Advantages: Fast, Reliable, big capacity & amazing value for money!
Disadvantages: Doesn't look like it would take too many heavey knocks

...This is a pretty standard USB HD but with a whopping 500GB for under £100 it is amazing value for money. So far I've had no problems with it. I run mostly audio/graphics from it (which is very demanding). This HD has no problems dealing with the big files I Use, providing an excellent transfer rate. It is pretty quiet, the only noise it ever makes is a slight hum! I carry this every where I go with my laptop, it's taken a few knocks and survived OK, but I wouldn't want to test it too much, as the case doesn't look like it would protect the drive too well! The design is pretty funky and its size isn't too big either! I've had big portable drives before which were a pain to transport! this fits into my laptop bag perfectly! This drive is well worth the buy.... Read review

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Advantages: Easy to install, easy to operate
Disadvantages: Power plug is a bit bulky if using extention lead.

...(your drive may appear as a different letter). When it comes to finding the external hard drive you simply select you’re My Computer icon, and then click on the drive that your hard drive sits on. You can change the name of the hard drive to make it easier for you if you have difficulty to identify. The Freecom 500GB hard drive emanates little or no heat, and is incredibly quiet (my old external hard drive made lots of clunking noises). Providing you are connected by USB 2.0 everything moves at a reasonable pace not dissimilar to being an internal hard drive. My USB 2.0 ports are highlighted quite well, but I’m told with my PC’s the only way to check is to run a diagnostic check on your ports through your PC’s control panel. My Freecom hard drive cost me £50 from PC world, ironically hidden behind the 400GB hard drives “on special” at £49.... Read review

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Advantages: Massive amount of storage at a reasonable price, nice design
Disadvantages: Quite noisy

...After a previous experience of my operating system needing a complete re-install and my internal hard drive nearly full of applications and media files. I needed a storage device I could back up and move all my files to, speed up my hard drive and have programs stored in case my operating system would decide to give up on me again. External storage has come down in price a lot lately, and I thought now was a good time to buy. I needed a good amount of space, something that could move files from one device to another quickly, something affordable and something with a recognised name. I've used Freecom products before and I've never had a problem with them. During my search of external hard drives, this hard drive came in a range of sizes from 40gb to 500gb. The 320gb were available at Amazon for £79.99, which was the best price around... 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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Advantages: good size, cheap, great customer service
Disadvantages: gets very hot

...I am a web developer and have several very large software packages installed on my laptop which take up a lot of memory when being used simultaneously. My machine was running very slowly. I bought a I portable external drive as it was small and light so I could carry it with me (very important as my laptop goes everywhere with me). I thought it would take ages to fill. I was wrong! I download lots of films and music etc which took up most of my memory but lets face it I don't need them with me 24/7. so I had a look on the web and found the freecom website. I saw this 400GB drive for £74 and thought it would be perfect. I would describe it as cheap and chearful. It's big, it's not that pretty and it's heavy. The fact that it has to be plugged in annoyed me at first as i was used to my portable one. However as it just sits on my desk... Read review

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Advantages: No fan noise
Disadvantages: Annoying light when you turn PC off

...Originally i wanted to replace my old 250GB external hard drive with something of at least 500GB, and was looking to spend around £200. But then I saw an offer at PCWorld for this drive for £109. I went to the store and then used my student discount to get it for (what I thought was an amazing) £98.99. I felt the loss of 100GB was worth a 100 quid saving! But still, 400GB is a massive amount of storage. Most people will have no problem fitting all their music, videos etc etc on it. The biggest plus about this drive I think is that it doesn't have a fan. Pretty much all other drives do, and this can make them quite noisy. This one on the other hand runs almost silently, with just the faint spinning discs being apparant. Store it under your desk though, for example, and you can't even hear this. For anyone who has had external drives... Read review

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Advantages: Portable quite light really
Disadvantages: Needs power saupply

...Great value portable external hard drive just plug it in and off you go needs no installing good drive for the price can store anything on it and can go on any computer it is 500gb which is morethan enough space for music pictures dvds etc. Can be used on a network with your server or main computer either on or off so if you had a wifi system with a laptop and main computer can leave on your main computer even though it turned off and still acess from laptop. If you know what you are doing. is quite light and comes with a good gaurantee. i connected by usb and needs to be powered by normal ac adaptor but apart from that it is easy to use... Read review

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Advantages: plug and play, fast and quiet
Disadvantages: External power supply

...the Freecom 160gb external hard drive is a so easy to set up, just plug into your usb drive and your ready to use. The main advantage of having an external hard drive is portability, you can store any files or programs and take them with you and plug into any computor with usb 2 ports. I originally bought mine to store my main hard drive disc image in case i needed to do a complete disc rescue, because it is external it will work even if your main hard drive decides to go belly up. it is fairly compact at 11.5cm wide 20cm deep and 4cm high It does sit nicely on my tower unit and because the colour is a nice matt silver with a black face it does blend in with the other peripherals I have. (all standard grey). You may think external usb hard drives run slower but this is fast with an average seek time of only 9ms and a track to track... Read review

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Advantages: Easy installation, looks good, ease of use
Disadvantages: None found

...I've bought two of these drives now and am very impressed. On opening the box you'll find the following: The drive itself, power supply, USB cable and an instruction leaflet. The drive feels solid and well built, although the aluminium case does have some sharp edges near the front where it joins the plastic bezel. The drive comes formatted to FAT32, but this is easily changed to NTFS. Being a curious sort, I took one apart to find out the manufacturer of the actual drive inside and was happy to find a Seagate Barracuda, not the bottom of the range drive I was expecting! Installation under Windows XP/Vista is a doddle, just plug in the power cable, plug in the USB cable, switch it on and it's automatically detected and ready to go. In use, both drives have proved very reliable, and although transfer speeds over USB 2... Read review

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Advantages: Small, Compact, Quite, Ease of Installation
Disadvantages: None that i can think of

...This is one excellent product. i bought one with my other 3 hard drives being filled with files and music etc. i thought that buying an external would cut all of my problems with the fact that i went through a lot of DVD-r's with burning data for work and other things. By jove has it done the job, i now store all of my work files, music, videos and all sorts of other data. i carry it into work in the morning and plug it in, i then use it for the day and then unplug, carry it home again and plug it in. i have tried in either port USB or Firewire and they both work like a treat. it is quiet and doesnt heat up tooo much.i also like the way that the led on the front has 4 differnet modes and these are the following: Power on state or power save mode Transitioning to System Standy Standby Mode System Standby Drive In Use... Read review

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