Storage and Backup: We get lots of questions about external backup and storage. From recent personal experience, I can recommend not getting an external hard drive smaller than 3TB. I...

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

We get lots of questions about external backup and storage. From recent personal experience, I can recommend not getting an external hard drive smaller than 3TB. I used to buy 250GB, then 500GB, then 1TB, then 2TB. There is no such thing as too much storage space. No matter how large a drive you buy, you will soon find it filling up. Then you have to start over and buy a larger drive. Get the larger one first.

I have a desktop WD 2TB drive that is 3/4 full, and I have a Synology NAS with two 3TB drives, and they are approaching the halfway point. It's much cheaper to buy more TB originally than to start over with a larger drive.

Of course, I can always go back and eliminate a lot of junk that is filling up the drives, but that's a tedious task.

nicksr1125 Loc: Mesa, AZ

I have to think back to 1988 when I bought my first 20meg hardcard for $500.00 at Radio Shack for my Tandy 1000TX. About 6 months ago I bought a 2TB external SATA drive when newegg.com had them on sale for less than $100.00.

Bob Yankle Loc: Burlington, NC

Just curious, is there any lagtime for recovering files from a large terabyte drive? The operating system has to use clock cycles searching through the hinterlands for a particular file. I suspect there is a sweet spot in there somewhere. I have purchased a 4TB USB 3.0 External drive, but haven't loaded it yet.

nicksr1125 Loc: Mesa, AZ

If I'm using the desktop the external drive is attached to, not so much. There is still some lag as it is external. If I'm working on my laptop, the lag is significant because I'm working over the wireless network.

Chris F. Loc: San Francisco

Storage is one of only a few things that have become more affordable these days! :) :)

Chris

jerryc41 wrote:

We get lots of questions about external backup and... (show quote)

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Amazon is selling an external WD MyBook 4TB drive for $158, but it doesn't say what "color" the drive is. I prefer the Black series. I couldn't find it on the WD site, either.

http://www.amazon.com/Book-USB-Hard-Drive-Backup/dp/B00E3RH61W/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1404225019&sr=8-1&keywords=wd+4tb+black+external

Bob Yankle Loc: Burlington, NC

jerryc41 wrote:

Amazon is selling an external WD MyBook 4TB drive for $158, but it doesn't say what "color" the drive is. I prefer the Black series. I couldn't find it on the WD site, either.

http://www.amazon.com/Book-USB-Hard-Drive-Backup/dp/B00E3RH61W/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1404225019&sr=8-1&keywords=wd+4tb+black+external

That's the one I bought - it's black.

amehta Loc: Boston

Bob Yankle wrote:

Just curious, is there any lagtime for recovering files from a large terabyte drive? The operating system has to use clock cycles searching through the hinterlands for a particular file. I suspect there is a sweet spot in there somewhere. I have purchased a 4TB USB 3.0 External drive, but haven't loaded it yet.

The operating system does not have to search the drive for a file, it simply has to search the "file access table", and that is quite efficient.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Bob Yankle wrote:

That's the one I bought - it's black.

I'm referring to the model designations, like Green, Blue, Black, Red.

http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=760

GeorgeH Loc: Jonesboro, GA

nicksr1125 wrote:

I have to think back to 1988 when I bought my first 20meg hardcard for $500.00 at Radio Shack for my Tandy 1000TX. About 6 months ago I bought a 2TB external SATA drive when newegg.com had them on sale for less than $100.00.

Yep, I remember a 40meg hardcard for my Tandy 1000TX. IIRC I had to partition the drive because the DOS whatever version couldn't handle more than 20meg, and it cost about $375. Wowzer!

BboH Loc: s of 2/21, Ellicott City, MD

Bob Yankle wrote:

Just curious, is there any lagtime for recovering files from a large terabyte drive? The operating system has to use clock cycles searching through the hinterlands for a particular file. I suspect there is a sweet spot in there somewhere. I have purchased a 4TB USB 3.0 External drive, but haven't loaded it yet.

No - I use a Buffalo 1TB (configured by 4 250GB drives) as the prime storage for documents and stuff NOT related to photography. I use a Syslogic 2 TB system as prime storage for photography - images and whatever. There is NO lag time with either.

My Buffalo is configured with RAID 5 which means that I can lose 2 drives, replace them and the other two will repopulate the new ones with the data that the lost ones contained.

With the Syslogic it is, I believe , RAID 0 which means one backs the other up. When the time comes I will add another Syslogic 1TB and reconfigure the RAID.

I somewhat agree with Jerry's logic to buy big to start; what I done is to have bought an expandable system - the Syslogic.

BboH Loc: s of 2/21, Ellicott City, MD

BboH wrote:

No - I use a Buffalo 1TB (configured by 4 250GB d... (show quote)

Jbat Loc: Charleston, SC

I have three 4 TB Seagate external drives. I have been using large external drives for quite some time and I have never seen any lag time or other problems. If there is a lag, it is not visible to my eye. I work primarily from a Apple MacBook and there is no way I could ever store my large photo files on the laptop even if I wanted to so the external drive setup is a necessity. And as was said at the beginning, you are ahead of the game to buy larger rather than smaller and the cost in the end is less.

DavidPine Loc: Fredericksburg, TX

I use a 2TB and a 5TB Seagate drives. I don't use their software. I format the drives from my computer.

Picdude Loc: Ohio

I'm currently using a 1TB WD external drive that so far is serving my needs, but when I outgrow that I will definitely want to go to a multi-slot system both for expandability and flexibility. As a side note, I also keep a partial eye on the "my cloud" technology. I'm not a hard-core traveler, but on the occasions that I do, it would be nice to be able back my pictures up on my home network from my laptop from whatever hotel I am staying at.