Wanna get a USB backup external drive about 500gb, but the reviews on Amazon are mixed, so I thought I'd ask here. Our PCs are only around 30gigs tops, and that's not cutting it anymore. I'm using mom's laptop as temporary storage, got around 200gigs of stuff on there. So I figure 500gigs would be good enough.
I've started printing what I consider to be some of the more critical PDF files I've gleaned from this site and others. Not nearly so trusting of flash drives. I have backed up some of my resources to a three terabyte external hard drive, though.
I currently have a 1TB Western Digital "My Cloud" which installs an agent on the PC and backs up on whatever schedule I choose. It is local to the house/network and I do NOT have it sync'd to any external source and the IP address of the device is blocked from all outgoing traffic at the router so it shouldn't be able to sync even if it wanted to. I have it configured to keep a half-dozen versions of backed up files and it backs up both my wife's and my machines. It's network connected but also allows you to extend it via USB2 or USB3 drives. The one thing it can't do that I wished it could was connect to the computer via USB. I like it so far (had it about 6 months) and it cost less than $120 I think.
I've been using a 40 gig Western Digital Passort (palm) drive for temporary storage for a long time, don't remember when I got it. It is USB and requires no on board processing, simply acts like another hard drive when connected, and can't be accessed by the house wifi network. Works for me, I use it to transfer the critical files from the tower to the laptop as backup and don't really need a third location for long term storage. WD has been good to me, but they've had a lot of problems in the past. @VHestin , memory is cheap in quantity. Get three times what you think is way generous, 'cause it'll get used eventually.
As I upgrade the HDs in the computers, buying them from outfits like Other World Computing (OWC) - Performance Upgrades For Your Mac as bare Drives, I always buy an external USB Drive Kit for an Extra few bucks, and then use the Old Drive as OffLine Backups of stuff I want to save...
Run CCleaner CCleaner - PC Optimization and Cleaning - Free Download You will be surprised at the speed and realibity of your old computer. It is one of 3 programs that I use. HK
Reliability comes from “2 is 1 and 1 is none." In this case it means buy 2 backup hard drives rather than 1. Don't worry about one major name brand over another. Better to go with 2 smaller drives and backup your core most important stuff to two different drives and put one in an off site location in case of fire or theft.
