Helping people with computers... one answer at a time.
I currently own five of these. If that isn't a recommendation I don't know what is
I currently own five of these.
If that isn't a recommendation I don't know what is.
One of the problems with recommending a specific disk drive is that drives change, capacities increase and what I might tell you about today may not even be available next year. The external drive I recommended some years ago is no longer even being made.
With that having been said, today the FreeAgent Go is an incredibly handy and valuable device.
The version I use has a capacity of 500 Gigabytes, all in a package that's smaller than a paperback book.
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One of its most appealing features is that it does not need an additional external power supply; this model is powered completely via its USB connection. As a result, it's perfectly portable. One of my five drives sits in my backpack for backup as I travel, for both data and photographs I take when on the road.
I use the other four for data storage at home.
Even though these drives are small and rugged, I take no chances. Since they're relatively inexpensive I actually have them set up as two pairs: one drive of each pair as the "primary", or drive that I actually use on one machine, and the other as "backup" on another machine, mirroring the primary via a script run automatically each night.
Now, while the drives are small and portable and convenient and relatively inexpensive, they're not particularly fast. They're perfect for backing up, for portability, and for redundant data storage, though, and that's exactly how I recommend using them.
If you're wondering what kind of external drive to get for your backups, it's hard to go wrong with the Seagate FreeAgent Go 500GB external drive.
I recommend it.
Article C3834 - August 8, 2009
Leo A. Notenboom has been playing with computers since he
was required to take a programming class in 1976. An 18 year career as a programmer at Microsoft soon followed.
After "retiring" in 2001, Leo started Ask Leo! in 2003 as a place for answers
to common computer and technical questions. More about Leo.
I use a Seagate Go Flex Home for 3 computers. Big Box setup...
Posted by: Jim Marris at October 26, 2011 10:10 AMA Memeo error occurs thus
Memeo Background Service.exe Application Error
"Instruction @ 0x74985dfe ref memory at 0x00000020 memory could not be read. click OK to terminate program.
Support wants me to uninstall the program..
As I did not setup the computers I do not wish to try to "fix" it as I do not know what is going on...and I have asked too.
So I "terminate the program" until it reappears sometime in several days.
This primary drive and backup technique sounds OK, but two comments:
Posted by: Mike Dalgleish at March 13, 2012 11:18 AMa). If you simply mirror automatically each night, what happens when you make a user mistake say deleting a primary file, and dont realize it until a day or two later. You have lost your backup. I use a package called ViceVersa which keeps copies of updated files in their original form in an archive directory of the backup drive; its easy to roll back with that.
b) I wonder about making a USB drive the primary drive. I'd feel more secure using the internal drive, especially when out and about with a laptop.
@Mike
Posted by: Mark J at March 13, 2012 2:23 PMThat's one of the reasons why Leo recommends taking incremental backups, so that you can always go back a few days and get what you may have accidentally deleted prior to backing up
What's an incremental backup?.
Normally a computer won't allow you to use an external disk as your system drive.
I can't say enough good things about the Seagate company! Almost five years ago I got a Seagate Free Agent external drive as a gift. It quit working about three months ago. I thought, "well, so much for that; I'll have to buy a new one." On a hunch, I called Seagate and when they heard the serial number they told me it was still under warranty! They sent me a new one and I sent the old one to them in a prepaid mailer. They were extremely courteous. Many businesses could take a tip from this company!
Posted by: Carol Marston at March 13, 2012 10:15 PMAlong with a large-capacity external Seagate drive that I keep connected to my main desktop system, I also have 3 Seagate FreeAgent Go drives. Since I use Macrium Reflect, I don't usually bother with the included software. I do, however, use one of my Go drives for simple copies of various in-process project documents and, on that one, I also have backups created with the Seagate Manager utility. Not only does this give me an extra layer of protection for my data, but it backs up files in their native format, so when I need to grab a copy of one of them, I can simply drag and drop in Windows Explorer. Quick and easy!
Posted by: Michelle G at March 17, 2012 11:04 AM