External Hard Drive Reviews

[joreth]

I'm in the market for a 1T external hard drive.  I currently have a 500GB WD My Book, which was working just fine for a while, but has recently begun overheating.  I have to unplug it, let it cool off, then reboot the computer while simultaneously plugging it back in to get the computer to see the drive once it overheats.

And, because I'm poor, I never bought a backup system.

So I'm doing google searches to find reviews, but I'm having trouble finding any for the 1T size.  I have a coupon for another WD product, and the 1T My Book Pro Edition is currently on sale for $200.  But I'm cautious about purchasing another My Book.

I found one review (http://www.gcn.com/print/27_14/46462-1.html) that covered several different brands, and based on that one article, the Seagate FreeAgent Pro and SimpleTech Pro Drive sound pretty good.  They both have decent transfer speeds, good backup software, and go for just over $300.

I've also heard that Maxtor has a good reputation for decent hardware.

So, anyone want to chime in with their opinions and experiences, or links to reliable comparison reviews?  I'm concerned with cost, overheating issues, and backup capabilities.  Transfer speed is important, but less so than the 3 I just mentioned.  It might be inconvenient for something to take a long time to transfer, but if I have to sacrifice speed for not losing my data totally, I'll make that sacrifice.

Comments

[tedeisenstein.livejournal.com]

Best Buy (the first store that popped into mind) has on its webpage a "Seagate FreeAgent Desk 1 TB External USB 2.0 hard drive" for $227.99; the "USB 2.0/FireWire" version is $299.99.
Same manufacturer, "FreeAgent Desk 1.5TB External USB 2.0" is $229.99.

....dunno exactly what the differences are, other than how you attach them to the computer, but you may be pleasantly surprised at prices. (I priced terabyte drives about two or three weeks ago, and am astonished at the speed of the price drop - my first external drive was 10 megabytes for an IBM PC-XT, 25 or so years ago, and cost a lot more.)

I've found Consumer Reports' reviews to be reliable, but it requires a subscription.

Here (http://www.macworld.com/article/135770/2008/09/freeagentdesk.html?t=223) is a MacWorld review for Seagate FreeAgent hard disks. It's been a while since I used anything but Macs, though, and cannot say if it holds true for non-Mac FreeAgent drives. (The review's favorable, for what it's worth.)