External? I've had good results with an Archos 20GB. Make sure it's USB II, as the access times are a lot shorter than USB 1.1
Their Jukebox range also come self powered (AA batteries) with MP3 and photo viewing ability. Not cheap though.
A friend has a Delkin. Also ok, but due to some quirk either in his laptop motherboard or in XP home, it does not show in mycomputer.
Word of advice:- Unplug USB devices before booting up. This can avoid a lot of problems. Also, if working on a file, copy it to a Temp folder on your PC, edit it, save it and copy the new file back across. You will hav fewer lost files. Remember USB plugs are not locked in place. They can move at a critical moment.
Get a solid state dongle too. Great things. I have a 128MB one. Never leave home without it.
Their Jukebox range also come self powered (AA batteries) with MP3 and photo viewing ability. Not cheap though.
A friend has a Delkin. Also ok, but due to some quirk either in his laptop motherboard or in XP home, it does not show in mycomputer.
Word of advice:- Unplug USB devices before booting up. This can avoid a lot of problems. Also, if working on a file, copy it to a Temp folder on your PC, edit it, save it and copy the new file back across. You will hav fewer lost files. Remember USB plugs are not locked in place. They can move at a critical moment.
Get a solid state dongle too. Great things. I have a 128MB one. Never leave home without it.
evildave
Unregistered
E
Actually, I recently had to dismantle and repair the Archos 20GB I had due to a manufacturing defect (they soldered the negative battery terminal on wrong - and it eventually caused it to quit...)
In any event, for the cost of an Archos 20GB MP3 player (and mine has always frozen within an hour of starting, even on the AC adapter) for the $213 minimum price I could find on Pricewatch, I could get an external 250GB USB2.0 hard disk drive, i.e. OVER TEN TIMES MORE STORAGE!
So, for a USB HDD, the Archos isn't very good. It's not all that great as an MP3 player, either. It needs its internal rechargeable batteries to work, and an AC adapter to be reliable.
The brand to shop for is unimportant. Shop for waranty, and failing that, buy an enclosure for $30, and put any IDE hard drive you like in it.
If you want VERY portable hard drives, then you could go for one of the MANY brands/types of USB2 notebook drives that draws its power from the USB bus (i.e. it DOES NOT NEED AN EXTERNAL 'wall wart' power supply). If you don't mind paying $200 for 20GB worth of storage, then you probably shouldn't mind paying $123.90 for 20GB worth of storage that you don't need to drag around an extra power adapter for.
Go to http://www.pricewatch.com, click on "Hard Drives" (under "Storage") and start shopping.
Anyway, the notebook drive type ones that draw from USB can still be very small, and convenient, but give you far bigger bang for the buck. One of the 1GB "pen drives" runs about $300, and you can get a 60GB of storage that fits in your palm or shirt pocket for $175.
(A search for "60GB adapter" turns up...)
http://www.isystor.com/poexusb20hi61.html
"40GB pocket" turns up a savings of about $20 for 2/3 the capacity... bad deal.
"80GB pocket" turns up an 80GB drive for $223.00 that doesn't require an external power solution other than the USB bus.
Words to look for are "Powerless" "No AC Adapter" "USB Powered", under any "nnGB Pocket " category.
In any event, for the cost of an Archos 20GB MP3 player (and mine has always frozen within an hour of starting, even on the AC adapter) for the $213 minimum price I could find on Pricewatch, I could get an external 250GB USB2.0 hard disk drive, i.e. OVER TEN TIMES MORE STORAGE!
So, for a USB HDD, the Archos isn't very good. It's not all that great as an MP3 player, either. It needs its internal rechargeable batteries to work, and an AC adapter to be reliable.
The brand to shop for is unimportant. Shop for waranty, and failing that, buy an enclosure for $30, and put any IDE hard drive you like in it.
If you want VERY portable hard drives, then you could go for one of the MANY brands/types of USB2 notebook drives that draws its power from the USB bus (i.e. it DOES NOT NEED AN EXTERNAL 'wall wart' power supply). If you don't mind paying $200 for 20GB worth of storage, then you probably shouldn't mind paying $123.90 for 20GB worth of storage that you don't need to drag around an extra power adapter for.
Go to http://www.pricewatch.com, click on "Hard Drives" (under "Storage") and start shopping.
Anyway, the notebook drive type ones that draw from USB can still be very small, and convenient, but give you far bigger bang for the buck. One of the 1GB "pen drives" runs about $300, and you can get a 60GB of storage that fits in your palm or shirt pocket for $175.
(A search for "60GB adapter" turns up...)
http://www.isystor.com/poexusb20hi61.html
"40GB pocket" turns up a savings of about $20 for 2/3 the capacity... bad deal.
"80GB pocket" turns up an 80GB drive for $223.00 that doesn't require an external power solution other than the USB bus.
Words to look for are "Powerless" "No AC Adapter" "USB Powered", under any "nnGB Pocket " category.
Evildave- That's interesting.The situation changes with unbelievable speed as you know and UK availability tends to lag the U.S by at least six months. (Also prices are a lot higher).
Seems Bonzo is after a dongle though. I know Linksys and Creative do these among many others. I think 128MB USB 1.1 is decent- on smallish amounts of data, the extra speed of USB2 is less important than for a big drive.
Mine is by PQR or a similar 3-letter name. It's ouside in the car right now and I ain't getting dressed again to go and check.
Sure beats carrying a 10" stack of floppies.
Seems Bonzo is after a dongle though. I know Linksys and Creative do these among many others. I think 128MB USB 1.1 is decent- on smallish amounts of data, the extra speed of USB2 is less important than for a big drive.
Mine is by PQR or a similar 3-letter name. It's ouside in the car right now and I ain't getting dressed again to go and check.
Sure beats carrying a 10" stack of floppies.
Janus
Thinker
- Joined
- Nov 20, 2002
- Messages
- 180
We've bought several different brands of USB flash dongles at the office. So far the only real difference has been in appearance. USB2 support seems to add nothing to the price (at least where I shop) and gives a nice performance boost on appropriately equipped PCs.
thrombus29
Flame War Master and JREF kid
- Joined
- Aug 5, 2001
- Messages
- 2,334
I like the Sandisk one, I have a 512Mb and it works fine.
Adding 2 Cents to the non related topic, I have a USB2 IDE enclosure that I have over it's life had an 8 gig Samsung, a 40 Gig WD and now a 120 Gig maxtor in it, It is made by ADS and If you don't mind the size, It is great.
http://www.supermediastore.com/adsusb20exen.html
I put that link up for show, you can get them cheaper.
Adding 2 Cents to the non related topic, I have a USB2 IDE enclosure that I have over it's life had an 8 gig Samsung, a 40 Gig WD and now a 120 Gig maxtor in it, It is made by ADS and If you don't mind the size, It is great.
http://www.supermediastore.com/adsusb20exen.html
I put that link up for show, you can get them cheaper.
I have a 128MB Attaché. It works great. I haven't really compared it to any other brands, though. USB2.0 is definitely faster, and this particular drive is stored on solid state flash memory. Works great for moving files to and from work.
evildave
Unregistered
E
Well, the thing I find is that I always need a few meg more.
Besides, the HDD based doohicky isn't much larger than the USB stick, and less expensive than the 1GB sticks, and according to the drive, even 512MB sticks, (which can actually be had inside a working pen), and the HDD can do actual hard disk backups. As in, of *everything* important on your computer's fixed hard drive, as opposed to selected bits and pieces.
Which reminds me (turns on USB hdd and launches backup batch...), I haven't spent a minute backing up this week.
Besides, the HDD based doohicky isn't much larger than the USB stick, and less expensive than the 1GB sticks, and according to the drive, even 512MB sticks, (which can actually be had inside a working pen), and the HDD can do actual hard disk backups. As in, of *everything* important on your computer's fixed hard drive, as opposed to selected bits and pieces.
Which reminds me (turns on USB hdd and launches backup batch...), I haven't spent a minute backing up this week.
Bonzo said:
Bonzo:
Like EvilDave has said, you get much more storage for your buck if you get a real USB 2.0 hard drive instead of one of those flash thingys and they are not much more of a hassle to carry around. I recently had a flash card go bad on me so I may be biased.
I just picked up a 256 MB Sandisk stick, USB 2.0, it works great and yeah, it does the office-home file shuffle very well.
Things to look for? Hmm, maybe an integral cover/cap for the USB port. The Sandisk is a separate piece that might get lost some day, but it did come with a couple of spare caps.
Things to look for? Hmm, maybe an integral cover/cap for the USB port. The Sandisk is a separate piece that might get lost some day, but it did come with a couple of spare caps.
evildave
Unregistered
E
Well, the first time you desperately need to move 300MB, don't say we didn't tell ya about those itty bitty USB2 HDDs with lots of gigabytes of storage!
A word about external drives: If they're more than $30-35 more than a comparable hard drive, you're wasting your money. You can get external cases that house 3.5" ATA drives for $30 and 5.25" ATA drives (including CD/DVD burners) for $35, so you'd be better off buying the drive and the case separately and putting them together.
Shanek- Do these "Enclosures" have some way to get around the 4 EIDE/ ATA limit that most PCs start with, or do you need an extra PCI card based ATA controller?
eg- I have in my pc, 2 hard drives , aDVD/CD player combo and my new DVD writer. So I've used all 4 ATA connections.
I also use a USB2 ARCHOS drive, that goes to work with the laptop.
Now, say I want to add another two hard drives-(I don't, but imagine)- The pc power supply can cope and has two spare power connectors, but where do these new drives connect to my motherboard?
eg- I have in my pc, 2 hard drives , aDVD/CD player combo and my new DVD writer. So I've used all 4 ATA connections.
I also use a USB2 ARCHOS drive, that goes to work with the laptop.
Now, say I want to add another two hard drives-(I don't, but imagine)- The pc power supply can cope and has two spare power connectors, but where do these new drives connect to my motherboard?
Shanek- Back up a little, I'm getting confused.
You said-
"You can get external cases that house 3.5" ATA drives for $30 and 5.25" ATA drives (including CD/DVD burners) for $35, "
I took these 'external cases' to be the same 'enclosures' mentioned earlier, but you are talking about ATA drives here rather than USB.
So, you mean I could get a box of some sort that plugs one or more ATA drives into a USB port?
You have a link to a source? (US is fine, once I know what to look for , I could source them here.)
You said-
"You can get external cases that house 3.5" ATA drives for $30 and 5.25" ATA drives (including CD/DVD burners) for $35, "
I took these 'external cases' to be the same 'enclosures' mentioned earlier, but you are talking about ATA drives here rather than USB.
So, you mean I could get a box of some sort that plugs one or more ATA drives into a USB port?
You have a link to a source? (US is fine, once I know what to look for , I could source them here.)
evildave
Unregistered
E
You can plug in as many USB or Firewire drives as you have ports.
USB/USB2 you'll need hubs to plug in more than what you have in USB ports on your computer.
The nice thing about Firewire (IEEE1394) is that you can just plug one drive into another. Each drive has (or should have) two ports. One in. One out.
I've seen some IEEE1394 RAID5 solutions as well, but not USB2 RAID. There are also some "IDE RAID" solutions that allow you to RAID up two IDE drives as one.
There is ONE additional limitation: To mount a LOT of drives, your computer needs more RAM to mount and keep track of them. If you have a gigabyte, plug away, but if you're reasonably skimpy on RAM (256MB, less), then you'll need more.
If you know you're going to buy a stack of 'em, you'll probably want to plan ahead when you shop and at least find some that stack nice. There are lots of curvey, compact, etc. ones that will not stack very stable.
Any two-digit price for a "USB" or "Firewire" drive will be an enclosure on http://www.pricewatch.com
Though if you only want something portable, grope through the links I provided previously for ones that DO NOT NEED an external power supply. That's just extra bulk.
USB/USB2 you'll need hubs to plug in more than what you have in USB ports on your computer.
The nice thing about Firewire (IEEE1394) is that you can just plug one drive into another. Each drive has (or should have) two ports. One in. One out.
I've seen some IEEE1394 RAID5 solutions as well, but not USB2 RAID. There are also some "IDE RAID" solutions that allow you to RAID up two IDE drives as one.
There is ONE additional limitation: To mount a LOT of drives, your computer needs more RAM to mount and keep track of them. If you have a gigabyte, plug away, but if you're reasonably skimpy on RAM (256MB, less), then you'll need more.
If you know you're going to buy a stack of 'em, you'll probably want to plan ahead when you shop and at least find some that stack nice. There are lots of curvey, compact, etc. ones that will not stack very stable.
Any two-digit price for a "USB" or "Firewire" drive will be an enclosure on http://www.pricewatch.com
Though if you only want something portable, grope through the links I provided previously for ones that DO NOT NEED an external power supply. That's just extra bulk.
Soapy Sam said:
Exactly.
The one I bought is from a private storefront on ChipCo, but here's one I just found by searching on Froogle:
http://www.bionicoutpost.com//product_details.asp?dept_id=103&pf_id=K020CO70ME-370
evildave said:
Not quite; USB supports up to 127 devices, FireWire 63.
And keep in mind that, unless the devices have their own power cable, they'll all be sharing the ±5V from the main port, and they may suck off too much power. In that case, you'd want to make sure your USB hub is powered; that way, it refreshes the power for every port.