Advantages: Portable, easy to use, never failed on me yet!
Disadvantages: Perhaps only the disc size, but it has taken me 2 years to fill it!

...Wester Digital, a respected brand name, and i agree! I have owned the unit now for around 2 years, and have 0 problems. My internal hard drive has died on me twice but my external one, never! This 80gb HDD is perfect for storing large files, home movies, photo albums, music etc. It's ideal when transfering data from one place to another, simply unplug it, plug it in elsehwre and hey presto! It supports drag & drop so moving files couldn't be easier. Standard power adpater with 3-pin plug, and USB 2.0 connection to your pc, mac, server etc. It is easily recognised by each operating system and i have yet to find one that doesn't support the unit. Plug it in, wait around 30secs and it's up and running. Can be stored horizontally, and if you have 3 like me, you can stack them perfectly, or store them vertically... Read review

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Advantages: Quick transfer speed,
Disadvantages: Fairly Bulky

...What can i say this is an internal had-drive which obviously integrates within a computer system. Nowadays 80GB is not enough for anyone as programs are now increasing in size due to their complexity and what they have to offer. A hard drive is a non-volatile storage device which stores digitally encoded data on rapidly rotating platters with magnetic surfaces. Non-volatile storage is simply the name given to a storage device which can retain stored data even when not powered. With a volatile storage device being one that can not retain saved data e.g. RAM (Random Access Memory). I used to have an 80 GB hard drive in the past on my "OLD" PC, which was about 5 years ago. Now i have a 300 GB hard drive which i have to admit is filling up really quickly. Due to the number of files stored e.g music, photo, video etc. This particular... Read review

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Advantages: 250GB capacity, 2 firewire port, 1 usb ports
Disadvantages: alittle bit expensive

...Hello again and welcome to Chan's new toys! Just had a box delieverd to my home 2 weeks ago which i hadn't ordered, someone at work had given me new hardware to help with a task I've got to do. How well people know me, give me new harware to play with and i'll do any work they want! Anyway, opening up my jiffy bag I find a box with Media Centre writen in big black letters. MY first thought is what on earth is a media centre??? The box seemed a bit small for a TV and DVD player, let alone surround sound, so i decided that putting on my glasses so i could focus on the box was probably a good idea. It turns out a media centre is a rather large USB and firewire hard drive, with a few extras thrown in to make it look special. What you get is a 250Gb drive, 2 firewire ports, 1 usb port to go to your machine and 2 usb ports to connect... Read review

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Advantages: Fast, high capacity storage. Well built, looks good. 2 year warranty, No fan.
Disadvantages: No fan.

...Freecom before as they've always looked a bit cheap and nasty so this would be an interesting experience. The box did feel reassuringly heavy though, a good start. ############### # What's in the Box? ############### Apart from the drive, the box contained a small light external PSU, a USB lead and a CD with some backup software. The case is made of extremly solid and heavy aluminium with a silver plastic front piece with a sexy blue '400GB' light (yes, you can have sexy lights. Really.) at the front just to prove how big it was. The finish is excellent and I have to say, if this is anything to go by, I'm converted to Freecom. Unlike the picture here, my unit has the aluminium finished in matt black which looks really nice on top of my black PC. It's also surprisingly compact - not that much bigger than a hard drive at 20x11.5x4 cms... Read review

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Advantages: Great invention, reasonable price, large capacity
Disadvantages: Bulky, noisy

...is approx. 3.5 inches in height, 10 inches across and 3.5 inches deep. When it is running it is also has quite a loud buzzing noise, which can be quite tedious. The hard drive has 120GB and can store approx. 2,000 hours of digital music, 38,400 digital photos, 120 hours of digital video or 60 PC games. You are able to store digtal photos, videos, music, DVD's, Business Documents and Emails on the hard drive. The hard drive has a 7200-RPM spin speed and a 2-MB cache buffer, BounceBack Express software for fast and easy back up, built-in self-monitoring technology and is also compatible with Windows and Macintosh platforms. I have found this hard drive really useful, no longer does my laptop get filled up, it also runs faster. I am able to store all large documents/music/games on the external hard drive which prevents the slow... Read review

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Advantages: Fast transfer speed, protection from knocks and drops
Disadvantages: Fairly high price

...The LaCie Rugged All-Terrain External 250 hard-drive is a portable storage device which will allow you to store 250gb of multimedia files such as pictures, music and video. You will obviously also be able to hold documents and other files as well (e.g. software installations). Measuring at 9 cm wide, 14.5 cm long, 2.5 cm in height and weighing just 250 grams, making the LaCie external hard-drive very light as well as portable. The hard-drive is portable in the way that it is very light, the only thing you have to take into account is that you will require a medium to large sized pocket or any form of bag in order to carry the device. You could always opt to just carrying it around in your hand, which is not very practical in everyday life. All external and internal hard-drives state a certain amount of memory capacity, but in fact... Read review

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Advantages: Quick Tranfer Rate, High Capacity, Low Price
Disadvantages: Reasonably Big, Not USB Powered

...I bought this external hard drive a week ago from Maplin for £90. I bought this because of its 300GB size, and because it was an extremely good price for the size. Seagate have a very good reputation for a good quality product for a reasonably good price. It came very quickly, and I saw that it came with BounceBack for backing up files. I installed it and connected the hard drive to my PC. The Seagate was found straight away, and it opened up in My Computer. I closed the window, and I opened up the BounceBack. The first time you run it, it asks you to select if you want to backup 'My Documents' and your program files, or just 'My Documents'. After this is done, it does a pre-backup to find out how big the backup will be. Once this is done, it starts backing up what you selected. You can make the window smaller and use you... Read review

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Advantages: Lightweight, Slim, Auto-sync
Disadvantages: Shame there isn't a higher capacity

...This Freecom External Hard Drive is a 2.5" Hard Drive that has a USB interface and uses your computer's bus power to power itself. This means that an AC adapter is not required. With so few of these truly bus powered drives around, this is one of the best, followed closely by the Lacie bus powered drive. Thsi drive is ideal for laptop users who travel with a lot of data, or for those going on holiday with laptops who want to take their mp3's, movies and software with them. It is also great for transferring files to your laptop from another desktop computer. The drive is small enough to fit in a side pocket or to be held in yur hand without difficulty. The box comes with a good instruction manual, although really one is not needed. The drive is a plug and play device, and windows picks it up as any ordeinary drive. I recommend... Read review

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Advantages: Very Fast, Efficient, Stylish, Easy Installation
Disadvantages: Only a minor point the 1m usb cable

...I needed a fast and efficient external hard drive for doing full and incremental backups of my networked computer systems. I did a bit of research first before deciding on this Iomega product. It costs £58.95 from ebuyer with £10 (£48.95)off for using google checkout and at only 18p per GB you cant get much better than that at the moment. The Iomega drive comes in a very classy and stylish silver/aluminium casing which you can mount on the included stand or lay flat on your computer desk. Included in the box is a usb cable and a power adaptor and an instruction manual.It is usb 2.0 compatible which means that it has a raw data transfer rate of 480Mbps.It is also backward compatible with usb 1.1 which has a maximum transfer rate of 12Mbits/second. Spindle speed of this drive is 7500rpm.Only negative point is the usb cable could be a bit... Read review

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Advantages: Fast, super-stylish and near-silent.
Disadvantages: Difficult to detect activity.

...I have owned this drive for a few months and have found it to be excellent. But I disagree with a previous review in several areas. This is the most stylish external hard drive I have seen. It is also one of the cheapest per GB, currently available for just £93 at Misco.co.uk, for example. It works with Macs and PCs and is almost silent. It comes with a USB cable and a driver CD for old Windows operating systems. The external design is superb minimalism and looks like it could have been designed by Apple themselves. The case is all aluminium except the front and back. The front face is black except for the capacity indicator of ‘500GB’ which lights up in blue and flickers during activity. The rear has the power and USB ports and a small power switch. The 500GB box value translates to 465GB under Windows due to the differing ways... Read review

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