Tips when choosing to buy a portable hard drive

The need to store our data is more and more, from photographs, good movies, attractive games . But, computer hard drive capacity is often very limited (especially with machines). bought a long time ago. Therefore, the solution here uses external portable hard drive. With the advantages of compact, easy to connect to the computer, this is a growing choice of many people.

However, on the market there are many types of external hard drives of different brands that make consumers wonder to choose to buy yourself a suitable product. Therefore, please refer to the following tips that we have collected to be able to find the type of hard drive suitable for your purpose.

Learn about the manufacturer

The market now has many different manufacturers such as Sony, Apacer, Samsung, Buffalo, LaCie, Toshiba, Western Digital (WD), Transcend, Seagate . in which two manufacturers Western Digital and Seagate are many. Consumers appreciate the quality and durability of the product. These are also two manufacturers that have been present for a long time and have built a brand in the Vietnamese market.

If possible, you should choose a hard drive model with additional features to reduce the risk of data. Examples include shock resistance, water resistance, dirt resistance, metal casing, rubber casing and security mechanisms. The more support features, the more expensive the hard drive. For example, LaCie's Rugged line is shock resistant with four US military standard 810-F protection, can bear the weight or impact force when dropped at a height of 2m without impact, or Backup Plus series Seagate's software is available for automatic backup of data.

In the process of use, it is not uncommon for the storage drive to crash or bump, so prioritize the hard drive models with shockproof rubber casing or a solid outer cover, good bearing to limit risk with your data.

Hard drive size and how to connect to the computer

There are 3 types of portable hard drives based on its size including 3.5 inches , 2.5 inches and 1.8 inches . The largest and most bulky 3.5-inch type, this hard drive model often has to use its own power cord to supply enough power to work with the data connection cord. The second type is lighter and lighter at 2.5 inches and is the most popular type of hard drive today. The third type has the most compact size of only 1.8 inches. These two compact hard drive models only need to use one cable simultaneously to access data and power.

For ordinary users who just want to own a hard drive with basic backup needs, a light and portable device with a high speed connection is the most suitable type of 1.8-inch hard drive. For small business customers, the 3.5-inch hard drive model with large storage capacity, wireless features, durable security and operation features will be attractive factors.

As mentioned above, large hard drives need to have their own power supply to supply it through wires. Most portable hard drives currently use only one cable to connect data and power. The speed of data access of hard drives is also an important factor and it is determined by a number of factors such as drive rotation speed (5400 - 7200 - 10000 rpm), standard connection (USB 2.0, USB 3.0, FireWire, eSata, Thunderbolt, Ethernet) .

Since 2012, the USB 3.0 protocol has been released on Windows laptops, signaling the era of 2.0 communication fades away, at least choose a portable hard drive with 3.0 interface with faster read / write speeds than with standard 2.0 and we will see the difference when sharing, backing up large amounts of data. For older devices using the USB 2.0 standard, the 3.0 interface is still backward compatible but the transfer rate will be reduced to USB 2.0. In addition, there are some faster connection standards than USB 2.0 interfaces, FireWire , eSata or Thunderbolt . FireWire, commonly known as IEEE 1394, is also a high-speed communication port for both Mac and PC. FireWire 400 has a transfer rate of 400 Mbps, FireWire 800 is 786 Mbps.

If you use an Apple Mac , choose a hard drive that supports the Thunderbolt interface at 10 Gbps, which is twice as fast as USB 3.0. Macs like the MacBook Air, iMac, which have just launched in the second half of 2011 all have Thunderbolt ports.

Capacity and price

Most 1.8-inch ultra-compact hard drives usually have a capacity of 250 GB or less, popular with 3 capacities of 120GB, 160GB and 250GB. 2.5-inch hard drives usually range in size from 320GB to 2TB, of which 320GB and 500GB are popular. Models of massive capacity hard drives above 2TB usually belong to 3.5-inch hard drives.

The current market average price is about VND 1.4 million for a mobile hard drive of 500GB, about VND 1.7 million with 1TB capacity. At 2TB capacity, the price is more distinct, for example, Western Digital's thin, light metal hard drive (Passport Utral Metal) is about 500 thousand more expensive than the Elements but has It can cost up to 1 million VND compared to Toshiba's Canvio model, but it is still nothing compared to LaCie Rugged with the price difference of 2.5 times the value of the Passport Ultra hard drive model.

With the same design, the higher the hard drive capacity, the more expensive it is (not to mention the factors: material, design .). Users should base on the level of data storage and usage needs, to choose the appropriate storage capacity. For example, high-quality film lovers need large-capacity hard drives, simple but easy-to-move office workers who need only a lightweight hard drive of between 160GB and 320GB. in a long time. Should choose larger capacity than current needs because there will be data to backup arising every day.

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Good luck!