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  • External USB disk drives

    Has anyone used those external disk drives that uses USB as the interface? Not the semi-conductor kind that sells for $12 for a 16Mbytes but the ones that cost between $100 to $200 for at least 100 Gbytes on a honest to goodness metal oxide coated plastic platter (hard disk drive).

    I know it's cheaper to get an internal disk drive but I am just looking to add more disk space without opening the CPU box.

    Any horror stories or good things to say about it?
    Last edited by helen; July 1, 2004, 08:43 PM.

  • #2
    Re: External USB disk drives

    I use my iPod as an external Hard Drive to make backups.

    For a firewire device, it works good. I don't know about the USB/USB2 versions, but I heard that the USB2 is a bit faster than firewire.
    How'd I get so white and nerdy?

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    • #3
      Re: External USB disk drives

      Originally posted by helen View Post
      Has anyone used those external disk drives that uses USB as the interface? Not the semi-conductor kind that sells for $12 for a 16Mbytes but the ones that cost between $100 to $200 for at least 100 Gbytes on a honest to goodness metal oxide coated plastic platter (hard disk drive).

      I know it's cheaper to get an internal disk drive but I am just looking to add more disk space without opening the CPU box.

      Any horror stories or good things to say about it?
      Just thought I'd ressurect this old thread dating from 2004 from Helen. Amazing how just three years ago we were considering buying 16-Mb Flash Drives for $12 whereas now in 2008 you can pick up a 1GB flash drive for a buck more.

      Back then Helen was lamenting on spending $200 for at least a 100GB external hard drive and here we are today getting a 500GB external hard drive for the same price.

      Can you imagine three years from now? Perhaps a 1TB external hard drive for $200.00 Right now the biggest flash drive I've seen is a 16GB flash drive for $129.99.

      Man back in the mid to late 80's I was stoked to have Tandy with an 8086 processor running 5Mhz. It had no hard drive and ran all applications off of those 5-1/4" floppy drive diskettes. My first hard drive equipped computer was another Tandy 286 running at 10Mhz and used a whopping 16Mb of RAM.

      Then I stepped up to a (hold on to your hats) a 486SX running 25MHz, a 40Mb hard drive and OMG 1Mb of RAM!!! I needed to upgrade so I bought 2Mb of RAM from Sears Ala Moana for $200 and a Single speed (not 52x) CD-ROM drive (had to have that new technology) for $300. Total cost for both the computer and the upgrades? $1,100. I bought the 486SX at Circuit City in Los Angelas.

      Now today's cheapo $599 laptops run circles around my 486sx. Heck my cell phone is more powerful then that thing too! Come to think of it some computers at the Salvation Army's thrift store are more powerful.
      Life is what you make of it...so please read the instructions carefully.

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      • #4
        Re: External USB disk drives

        I picked at least a couple Maxtor One Touch III Mini to use around the office. They seem to work okay.

        I suppose I should vulture some up at CompUSA before they run out.

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        • #5
          Re: External USB disk drives

          10-years from now people will be saying, "remember that old computer store, Comp something" Anyone remember the store they bought out? Computer City?
          Life is what you make of it...so please read the instructions carefully.

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          • #6
            Re: External USB disk drives

            Originally posted by craigwatanabe View Post
            Now today's cheapo $599 laptops run circles around my 486sx. Heck my cell phone is more powerful then that thing too! Come to think of it some computers at the Salvation Army's thrift store are more powerful.
            In his book "Hog Pilots", Kaplan describes his ride in a B-2 bomber (the "flying boomerang"). The pilot supplements the plane's avionics with not one but two laptop computers, either of which has more computing power than the entire plane. Heck, with the right Firewire bandwidth the laptop could probably take over for the pilot.

            And then there's the Space Shuttle's "technology"...
            Youth may be wasted on the young, but retirement is wasted on the old.
            Live like you're dying, invest like you're immortal.
            We grow old if we stop playing, but it's never too late to have a happy childhood.
            Forget about who you were-- discover who you are.

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            • #7
              Re: External USB disk drives

              Originally posted by helen View Post
              I suppose I should vulture some up at CompUSA before they run out.
              Go Pearl City. Honolulu has been cleaned out of drives.

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