Ext hard drive advice.

Just want something for run of the mill file storage and basic back-ups.

I've seen the Maxtor One Touch 4 (500gb or 1tb) models pretty cheap over the weekend. Most of the user-reviews I've seen online say they're utterly crap.

Any suggestions on a 500gb (or near) ext HD in the $150 or less range?

Thanks for any pointers.

BTW, I'm assuming they're being sold cheap at the big stores because they're old models.. Will this really make any difference for normal file storage?

Won't make any difference if its old stock or not. I don't use Maxtor but from past experience they are ok. Seagate and the Western Digital Ex drives are awesome and pretty fast for file transfer.

They will be cheap because hard drives are cheap as these days. 500GB HD is like less than $100 now. And an external drive is pretty much just a hard drive in a case.

Look at the rpm of the disks if you are worried about file transfer speed. Should be 7200rpm. But when you're plugging into your PC with a USB cable that won't matter as you'll be limited by what USB can handle.

I use Western Digital they are pretty good, I reckon you should go for those pocket drives, they do upto 750GB now I think and a 500GB you can get maybe for about $200-$249?

Yeah, you'll see ZERO difference between 5400rpm and 7200rpm drives over USB.

Firewire or eSATA sure, but not USB.


Nothing wrong with those Maxtors, I know several people who've had them for ages, no problems.

There is still a cloud over some of the Seagate ~1tb drives, so personally I'd avoid them at the moment.

And yeah, they are cheap because these things are cheap. You can buy a bare 1TB drive for $150 inc GST at (online) retail. And enclosure would cost a manufacture sub ~$5 in volume, you can pick up up for $30-40 retail.

The Maxtors have Seagate drives in them...

Simply, is there any day-to-day use downside to buying a drive which has been on the market for 2 years as opposed to a brand new model?

Is it the hard drive that has been on the market for two years, or just the external enclosure? The hard drive is probably brand new.

In short, it doesn't matter. It's pretty simple technology. There is no real risk above and beyond the usual risk of hard drives failing.

Last one I pulled apart had a Maxtor branded drive. It probably varies.