External hard drive vs. Enclosed Internals? Difference???

[alexfierro]

Hey all!

Proud PowWeb customer looking for a little help. Anyway, my main computer is my laptop and although it's 80gb, I have some large archived files, etc. I'm looking to expand. I'm quite advanced with computer hardware and I've replaced many a hard drive. But, for the $2000 laptop, I don't really want to tinker with it and need external memory.

In the latest TigerDirect (my Bible), I noticed that external 200 GB hard drives are going for $220 while internals are going for $129.99. What would be the difference between an internal in a $30 3.5" USB 2.0 external enclosure, and one of the other external hard drives?

Also, I need to know the speed variation on these external hard drives. Let's say, I get a 7200 RPM, 16MB cache hard drive and hook it up via USB 2.0. How fast is the hard drive going to perform? For example, will it be able to run games off it?

Also, I'm getting a Hauppage TV tuner and it records live TV directly to your hard drive. WIll the externals be able to keep up? Thanks for your help!!

[tenndevil]

Yes you it will handle games and tv, I have a hauppage also and use it to record to a usb 2 drive.

You could save yourself a few dollars by getting the internal and getting a usb 2.0/firewire enclosure and making your own external. Look in your bible for them.

[patrickpawlowsk]

I've often wondered the same thing. About purchasing an enclosure seperately. I figure not only is it cheaper, but you have more options. You can take the drive out and stick it in a machine later. If the drive goes, bad you could just replace it. You could probably do these things with the all-in-ones but it's probably more dificult and they probably don't provide any instructioins. We use and external USB 2.0 at work for backups, images, and just to move large files, and I haven't noticed it being any slower than and internal drive. IDE moves data at 66-133Mbs theoretically, empirical tests never show that though, it usually much slower. And USB 2.0 puts it through at 400Mbs so there shouldn't be any bottlenck.

[symo]

Might want to take a look at Ximeta. They are external drives that use either ethernet or USB2 and come in 80, 120, 160 and 250 MB sizes. Fry's has them on sale quite often.

http://ximeta.com

I've got two 160's and they work great. I like the Ximeta's because I can put them on the network switch and use them with my other systems. The support Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.

symo

[alexfierro]

Hey!,

Just to let you all know, I've abandoned my external HD quest due to lack of funding...

but on an unrelated side note...

Hauppage USB TV Tuners aren't good with video games. They have a split-second lag between pressing a button and response to the screen. Although the lag is extremely minimal, everyone knows that (lag!=frag).

[tbonekkt]

MThey are external drives that use either ethernet or USB2 and come in 80, 120, 160 and 250 MB sizes.Whoa! A whole 250 MB?? What would I do with all that space?? :D

[IanS]

Probably fill it with junk - remember the days of 15Mb hard drives - thought they'd never fill up then, but now!

[alexfierro]

Whoa! A whole 250 MB?? What would I do with all that space??

I watched this and asked myself "250GB isn't that small..?".. Then I saw the joke...

...and my 80GB is just about filled up. Apparently it sucks up your HD as well as your system resources!...

Well, I almost beat it. That'll save 3.5GB after the uninstall...

[patrickpawlowsk]

Probably fill it with junk - remember the days of 15Mb hard drives - thought they'd never fill up then, but now!
I remember my first machine. I splurged and got the optional Hard Drive. It was 40Mb. Prior to that I tried to get to the lab early to get the machines that had dual floppies so I didn't have to swap the application floppy for the data floppy. Yeah, I was the man with 40Mb of space. I had it full in about 2 months.

[alexfierro]

I like to program in C++ alot, but I hate the Microsoft Visual line of products for reasons I'm sure you all know.

Anyway, I talked to Borland and they sent me an archived copy of Turbo C++... v2 or 3, I don't remember.

It was when made when DOS started to wane and certain computers started to use this new OS called... "Microsoft Windows". Real buggy program, glad it never caught on... :D

Anyway, to make a long story short, the program came on FOURTEEN 3.5 floppy disks.

Awesome.

[patrickpawlowsk]

Microsoft Office 95, 31 floppies. When I worked at the non-profit I used to use volunteer to sit and swap disks when I needed to install it. Then I learned how to do an administrative install and install from the network. Sweeeeeeet!