External Hard Drive Use

[James Emory]

Hello guys/gals,

I'm eating memory up like crazy with my RAW photo storage and I would like to know if getting an external hardrive would allow me to run my photo programs and store my photos strictly on that drive. I don't know much about what all you can do with external drives, but the way I understand it, is that they are for storage only. Do correct me if I'm incorrect.

Thanks,

[tvphotog]

They function just the way your internal drives do, but they run through a Firewire or USB connection. I use the Western Digital My Book 2 TB drive, as I have a bunch of RAW photos to store as well. It comes as a 1 TB as well. The benefit of the 2 TB is that you can either use one TB for storage and the other to make a backup image of the first drive, or use all 2 TB for storage.

[Lowner]

External hard drives are excellent for storing data, they are less good with actual software.

Thats probably less to do with the hard drives themselves as the fact that they are at "arms length" so to speak. A typical post processing programme like Photoshop works a lot harder than we realise and needs to be in close touch with the CPU and RAM. I do use my E drive for the scratch disc which seems to work quite well.

[Kasrielle]

I have 2 Sandisk external HDs (1T, 500G) that I only use for storage. My programs (DPP, PSE5) I leave on the C drive.

[James Emory]

Thanks for the help guys. From what I am reading, the external drives aren't much good for running programs, just storage. I guess it still will save me plenty of disc space.

[tsamarin]

Just don't forget to back up to a DVD or other media. These external drives seem to fail a lot. I've heard it reccomended that you buy an internal drive and mount it in an accessory case-they're supposed to be more reliable.

[James Emory]

Just don't forget to back up to a DVD or other media. These external drives seem to fail a lot. I've heard it reccomended that you buy an internal drive and mount it in an accessory case-they're supposed to be more reliable.

Yes, I would if I didn't have a laptop. Thanks.

[yourdoinitwrong]

Yes, I would if I didn't have a laptop. Thanks.

You can still purchase an internal hard drive and then mount it in an external case. This would allow you to hook it up to your laptop just like one of the "ready to go" external hard drives. Some people feel this is a more reliable way to go. Here is a link to what I'm referring to: http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.aspx?SubCategory=92&name=External-Enclosures, just to give you an idea. It's a very simple DIY project. Your computer should recognize it just like an other externally mounted drive.

[ed rader]

Yes, I would if I didn't have a laptop. Thanks.


run a mirrored pair of external drives so you'll have a back-up in case your main drive fails.

ed rader

[dpark]

Some people feel this is a more reliable way to go.

Can someone explain why this would be more reliable? When you buy an external hard drive, it contains the same hard drive one would buy to install internally. It's just pre-installed. Is there something I'm missing?

[Jon]

The thinking is that you can pick and choose the model of hard drive you put in the housing. If you buy an external drive housing with drive already included, you don't know for sure whose drive (or which model) you're getting. If you buy a housing and add your own drive you know what drive you're getting up front.

[RPCrowe]

run a mirrored pair of external drives so you'll have a back-up in case your main drive fails.

ed rader

I use a pair of 500GB Western Digital Passport external hard drives to store my images when I am traveling. I have a copy of each RAW image stored on each hard drive and will usually keep the drives in separate places.

If I am flying, one is kept in my carry-on case and one is kept in my checked baggage. That way the images are pretty secure. I wouldn't expect both hard drives to crash at any one time.

I was thinking about keeping my Photoshop program on the external hard drive but, have decided against that. Instead, I have just loaded Canon Digital Photo Pro on my notebook computer and will use this to download from my CF cards, make a quick inspection of images to intercept any glaring camera problems and then copy to the hard drives.

The DPP is free and hardly uses any space on my notebook hard drive. I usually don't do any major editing while I am traveling so DPP seems fine for me.

[rklepper]

Buy an external box and put an enterprise level hard drive into it. The drives they put into the external boxes you buy are intended to maximize profit and not necessarily provide the best solution.

[dpark]

The thinking is that you can pick and choose the model of hard drive you put in the housing. If you buy an external drive housing with drive already included, you don't know for sure whose drive (or which model) you're getting. If you buy a housing and add your own drive you know what drive you're getting up front.
I guess that makes sense, depending on what you buy. e.g., I own a Seagate external hard drive. I'm pretty sure there's a hard drive from Seagate inside. :)

[goldboughtrue]

I have a laptop and have all my programs running on it. No files are stored in "my documents" so everything else is on other storage. I have an external drive for pictures, music, and video. I use flash drives for random small personal files. You definitely want backup (or 2) of your pictures. One day, my external drive decided to quit. I had everything on two other drives so no worries, but you don't want to be caught unprepared.

[Lowner]

The reliability comes from having a minimum of two entirely seperate drives saving the same information. Then if one goes wrong the data has not been lost. I have to admit I currently run with just one external drive, but two more are on order.

[dpark]

The reliability comes from having a minimum of two entirely seperate drives saving the same information. Then if one goes wrong the data has not been lost. I have to admit I currently run with just one external drive, but two more are on order.
If this is in response to my question, I think you misunderstood me. I wasn't asking why an external drive is more reliable than an internal one, but why buying an external carrier and installing a drive in it would be more reliable than buying a pre-assembled external drive.

I completely recommend buying and using an external drive, though. The real benefit (in addition to having an extra copy, always a good thing), is that it's less likely to get zapped in a power surge, assuming it's only plugged in during backups.

[yourdoinitwrong]

If this is in response to my question, I think you misunderstood me. I wasn't asking why an external drive is more reliable than an internal one, but why buying an external carrier and installing a drive in it would be more reliable than buying a pre-assembled external drive.

I completely recommend buying and using an external drive, though. The real benefit (in addition to having an extra copy, always a good thing), is that it's less likely to get zapped in a power surge, assuming it's only plugged in during backups.

I think the reason some people do it is because you can select one of the higher quality (more expensive) drives from a particular company. My guess is the drives in the pre-assembled units are their lesser expensive, lower quality drives.

[dpark]

I think the reason some people do it is because you can select one of the higher quality (more expensive) drives from a particular company. My guess is the drives in the pre-assembled units are their lesser expensive, lower quality drives.
I think if buying a name-brand external drive, this shouldn't really be an issue. I also don't really think that most people are in a position to know which internal hard drives will be most reliable. e.g. Is the Seagate ST31000528AS more reliable than the Western Digital WD10000LSRTL?

The ability to drop a newer, larger hard drive into the same enclosure is a real benefit to buying an enclosure instead of a pre-assembled drive. I'm just not sure that there's much reliability benefit. I suppose you can get a longer warranty on an internal drive (5 years if you're willing to pay for it), but a longer warranty doesn't guarantee longer life. It just guarantees replacement if the drive dies (and if it dies 3 years down the road, a replacement will be cheap anyway).

[yourdoinitwrong]

I think if buying a name-brand external drive, this shouldn't really be an issue. I also don't really think that most people are in a position to know which internal hard drives will be most reliable. e.g. Is the Seagate ST31000528AS more reliable than the Western Digital WD10000LSRTL?

The ability to drop a newer, larger hard drive into the same enclosure is a real benefit to buying an enclosure instead of a pre-assembled drive. I'm just not sure that there's much reliability benefit. I suppose you can get a longer warranty on an internal drive (5 years if you're willing to pay for it), but a longer warranty doesn't guarantee longer life. It just guarantees replacement if the drive dies (and if it dies 3 years down the road, a replacement will be cheap anyway).

I had hoped that the pre-assembled ones would be as reliable as well. However, I had an Iomega 750GB drive fail after only 8 months. Luckily I didn't lose anything because I only use the external to backup the hard drive in my Mac, I don't store anything solely on the external drive. I just picked up a pre-assembled Western Digital so hopefully that will work out better. As far as choosing a drive for an external enclosure I think you are right that most people won't know which drives are better. Unless they are a nerd like me and do a bunch of research on everything they buy!

[dpark]

I had hoped that the pre-assembled ones would be as reliable as well. However, I had an Iomega 750GB drive fail after only 8 months. Luckily I didn't lose anything because I only use the external to backup the hard drive in my Mac, I don't store anything solely on the external drive. I just picked up a pre-assembled Western Digital so hopefully that will work out better. As far as choosing a drive for an external enclosure I think you are right that most people won't know which drives are better. Unless they are a nerd like me and do a bunch of research on everything they buy!
That sucks that your external drive died. Glad you didn't lose anything. I've had internal drives fail, too. It's just luck of the draw. They're destined to fail at some point. That's why a good backup system is essential (though I'm not as good at that as I should be). I plan to sign up for one of the online backup systems once I get my new desktop built.

I had a friend running two drives in a RAID array and they both failed at the same time. I assume a power surge caused it, but it could just be that he was unlucky. Of course, he was running them striped, so he was asking for trouble anyway.

[rijndael]

I had a friend running two drives in a RAID array and they both failed at the same time.

Redundancy is a great thing, as long as you know when something has failed and you no longer have that redundancy.

It's a lot like headlights on a car. Most folks don't know they have a burned out light until the 2nd one goes and everything is dark.