Ken Schneider wrote:

On Tue, 2006-02-07 at 08:07 -0500, ken wrote:

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Previous posts say that people are successfully using external USB hard drives. Who of you has a recommendation/review of what they've been using, how they like it, what they don't like about it, what it has or lacks or what additional features would be desirable (e.g., a blinky read/write LED). Yeah, price is a consideration, but I've found again and again that it's a mistake to sacrifice quality; the little bit of cash saved is more than swamped by the time and trouble second-rate equipment lays on me. I plan on using this, among other uses, to back up my laptop and other machines, so longevity is definitely an issue. I'm thinking I'd want a capacity of at least 100Gb.

Comments, recommendations, analyses, and opinions cordially invited.

You can also take a look at buying just the external case and then buy the harddrive of your choice. CompUSA sells a bare case that accepts most internal harddrives/CD/DVD drives for about US30.00.

I recently bought an Adaptec 3.5" drive case, for $20 (CDN). Works well, though at the moment I've only got a 6G drive in it, as that was the largest spare I had. I'll have to get a bigger one sometime. Incidentally, that drive came in handy the other day, when a friend's notebook drive started to fail. I plugged the drive in and used the linux based System Rescue CD to copy all the data off her now unbootable hard drive. The next project is to replace that drive and reload the software, including OpenOffice, instead of Word etc, though she'll still be running XP.

Also you only needed to address this to the list once.

I was also wondering why he had the same address in the message 3 times. I guess he wanted to make sure we got it. ;-)

On 2/7/06 8:18 AM, "Ken Schneider" wrote:

You can also take a look at buying just the external case and then buy the harddrive of your choice. CompUSA sells a bare case that accepts most internal harddrives/CD/DVD drives for about US30.00.

I have CompUSA ones...the sides are all blue (light) that makes it easy to tell when it does a read/write. That is nice. They also are USB and firewire. It says up to 200GB, but I have 250's and 300's in them. http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=317414&pfp=BRO WSE They cost more, but the are very easy to get into and can hold a DVD drive. My only gripe is they don't have a fan. This is very, very important for extended use. Cases without fans will fry drives. As soon as I cut the case and put in a fan, the drives last. Any small fan does the trick. (check electrical specs) Then again, I have them hanging off a server running 24/7. :| In a 65F room, they don't get hot with use and are fine. Also, if you get more than one...label the things. You will get them confused when they all look the same. Takes all of 60 seconds to install a drive. (yea, I've timed my self - we have four) I can't say if the chips work well with suse. I use them with another system, for now...but it's in my plans... -- Thanks, George Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved. - William Jennings Bryan

I have two Maxtors. Both work fine. One is an 80gb drive with the other being a 100gb drive. They are both brand new and come with backup software that is only of any use in Micorsoft operating systems :-( That's possibly the only bad point. I have used them with SuSE 9.1, 9.2, 9.3 and now 10. Both are USB2 but they do also come in firewire guises and I think there is a LAN version. The USB2 ones that I have just worked and have nice blue read/write LED's. That's about it really. -- ============================================== I am only human, please forgive me if I make a mistake it is not deliberate. ============================================== Xmas may be over but, PLEASE DON'T drink and drive you'll make it to the next one that way. Kevan Farmer Linux user #373362 Cheslyn Hay Staffordshire WS6 7HR

On Tuesday 07 February 2006 12:16, Scott Stickeler wrote:

I recently bought a Seagate 300GB external drive at Fry's ( a US store ) for $139 after rebate. Works great with Linux. Has one light / button in the front that blinks when the drive is being accessed. Supports USB and Firewire ( I'm using USB ). Seems like they have these deals almost weekly.

-Scott

Which one do you go to? - Carl

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On Tuesday 07 February 2006 12:16, Scott Stickeler wrote:

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I recently bought a Seagate 300GB external drive at Fry's

On 2/7/06, Carl Hartung wrote:

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Which one do you go to?

On Tuesday 07 February 2006 16:30, Scott Stickeler wrote:

Either Campbell or Sunnyvale CA.

Seeing the name 'out of the blue' made me nostalgic all of a sudden. The original store in Sunnyvale was like a second home to me for several years... that and Weird Stuff Warehouse across the street. I don't know if it's the store I miss or all the 'toys' I was buying back then or if it's the hot dates I'd drag in with me ;-) Those were great times, though. Carl

On Tuesday 07 February 2006 19:23, Scott Stickeler wrote:

Are you sure its not the Fry's always helpful employees you miss? :)

They were actually pleasant and knew their products back then. Of course, there were fewer selections and margins were a lot higher, so the quality of people working there was pretty high. That all went downhill when the 'big box' retail chain store model set in. And I'm pretty sure it was all the 'toys' I used to buy in Sunnyvale. Most of those 'hot dates' turned out to be heartbreakers in the long run, so sanity has returned and the wave of nostalgia has passed. Good! Back to business... later! Carl :-)

Carl William Spitzer IV wrote:

On Tue, 2006-02-07 at 16:23 -0800, Scott Stickeler wrote:

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Are you sure its not the Fry's always helpful employees you miss? :)

Yeah so helpful that when I wanted a computer with DOS and Windows, a long time ago, all the salesman could here was OS2. Seems he had dummy wax in his ears and was also tone deaf. So I bought from Axel Sorenson out of OCC in Costa Mesa.

Well, at least he was smart enough to realize that OS/2 is far better than Windows.

On Tue, 2006-02-07 at 09:16 -0800, Scott Stickeler wrote:

I recently bought a Seagate 300GB external drive at Fry's ( a US store ) for $139 after rebate. Works great with Linux. Has one light / button in the front that blinks when the drive is being accessed. Supports USB and Firewire ( I'm using USB ). Seems like they have these deals almost weekly.

Good luck on that ripoff bait those things never work for me from Fry;s A better price search is on www.pricegrabber.com I know the server guy. -- ___ _ _ _ ____ _ _ _ | | | | [__ | | | |___ |_|_| ___] | \/