External vs. Internal HDD

kookooshortman55

kookooshortman55

New Member
I was looking into getting an external or internal hard drive to back up my data and possibly move my page file, for whatever performance benefit I get from that. I was looking in the 320GB-500GB range and I'm trying to decide between an external or an extra internal hard drive. The WD externals that I was looking at run around $120 and I found an internal 500GB for $75 on NewEgg. Besides portability, is there any benefit to spend $45 more for an external HDD when it comes to backing up a computer? And is installing an internal hard drive just a matter of plugging it in and booting it up? Thanks!
 
Are you looking at a SATA or IDE for the internal ? I ask because both have their own methods of connecting. For IDE you will have to set the jumpers on the HD (eg: master,slave,cable select)before you connect it. Then the new drive needs to be formatted.
If you have a sata already connected , you should have the app.sata drivers installed,so yes you should be able to just plug in and format that new drive.

If you are looking at external ,you can just buy the internal Drive, and buy a 3.5 HD external case. These are very cheap. You just have to format the HD before you put it in the case.
I think you might have problems using the pagefiles on an external, windows is always accessing/writing on these files if I remember right.(it´s been a while :) )
 
Mr Soft is spot on. Just to back up an external might be better as it doesn't have to be connected all the time. Not that a internal does but its hassle opening the case and unpluging it etc.

So if you want to back up photo's etc then you will only be doing it weekly or whatever so if you do get a virus the HDD will (most likely) not be attached. Also if you want you can keep it elsewhere to protect it from fire etc if you are really keen on protecting your stuff.

Hope that helps, Doug.
 
If you end up getting an external one and intend to move it around, make sure the set-up is sturdy and well protected. I say this because I have a LaCie 1TB external and it has survived quite a few bumps and tumbles in the back of my trunk and it is still running well (RAID 0, too). It has a heavy duty metal case as well.
 
If you are going to take your data with you places the external is what you would want but if you are just backing up files than you would probably be OK with an internal
 
Without a network, my own preference is to use a 3 1/2" drive in a 5 1/4" swappable frame. That makes it easy to plug or unplug the drive from the front of the computer. I recommend getting two drives for the frame so that you can rotate them. The more redundancy the better. The only downside to an internal drive like that is added heat. Not a problem in a well cooled case.

With a network I recommend using a NAS RAID. I use a NAS Raid 1 and even backup critical files a second time to another hard drive on the network. I'm good for anything save total destruction of the building. If you're concerned about that, then have an off site drive that rotates into the mix.
 
Are you looking at a SATA or IDE for the internal ?
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I forgot to mention, SATA.

Hmmm, well I'm definitely not looking for portability. I just got an 8GB flash from a black Friday sale, and the most I ever transport is a couple word documents and pictures. I was mainly just looking to backup/move the files from my hard drive. I have about 120GB free of my 320GB, maybe if I got a bigger 500GB I could backup the computer and move some larger files over to it so I don't have everything reading from one HDD.

So I don't really need the portability of an external hard drive, and I definitely don't need the increase in price. So pretty much the only disadvantage to an internal HDD is a virus? Would a partition solve this problem or not?
 
Besides portability, external HDDs do offer superior back-up solutions simply because the failure rate of external HDDs is far below internal HDDs. Why? Because external HDDs are connected, data is transferred or backed-up to it, and then it's unplugged and turns off. There's no overheating and there's no wearing of the drive. That's just my two cents if you are using it strictly for backing data up, though. :)

Some people use external hard drives for RAID 0 and beyond...I mean it may be just as good but I don't know if USB or FireWire is the best way to achieve these RAID settings in terms of speed. But I would guess a benefit of doing this is cooling: the HDD(s) won't be in the hot computer case along side with other hot computer parts.. :o
 
Hmmmm, I'm just thinking, an External HDD is just another thing to carry around haha. My computer already takes up 4 outlets :P

Well I wouldn't think the probability of both internal hard drives failing at the same time would be very high. I have the whole computer system on a huge surge protector (Arizona monsoon season haha) so I don't think I would have to worry about that source of failure. Does anyone know if a partition would help protect one part of the hard drive from viruses? Or have it so the computer only accesses the backup partition of the hard drive when I manually back something up on it?

So basically, as far as I understand:

Internal: Low cost, less mess
External: More secure, more stable, cooler?
 
Bump

Does anyone know if a partition would help protect one part of the hard drive from viruses? Or have it so the computer only accesses the backup partition of the hard drive when I manually back something up on it?
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