Toshiba StorE Portable External Hard Drive (320GB, USB 2.0)

So for USB 2.0, they have almost the same performance. Price and looking are the things you need to chose.

Glad to know that my Samsung S2 and Toshiba (girlfriend wanted it for its looks) weren't bad choices.

Just be sure to stay away from the WD passport drives. The bundled USB cable will come loose from the drive if you just look at it oddly. Other brands like the Samsung S2 and others that use the same connector have cables that don't come loose at the slightest touch. WD are full of fail.

The WD Passport DOES have the USB issue people are talking about when you wiggle it around since it doesn't fit snugly . If you take care of your things, slide the usb firmly and not jam it in sideways, there will not be this issue.

How can you have a portable drive test and not include a single product from Transcend - not only are they one of the biggest (and often recognized as best) manufacturers but their drives are the only ones that are subjected to the US Army's Drop Test and ensure they can survive all kinds of shocks. That's far more valuable in a portable drive IMO than a 1-2MB/s read performance advantage (which might not even be the case because they were not tested with the others).

Furthermore, this kind of feature is much more important to the average buyer of a portable drive - what % of readers are going to worry about transfer rates to a portable drive, beyond reasonable levels of performance?

I hate to say it, but the quality of articles on THG is dropping steadily...

Nah, its because there is something wrong with the inside of the connector. The Kindle uses the same USB connector and it locks in place really well. When using the kindle cable there is no issue with the WD drive. WD just cut corners, used a cheapo connector and all the poor saps who bought their drives have to suffer.

When reviewing products where the vendor is not a drive manufacturer, you really should specify the brand of the HD that is actually in the product.

I bought 2 LaCie drives, a 320 and a 500. The 500 failed in short order. It had a Seagate drive in it.

LaCie tech support was a PITA. I won't buy their products again.

I have seen far too many bad Seagate drives. The 5 year warranty means nothing, since they replace a drive with the same junk.

Just a side note that Seagate no longer do a 5 year warranty, only a 3 year like all other manufacturers. 5 years is only offered on enterprise class models.

I just can't stand usb 2.0 any more..i want usb 3 and only usb 3

I agree with dimitrik that reliability is a more important factor than performance when it comes to portable drives.

@JohnMD1022:
Seagate's 7200.xx are very reliable, and I have not had a problem with them for several years.

@dimitrik:
If you look at the data sheet for the FreeAgent Go, it says in large letters that it has a 5-year limited warranty:

http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/p [...] eagent_go/

Oops, sorry I was thinking of the desktop drives, you're right!

I needed something pocket-able for off-site backups. My specific backup job runs more than 10x faster on 250gb 1.8-inch usb2 Samsung drives than on the 32gb thumb drives I used before. And so far the 3 Samsungs have been 100% reliable -- one of the thumb 2 drives flaked-out after a lot less usage than the Samsungs have had so far. So for my needs, just no contest.

@dimitrik:
Sorry to contradict you again, but if you look at the product pages for Seagate's internal hard drives (both Barracuda and Momentus,) you will see that they also have 5-year warranties.

Not so, the warranties were shortened to 3 years on Jan '09. Only products purchased prior carry the 5 year warranty. There may be a few products out there that still have it such as external drives and of course the enterprise class models e.g. ES series but the majority of desktop products are now 3 years. Google "seagate lowers warranty to 3 years" or simply try to find an internal drive with a 5 year one

According to Seagate's warranty statements, the 3-year non-enterprise warranty only applies to OEM products:

http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/s [...] ssistance/

If you purchase a retail kit, you get a 5-year warranty:

http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/p [...] -5900-kit/
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/p [...] -7200-kit/
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/p [...] -7200-kit/
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/p [...] -5400-kit/

"Key Features and Benefits: Five-year warranty"

Well, if you say so. I have not seen any such seagate product on sale anywhere recently but they must be available somewhere. If you find one let me know. I just checked newegg out of curiosity and not one of the desktop class drives has a 5 years warranty. So I think the point applies for the vast majority of users. Since it's not really relevant to this review, I'm dropping it.

The WD Passport Essential SE is 149.99 USD, not 249.99

Still WAY too much for a device that will disconnect if an ant touches the cable with its antennae.

Why waste money on a USB 2.0 external hard drive? USB 3.0 is backwards compatible with USB 2.0 and doesn't cost much more, if any.

"Intel, certainly one of the standard's key driving forces, has been quiet about USB 3.0, and there remains a chance that the next chipset generation won’t include this interface natively."

If that turns out to be true, the widespread adoption of the USB 3.0 standard is going to take longer.