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usb portable backup drives

malcommalcom Posts: 2,261
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in PC & Mac Hardware and Software #1
Hi. Finally got round to getting a usb external drive to go with my 2 month old laptop.

I was wondering what the reliability record is like for portable usb drives. Mine is a wd passport 1 terabite.

Its a lot of eggs in one basket I now get the urge to get another drive as a backup for the backup drive should that fail for some reason.

How insecure is that. :D

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    RobinOfLoxleyRobinOfLoxley Posts: 27,040
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    #2
    Reliability is good enough.

    External drives are for backing up your main drive and for other stuff that is stored elesewhere.

    eg photos and music stored 'in the Cloud'

    I keep some videos, Linux and other Image filles on my ext drive and they are not on main laptop drive because they are large.
    But if the ext drive fails, they are replaceable.

    I wouldn't keep Personal videos only on ext drive because they are not replaceable.

    If you are unduly worried, and have the money, then buy another drive by all means.
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    malcommalcom Posts: 2,261
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    #3
    RobinOfLoxley wrote: »
    Reliability is good enough.

    External drives are for backing up your main drive and for other stuff that is stored elesewhere.

    eg photos and music stored 'in the Cloud'

    I keep some videos, Linux and other Image filles on my ext drive and they are not on main laptop drive because they are large.
    But if the ext drive fails, they are replaceable.

    I wouldn't keep Personal videos only on ext drive because they are not replaceable.

    If you are unduly worried, and have the money, then buy another drive by all means.

    Thank you. I have irreplaceable stuff also backed up on flash drives and also on DVD-R discs. I don't use cloud storage. I was thinking that a second backup device would be cheaper in the long run than repeat backups put on flash drives. 64gb worth of flash drive will almost pay for another usb drive which holds far far more...........
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    oilmanoilman Posts: 4,529
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    #4
    Use of a cloud service as Robin of Loley suggests e.g. dropbox, onedrive, google drive is a really good way of having a second backup.

    Obviously do not put personal info e.g. passwords, bank details etc on cloud. Great for photos, videos etc. That way even if your house burns down, or burgled, you can still get the stuff back.

    You cannot be too careful about having multiple backups - two backups is probably enough unless you are really paranoid (however, no matter what you think, they are out to get you :-))!
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    chrisjrchrisjr Posts: 33,282
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    #5
    oilman wrote: »
    Use of a cloud service as Robin of Loley suggests e.g. dropbox, onedrive, google drive is a really good way of having a second backup.

    Obviously do not put personal info e.g. passwords, bank details etc on cloud. Great for photos, videos etc. That way even if your house burns down, or burgled, you can still get the stuff back.

    You cannot be too careful about having multiple backups - two backups is probably enough unless you are really paranoid (however, no matter what you think, they are out to get you :-))!

    Or if you must put sensitive data into the cloud use some industrial strength encryption on it first. Any casual hacker is just going to move on to easier targets. And lets face it I wonder how many plain text documents are floating around the cloud with who knows how many passwords, banking details etc etc on them? Much easier to suck those out of the cloud than bother cracking an encrypted file.
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    MaxatoriaMaxatoria Posts: 17,980
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    #6
    If you have kids make sure that its kept well away before they decide to play whack-a-mole or decide its a good ornament for the fish tank etc ;)
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    Alan FAlan F Posts: 1,043
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    #7
    Remember that it is very easy to drop a USB hard drive.

    Hard drives do not like being dropped especially when they are in read/write mode.
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    malcommalcom Posts: 2,261
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    #8
    oilman wrote: »
    Use of a cloud service as Robin of Loley suggests e.g. dropbox, onedrive, google drive is a really good way of having a second backup.

    Obviously do not put personal info e.g. passwords, bank details etc on cloud. Great for photos, videos etc. That way even if your house burns down, or burgled, you can still get the stuff back.

    You cannot be too careful about having multiple backups - two backups is probably enough unless you are really paranoid (however, no matter what you think, they are out to get you :-))!

    I am a bit paranoid about technology kicking me in the teeth. :D

    However isn't cloud expensive ?
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    RobinOfLoxleyRobinOfLoxley Posts: 27,040
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    #9
    You can go free till you know what your requirements are. Or stay free if they are adequate.

    If you want to upload and download lots of GBs, you'll need a fast Unlimited connection.

    If you are limited to total web usage of 10GB per month be careful of extra charges from your ISP.

    http://www.techsupportalert.com/content/best-free-online-backup-sites.htm

    Lots more if you Google.
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    zapodzapod Posts: 661
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    #10
    I had a drive 'die' on me recently - made a repetitive clicky beepy sound when attached. I was a bit cross as I was about to restore the contents to a new PC... Anyway, I removed the drive from the enclosure & attached it via a SATA-USB adaptor and it worked fine.

    I have 3 WD desktop drives, one of which went bad and again it was the [Firewire] interface - the drive was fine although in this case I think it was ultimately corrupted by the faulty I/F so I stopped using it to avoid future heartache.
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    malcommalcom Posts: 2,261
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    #11
    Alan F wrote: »
    Remember that it is very easy to drop a USB hard drive.

    Hard drives do not like being dropped especially when they are in read/write mode.

    Indeed they are with their shiny surface. Almost designed to be dropped. :D
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