig drives.
What I do is make an exact image/clone/mirror/copy (or whatever you want to call it), of my "C" drive. When and if my "C" drive crashes, I can just swap the backup drive "D", with the "C" drive and I am back to EXACTLY the same state I was in since the last backup. The 2 slight hassles with this method is that it requires you drop to DOS and use a program like the free "copywipe". (I used to use Ghost to do this but it doesn't seem to work as well in the more recent updates).
The 2nd problem is that it is not an automatic system. You have to remember to do it.
Most backup software and discussions about backing up focus on data saying, "you can always reinstall your programs, but what about your data?" Well, they are correct, data IS the most important. But I have tons of programs installed and I'm not very organized so the idea of reinstalling everything is quite a nightmare.
Also, most of the scenarios I read about involve some kind of isolated data loss or a minor hardrive malfunction. What happens when the "C" hardrive just stops working? With this method you have everything intact and are back to work in minutes.
External hard drive for back up
by Channing - 7/25/08 9:26 PM In reply to: External hard-drive buying advice and backing up data by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I've had good luck with Western Digital. I get a good deal of IT literature and IT Internet news. There is only one way to be sure that you avoid a hard drive failure where you lose data. That is to have more than one back-up drive and backup on a regular basis. Redundancy is the only guarantee.
Channing
Ventura CA USA
Is there such a thing as a reliable hard drive for back up?
by BobHG - 8/1/08 8:00 PM In reply to: External hard drive for back up by ChanningWell no, but some are more reliable than others. If you do a search for hard drive reviews, you'll quickly come across the models and brands that are not reliable. I've just had a hard drive crash in my MacBook Pro - a Seagate, made in China and a known problem, but this doesn't mean that all Seagate drives are unreliable. Similarly, you'll find stories about Western Digital drives being "an accident waiting to happen", but it doesn't necessarily mean that all WD drives are to be avoided.
I have a pre-Leopard Mac, so am forced to make manual back-ups. My choice for a bootable clone of my hard drive was a Fujitsu and for my replacement resident hard drive, Hitachi. When my resident hard drive crashed, I was able to start up from my bootable clone and continue working within minutes. I would recommend that you make a bootable, external clone of your current hard drive for that awful moment when your resident hard drive fails. Make a point of backing up your data regularly at a fixed time on a certain day or days. A program to help you do this can be extremely useful as it backs up all the essential hidden files along with your working files. For my Mac running Tiger, I used Synk. If I'd had Leopard, I could have used the built-in Time Machine, but I'd still have needed an external drive.
Save all your absolutely essential files to good brands of DVDs or CDs, and, if you can, make a bootable DVD or CD.
You can also make more than one back-up to an additional hard drive. I would recommend setting yourself a time and day when you do all your back-ups and then make yourself stick to that routine. I didn't and lost 2 month's new passwords, some e-mails and miscellaneous work. If you're doing essential work, then back up those files every day - it doesn't take long. It's also worth setting your e-mail preferences to save your e-mails on your e-mail provider's hard drives.
Whichever method you choose, make your back-up password protected, so that, if anyone steals your back-up drives or CDs, then the content will be safe. You could also encrypt the most sensitive content.
If you have Mac, get Time Machine and CCC with two extdrives
by jigmeg - 8/3/08 7:37 PM In reply to: Is there such a thing as a reliable hard drive for back up? by BobHGFor mac users (running leopard), the best thing to do for a totally secure and safe backup system is to have two external drives:
1) external drive that matches your internal drive
2) external drive that is as large as possible (1TB recommended)
then, use the larger drive as your Time Machine drive which makes hourly backups up to the size of the drive, and then set up a routine schedule using Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC) on the other drive. Keep the CCC drive in a safe place outside the office or home. There u have it. Cheap, simple, and foolproof.
One more thing ...
by husky91 - 8/3/08 8:22 PM In reply to: If you have Mac, get Time Machine and CCC with two extdrives by jigmeg>Keep the CCC drive in a safe place outside the office or home. There u have it. Cheap, simple, and foolproof.
Make sure you update that CCC drive on a regular basis as well, at least monthly.
Western Digital Crash Experience
by ewt38 - 8/2/08 7:46 AM In reply to: External hard drive for back up by ChanningI have 5 Western Digital External HD's which I use for storage. Recently need to access data on all 5 and 3 had crashed - could not access anything - IT tried and still nothing. I called WD for help and got the reply "They are out of warranty - nothing we can do". My WD experience does not track others and I am now researching other HD systems
Recommendations ... advice ... suggestions external drives
by toddlorensinclair - 7/25/08 9:33 PM In reply to: External hard-drive buying advice and backing up data by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Ben ... first of all ... don't believe what they tell you ... Size does matter!
You'd be surprised how fast that space fills up once you have it available.
Before I get to the recommendations I feel obligated to say that any backup solution should include off site storage ... If your house burns down or you get burglarized .. you've got bupkiss! So, I suggest getting two 500gb usb external drives ... if you're a clever shopper you can find them well under $100 each. The price difference for anything smaller is negligible. (you might even find 750gb's for that amount. Take one to work with you and leave it there... then swap them out once a week.
I recommend Seagate, Maxtor or Western Digital ... they are generally more reliable than off name brands. Also a note ... stay away from "refurbished" or "Factory renewed" they will have a much shorter warranty and tend to break the week after the warranty has expired. Some drives may have some backup software included on the drive.. in my opinion that software sucks ... (pardon my french).
As far as the backups I recommend doing 2 things.
Really what you want to save is you music, your videos, your email, and your documents. That is the important stuff! The best thing to do when you have a drive fail or a virus infect your system is to wipe the drive and reinstall the operating system and then copy your backed up data back on to it.
As a backup method ... Microsoft has a free program called synctoy .. I've been using synctoy 2 beta .. which has been very stable for me (I heard Paul Thurrott recommend it). You select the folders in each location and the program synchronizes those 2 folders. There are several additional options you can choose.. you'll understand once you see it. Once you have it set up you can also create a scheduled task to run daily or weekly etc. That's it... like that Ronco Rotisserie Oven commercial "just set it and forget it".
The second part is to make an exact image of your entire drive. Obviously this takes up more space on your storage and you should make a new updated image periodically. The advantage is that if something bad happens you pop in the boot Cd for the program and answer a few questions and in about 5 or 10 minutes your drive is back to exactly the way it was when you made the image . Ideally you would make one of these on a clean install with all the programs you normally use installed and the settings tweaked the way you like them ... and Microsoft updates current. This saves a lot of time versus having to reinstall all your programs and settings again in the future. Acronis True Image, Paragon and Norton Ghost are the programs I would recommend. Some of these programs will allow you to browse the image file as a hard drive and restore individual files or folders. Now if you use Vista its important to pay attention to which version you buy ... older versions won't work with Vista.
So that's my opinion ... and I think Leo Laporte would agree with me. Leo?
Recommendations ... advice... suggestions external drives
by dmarquar - 8/1/08 7:04 PM In reply to: Recommendations ... advice ... suggestions external drives by toddlorensinclairFor someone who doesn't need as much (my computer only holds 60 gigs so obviously I don't need 300 gigs - I bought a MAXTOR from Radio Shack and have been very pleased. It holds 80 gigs which for my current needs is plenty. If/when I need more, I will get something more or something else.. It only cost in the neighborhood of $30 so it was very cost effective. I can use it either with or without the software that came with it.. the software is nice for knowing what has been backed up already and only backing the new stuff.. but if I am on a different computer (like work) I can attach it (via USB) and just open it from "My Computer" and save files into it as needed. That is great too.
External Internal hard drive
by cracker39 - 8/2/08 6:48 AM In reply to: Recommendations ... advice... suggestions external drives by dmarquarI've used several Maxstor drives in the PCs I've built. I've had motherboards go bad but no hard drive crashes yet. My new PC that I bought has a WD hard drive. I'm using one of the old internal Maxstor 120 GB drives in an external case with a USB connection for my backups and seldom accessed data. I think I paid around $20 for the case. I only turn it on to do backups or retrieve something I stored there. It works for me.
Really? On Vista?
by ZupATL - 8/1/08 7:05 PM In reply to: Recommendations ... advice ... suggestions external drives by toddlorensinclairHow will you get the Image on your external to work on Vista? Your solution works on XP (yes, the questioner asked about XP, I realize) but Vista will not boot up from an external USB hard drive and the original install disk. Now what?
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