Please suggest a reliable external storage.

I am looking for a reliable external storage device and would greatly appreciate any input pointing me to a dependable device. I would like to have at least 500GB to 1TB.


Thanks in advance!

You definately want a Drobo

I get all of my tech stuff from NewEgg.com. I've tried various hard drives over the years and have been using Western Digital exclusively for a quite a few years.


Check this out:


Western Digital Element 1TB 3.5" Black External Hard Drive


I'm using this same drive and love it.


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BTW - Always use the links on this site when you shop to help support it. The link above was made using one. This is a copy of the Newegg link:http://media.the-digital-picture.com...Ads/Newegg.gif

I always find Western Digital & Seagate to be very reliable - from many years of experience with them.


I myself have 2 Seagate FreeAgent drives, 1 500GB and 1 1TB, both superb!

I hate to name a bad product by name but I've had terrible luck with Maxtor. I've never had one last more than a couple of years and a few that didn't last long at all.

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Originally Posted by Jarhead5811

I hate to name a bad product by name but I've had terrible luck with Maxtor. I've never had one last more than a couple of years and a few that didn't last long at all.
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ditto to that! although, seagate now own maxtor :P says it all really lol

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Originally Posted by lculpin

You definately want a [url="http://www.drobo.com/]Drobo[/url]
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After reading up on them I want one now (I really like their choice of WD drives)...but can't afford it due to the fact that most of my "free" money is aimed at lenses and whatnot.

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Originally Posted by lculpin

You definately want a Drobo

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I couldn't agree more. I've had the oroginal Drobo for a few years and Im quite happy with it. Even now, a few years later, nothing beatsthe flexibility and reliability. The only downside of my drobo is the transfer speed, but to be fair that applies to all USB drives. The newer Drobosare supposed to be faster, though.

[quote=piiooo]

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Originally Posted by lculpin

You definately want a [url="http://www.drobo.com/]Drobo[/url]
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I couldn't agree more. I've had the oroginal Drobo for a few years and Im quite happy with it. Even now, a few years later, nothing beatsthe flexibility and reliability. The only downside of my drobo is the transfer speed, but to be fair that applies to all USB drives. The newer Drobosare supposed to be faster, though.
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I have never heard of them before! (Drobo that is)But I am impressed!

It's one of those things that sounds expensive up front (cuz it is :P) but once you have one... totally worth it. You can buy all of the lenses and cameras you want, but if you lose all the shots you took with them due to a hard drive failure it don't matter much :P


I think the best thing about them is that there's no real maintenance required... install and forget :D

Drobo? $350 ( 4 slots ) or $1400 ( 8 slots ); for empty boxes no less.


Bang for the buck, you're better off getting two separate 1TB usb disks ( seagate or WD ) for $250 and manually syncing between them for a 'backup'.


Flirt as you may with idea of RAID ( e.g. drobo ), RAID alone isn't a backup. RAID levels above 0 will survive a drive failure, but if you accidentally delete
a file from a RAID volume it's gone short of an un-delete miracle. There are
several software solutions that will mimic independent copies of files ( e.g. Time Machine, rsync, LVM, ZFS, Veritas ), but they all have an Achilles' heel.


Personally, I use rolling snapshots on a ZFS/OpenSolaris box for local archives of video and raw images. I do have a small pelican case with encrypted drives @ a friends house, and I also mail encrypted disks to relatives for the real important bits.

Thank you all for your very useful comments and suggestions. I now have a good place to start.