Debating on a 3Tb External..

[Calidus]

So I need a 3Tb External drive as I'm running out of space on one of my Samsung 2Tb externals (Samsung Spinpoint in enclosure), everything on this drive will go on the new one and the Samsung will take whats on my 2 500Gb Externals (Seagate and WD External drives) as I don't have enough power plugs for more then 4 external drives.

 

So now I'm debating on what the best cause of action as both Internal drives with enclosures and pure external drives have the same warranty. Now in the past with both my Samsung 2tb Spinpoints, the internal drive plus enclosure was quite a bit cheaper then pure extrernals, but its not the case nowadays.

 

So my question is what's the best in terms of reliability? heres my current choices below:

 

 

 

Toshiba 3Tb or  3Tb Western Digital Green in Icy Box IB-351StU3-B enclosure (already have one these enclosures and its good)

 

OR

 

Samsung D3 Station External or Western Digital 3 TB USB 3.0 Elements.

 

 

Thanks in advance, also it's to purely store videos and wont be on all the time, only when required.

[Dorian_WD]

Hey there, the WD Elements is a very good, simple and reliable storage solution. 

Have you also considered buying a 4 TB external drive, on which you will be able to store most of the data you have stored on the external drives you currently use?

I could suggest you to check the My Book, which supports a capacity of up to 6 TB.

It also comes with the automatic backup software WD SmartWare Pro as well as Acronis True Image.

You could also take advantage of its password protection and hardware encryption.

In case you want to find more information about it you can check it here:

http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=870

 

I hope this helps.

Cheers, Dorian_WD

[Calidus]

Personally do not care for backup software, I do everything manually and organise it the way I like. 4Tb is out of my budget I'm afraid (more so externals, internals aren't so bad), 3Tb alone is going to take a hit on my finances as it is though. (last two months I got a new monitor and graphics card...) Plus a 4Tb would be one weeks worth of my wages (on minimum wage) and I got bills to pay. Sure I would love a 4Tb instead but oh well.

 

I do appreciate the responce though, I maybe should of put prices in my first post as the Externals both cost £78 atm and the Internal drives are £70 (Toshiba), £75 (WD Green) and £22 (enclosure). One thing that annoys me with most externals I've seen is a lack of and on/off switch, as it will be off most of the time.

 

Well I can't get anything till friday and most of these prices are on a weekly offer, so I guess I should wait if anything chances price wise.

[Kimmaz]

Scramble together a file server from old hardware, put all disks in it. design a locally stored/hosted website that can browse and play the movies, then port forward and password protect it.. then you can watch them anywhere you got internet ^^

idk if you'll do it, but it could be a cool project, would learn a few things! 

[Calidus]

I have a home server with two 2tb Barracuda greens in it. (though they are in a RAID) It mainly hosts a site and runs amule, though its been offline for a while as I screwed up some settings, planning on redoing it once I have enough spare time.

 

Nice idea but no real point for me, everythings in the same room anyhow.

 

Edit: Oh and its a very small case, no room for more hard drives heh.