Best External Hard Drive (2TB+)

[Baasha]

What is the best external hard drive out there in terms of performance and reliability?

I have a Maxtor 500GB that I got about 4 years ago and it has worked really well. It's connected to my PC and so it's on 24/7.

I would like to get a larger drive to store my media files and use this Maxtor as the Network drive in my house.

Which one do you guys recommend that's 2TB or larger?

I saw this WD 3TB: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136749

The reviews aren't too positive though.

I want absolute reliability.

 

[C1]

You obviously arent in engineering. Also you are being unrealistic. First you will need to prioritize and give weighting to your requirements. There is no such thing as 100% reliability. If that is so important then a different strategy needs to be employed - one that uses RAID/redundancy. How can you even consider looking at the latest cutting edge technology (single drive on top of that) for which there is little data history and demand "absolute" reliability?

Recommend you go back to the drawing board and consider other alternatives such as use of smaller enterprise drives (reliability based on quality control along with established data histories) as well as running directly on a SATA III Controller for performance.

 

[ViviTheMage]

I use this for my backups :

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136471

I have 3, they work great!

 

[corkyg]

The best external HDD, IMHO, is to use a good external case, like a Vantec Nexstar with eSATA/USB, and put in a good HDD of your choice. As is stated above, there is no such thing as 100% reliable. Anything made by man has a MTBF.

 

[f4phantom2500]

I use this for my backups :

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136471

I have 3, they work great!

i have the 1.5tb version of this and have absolutely 0 complaints. it's been a great drive for me.

but i agree with corkyg...the 'best' thing you can do, performance-wise, is to get an external enclosure that has esata and/or usb 3.0 connection (whichever you want/are able to use, i'd personally get usb 3.0 if it were an option, since esata looks to have no real future from what i can tell), and then put whatever drive you want in there.

but, in terms of reliability, the best thing you can do is a raid 1 array. i *think* they make external enclosures that can accommodate 2 drives and do raid, but i really don't know. sounds expensive, too. other than that, i suppose you could just get two separate external drives, and whenever you put data/back up to one, also do it to the other. that way if/when one fails, you should be good with the other until you can replace the defunct one.

 

[jjmIII]

The best external HDD, IMHO, is to use a good external case, like a Vantec Nexstar with eSATA/USB, and put in a good HDD of your choice. As is stated above, there is no such thing as 100% reliable. Anything made by man has a MTBF.

Always good advice from Corky.

IMO any external run for longer than a quick back-up needs a fan too. I have had great luck with this external. It has run 24/7 for 2+ years.

 

[bruceb]

I use this for my backups :

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136471

I have 3, they work great!

I bought the 1TB version of this same drive for $69.99 shipped
from Amazon. Nice unit, but it does not have a power switch
or an activity light. Case should have a couple of vent holes,
but I leave it not powered up unless it is in use. Only drawback
is it USB 2.0 speed, but my pc does not yet have a USB 3.0 card.
Also this drive has absolutely no bloatware software on it. Plug it
in, windows will do what it does and it is ready to use.

 

[f4phantom2500]

I bought the 1TB version of this same drive for $69.99 shipped
from Amazon. Nice unit, but it does not have a power switch
or an activity light. Case should have a couple of vent holes,
but I leave it not powered up unless it is in use. Only drawback
is it USB 2.0 speed, but my pc does not yet have a USB 3.0 card.
Also this drive has absolutely no bloatware software on it. Plug it
in, windows will do what it does and it is ready to use.

when i read up on these drives after i got mine (as a gift), i'm pretty sure i read that they're caviar green drives. which makes sense; this, presumably, allows them to run passively without sacrificing performance (due to the limitation of usb 2.0). i use mine to store all of my music, videos, documents, etc...basically any data that isn't a program and doesn't need fast access. i've had no problems with this drive at all, and i live in texas, so i think that, for what it is, it's a great product. as you said, no bloatware = awesome.

 

[QueBert]

I picked up a Samsung 2tb drive off Newegg and an Antec MX-1 enclosure off Amazon today. This week Office Depot has a Seagate Freeagent Goflex 2tb drive for $119, cheaper than anywhere online, even with tax. They get pretty good reviews and the base can be upgraded to USB 3.0 if you want.

 

[Soundmanred]

I just bought 4 of the 3TB Seagate USB3.0 externals and the transer rate is much better than USB2.0.
They are fast and look nice, time will tell about reliability.
I also have a bunch of the 2TB WD's mentioned above and they work flawlessly right out of the box.

 

[Baasha]

You obviously arent in engineering. Also you are being unrealistic. First you will need to prioritize and give weighting to your requirements. There is no such thing as 100% reliability. If that is so important then a different strategy needs to be employed - one that uses RAID/redundancy. How can you even consider looking at the latest cutting edge technology (single drive on top of that) for which there is little data history and demand "absolute" reliability?

Recommend you go back to the drawing board and consider other alternatives such as use of smaller enterprise drives (reliability based on quality control along with established data histories) as well as running directly on a SATA III Controller for performance.

Your asinine comments are of no help.

To the rest of the comments, I appreciate the candor. I didn't mean 100% reliability literally; I suppose that was implied in my rather bland description of what I was looking for.

The Western Digital 2TB seems to be nice. I am leaning towards the 3TB drive, however, mainly because of the 3.0 USB/SATA III functionality. I have a PCI-E SATA controller that is SATA III/6.0Gbps. Yet, connecting an external hard-drive to such a device is all but ridiculous; I have my current drive connected to a simple USB 2.0 port on the back of my MoBo, the Asus P6T7 WS.

I will do some more research and read some better reviews of external hard-drives before I take the plunge.

Thanks to all that attempted to help.

 

[Baasha]

I just bought 4 of the 3TB Seagate USB3.0 externals and the transer rate is much better than USB2.0.

Do you have several USB 3.0 ports on your MoBo? How are you able to connect 4 USB 3.0 devices?

 

[Soundmanred]

Do you have several USB 3.0 ports on your MoBo? How are you able to connect 4 USB 3.0 devices?

Nope, just the two on the Gigabyte P67 UD3.
They are used as backups, so usually only one at a time.

 

[jarplpn]

i have been considering buying a external hard drive is there any one that really stands out in fuction and reliability,

 

[Baasha]

This Seagate drive seems good but the reviews are terrible. Anyone else have experience with this particular model (2TB/USB 3.0)?

Link: http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-FreeAg...191160&sr=1-40