Which external hard drive won't crash and lose my data?

I am planning to buy an external hard drive, for example one of these:

* Maxtor Personal Storage 3200 U01H320 (STM303204EHAB01-RK) 320GB
* Western Digital My Book Essential 2.0 WDH1U3200N, 320GB

But then, sudden crashes and data losses seem to be a problem,
according to many user reviews on the web. Is that just a risk I have
to take when buying an external hard drive?

What model should I buy to minimize the crash / data loss risk? What
companies are most known for safe drives that don't crash after a year
or so? (I thought that was Maxtor, but apparently not?)

Thanks!
--Markus

"Markus Dehmann" <markus.dehmann@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:4a8ef366-b157-4bfd-849f-4ae53019f9e5@f10g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...
>I am planning to buy an external hard drive, for example one of these:
>
> * Maxtor Personal Storage 3200 U01H320 (STM303204EHAB01-RK) 320GB
> * Western Digital My Book Essential 2.0 WDH1U3200N, 320GB
>
> But then, sudden crashes and data losses seem to be a problem,
> according to many user reviews on the web. Is that just a risk I have
> to take when buying an external hard drive?
>
> What model should I buy to minimize the crash / data loss risk? What
> companies are most known for safe drives that don't crash after a year
> or so? (I thought that was Maxtor, but apparently not?)

Any drive is a risk. Stick with name brand and you should be safe.

Personally, I've got a Seagate Freeagent drive and haven't had problems with
it.

If reliability is that important, then investigate the RAID1 enclosures.
They hold two drives. If one fails you can still access your data.

In message
<4a8ef366-b157-4bfd-849f-4ae53019f9e5@f10g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>
Markus Dehmann <markus.dehmann@gmail.com> wrote:

>I am planning to buy an external hard drive, for example one of these:
>
>* Maxtor Personal Storage 3200 U01H320 (STM303204EHAB01-RK) 320GB
>* Western Digital My Book Essential 2.0 WDH1U3200N, 320GB
>
>But then, sudden crashes and data losses seem to be a problem,
>according to many user reviews on the web. Is that just a risk I have
>to take when buying an external hard drive?
>
>What model should I buy to minimize the crash / data loss risk? What
>companies are most known for safe drives that don't crash after a year
>or so? (I thought that was Maxtor, but apparently not?)

If your data is important to you, http://www.drobo.com/ is the way to
go.

"Markus Dehmann" <markus.dehmann@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:4a8ef366-b157-4bfd-849f-4ae53019f9e5@f10g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...
>I am planning to buy an external hard drive, for example one of these:
>
> * Maxtor Personal Storage 3200 U01H320 (STM303204EHAB01-RK) 320GB
> * Western Digital My Book Essential 2.0 WDH1U3200N, 320GB
>
> But then, sudden crashes and data losses seem to be a problem,
> according to many user reviews on the web. Is that just a risk I have
> to take when buying an external hard drive?
>
> What model should I buy to minimize the crash / data loss risk? What
> companies are most known for safe drives that don't crash after a year
> or so? (I thought that was Maxtor, but apparently not?)

Personal preference and experience separates these two. I personally will
never buy another Maxtor hard drive as I have had 2 fail out of 3 and know
of other people who have had similar experience. However, there are other
contributors in this group who will quote the opposite, so just go with the
fastest/cheapest of the two above and make sure you have a good backup
strategy!

Well, hard drives are measured in MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure) -
which means, they will fail, no matter what, at some point.

To get around this, you need a storage solution that handles a disk
failure while protecting your data.

I use Drobo, it's very easy, and very flexible - give it a look.




--
EddieZ