Which is the best External HD for < ~$150?

do you want usb or esata?


usb will be 30-45meg/sec


esata will be as fast as the disk can do.. upto 120meg/sec or so


all esata drives can also do usb 2.0

you could add esata ports for <$20 if you desire to.

dont let that hold you back.

but if you just want usb2.0

you can also get any bare drive you want and buy a case for it.

and i wouldnt be afraid of the one you linked seems ok..

any drive will max out usb nowadays.

anyone?

^ hi thanks so much for that link. With that Esata converter will there actually be 120mb/sec file transfer? Or will there be hindrance in performance?

Thnx

PS: i just checked for eata external hds.... the 1TB ones are way too expansive ...~$250 ... any cheaper ones available?

eSATA peak communication speeds are 150 or 300 Mb/s (depends on the device), BUT you'll never see that speed for sustained use. Real performance measurements show average data transfer rates around 30 Mb/s for USB2 connections, around 40 or better for eSATA and Firewire 400 (aka IEEE 1394a), and even better for Firewire 800 (aka IEEE 1394b). So although you will not, on ANY of these systems, see peak performance, there are real meaningful differences among them. Oh, and for a reference point, some tests I've seen say that a decent eSATA enclosure on a real eSATA port, and holding a SATAII drive, will perform at almost exactly the same speed as an internal SATAII drive.

Whether you get a case and drive separately and assemble (easy to do) or buy a finished external drive, I'd look for these:

Dual (USB2 plus eSATA, or USB2 plus IEEE1394a (Firewire 400)) or triple (all three) interfaces available. Gives you maximum flexibility and portability to use your unit anywhere.

Its own power supply unit - almost impossible to get a case for a 3½" HDD without that, now. Most larger HDD units pull more power than a USB2 port alone can supply.

On / off switch on the case to turn off when not in use.

Built-in cooling - ??? Some say it's really useful, I don't find it necessary. Depends a lot on which HDD you have and how warm it gets in sustained operations. My case does not have a fan, and runs fine with a 500 GB Seagate unit inside.

A word of warning about SATA to eSATA "converters". Many are just cables with the right connectors on the ends and a mounting panel to make the eSATA sockets available on the back of your case. These will work just fine for most people, minus a few features you may not need. True eSATA includes some things that you may have already in your SATA mobo controllers, or may not, and you'll never know. The most important to consider are cable length and hot plugging. eSATA allows longer (than SATA) cables from computer to external case. And it is supposed to support "Hot Swapping" so you can disconnect the external drive while the computer is running, as opposed to needing a proper shut-down of the whole system. Sometimes those things are in your SATA controller anyway, sometimes not. But if you never need those features, the simple adapter cable system is just fine for you.

First of all, eSATA is an interface system between your mobo and an external box containing a device. It is NOT part of a bare hard drive system. So, for example, when I put mine together I bought an external enclosure that connects to the computer via either eSATA or USB2. Now, inside that enclosure I made sure it would accept a SATAII hard drive, and I bought a Seagate 500GB SATAII unit. Note that the Seagate drive knows nothing about eSATA - that is a property of the external enclosure, not of the drive unit.

How to install a standard hard drive (there is no difference between internal and external) in an external case is normally easy and described well in the instructions that come with the enclosure. So-called "External Hard Drives" just mean they are a finished unit that consists of a case with a "internal" hard drive already installed inside and ready to use. If you want to look at installation instructions before buying, try looking up the external enclosure manufacturer's website and see if they can show (or download) a copy of that instruction sheet.

the WestDig 1 TB Elements is OK. i'd like to see which drive they used by taking it apart.

looks like Amazon & Newegg are having a price war. Amazon has 'em for $109.94, Newegg for $109.99. with free shipping !

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6822136321

http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digi [...] 572&sr=8-1

Anyone?