External HDD

[blakecarter]

so i have a external HDD that i am going to use for a little while until the price of HDDs drops and ill invest in one, the question is that its a brand new HDD never been used or anything.

can i boot from my new HDD and go ahead and install windows on it? ill have my processor in the next couple days and will be able to boot my system up finally?

 

[CaedenV]

as an external drive it is possible, but not suggested. Your average HDD these days can read at 120-150MB/s (and some will do even better), but if you are plugged in through firewire or USB then you can only expect to see ~20MB/s, which is fine for streaming content off of it, but WAY too slow to use as a system drive. If this is your plan I would highly suggest opening the box up and installing the drive internally (they are all SATA drives inside).

If this is an eSATA or lightpeak/thunderbolt drive then pretend like I didn't say any of the above.

 

[blakecarter]

so its okay to take off the case to the HDD? and there will be a sata connector on it so i have install it internally?

speaking of e-sata, if i plug it into that will it make it a faster speed and be able to keep it outside my casE?

 

[blakecarter]

even if its usb 3.0? i have a front port on my system for usb 3.0? will it still be slow if i boot windows and load applications from it? there is a sale on a 750gb internal HDD for like $90 bucks but id hate to spend that money if i can wait till the price drops and i can use this HDD for the time being,

the external HDD i have is a toshiba 750gb from walmart for like $110 bucks i think