subject: How To Select The Greatest External Hard Drive [print this page] How To Select The Greatest External Hard Drive
The size of computers today is amazing. I remember when I bought my first machine several years back, the hard drive was a measly 80 Megabytes. Today they are astronomical compared to those old dinosaurs. The speed, size, and computing power just seems to get better year after year. One shudders when one thinks of how they'll be in ten years or so. Likewise, external storage media has grown proportionally. Only a few years ago, there weren't that many brands in the external hard drive market, but today, there are plenty. Which means if you don't know much about these, it can be difficult to find the right one if you go shopping. Unless you're a complete computer geek, you might end up standing there scratching your head. So naturally, when you head out shopping for one of these wonderful devices, it can help considerably to know exactly what you are looking for, and exactly what you want it to do. That way you won't end up with an external hard drive that is either ten times too big, or half as big as you need. With the right questions answered, shopping for a backup system for your computer can be a snap. Of course of primary concern is the size of your actual hard drive that you'll be backing up. If you only have a 100 GB machine, like I do, then a moderately sized external drive will do the trick. If, however, you've got several machines with hard drives in excess of 500 GB, then you are definitely going to need some more space. Luckily, they make external drives plenty big enough to satisfy even the hungriest customer. The kind of media you will be backing up has an impact on the kind of drive you should buy. If you are going to be backing up documents and what not, then a smaller drive may suit your needs. If, however, you have plenty of music, and videos and other large sized files, then you will definitely need a bigger drive. Another consideration is how often you plan on backing up your system. Some back up once a month, and that's fine. Others back up every day, either before shutting their computer down, or as soon as they fire it up. This is another important consideration. One more thing to think about is portability. Will you be carrying your backup device around with you? Or will it be sitting in a designated location in your home? Portable models and desktop models are different in size and configuration and portable models are generally more expensive. With these ideas in mind, you will be much better equipped to choose an appropriate back up system for your machine. Once you are set up and backed up, you won't have any more fear of data loss if your system happens to crash. Happy shopping.
