SO the time has come when i need a new hd, well a 2nd one, as ive filled my current with films and silly amounts of music.

Is it as simple as getting a 500gb one and thats good?

What do i need to look for when getting one, or can you suggest a good one.

I dont want to be spending silly money maybe £50 at most, student!

What size can i get for my money, in mind i get a lot of films and music, i've got 200gb of them at the moment. So as big as i can really.

Cheers:)

physical size (i.e. 3.5" or notebook (2.5"))?
connector type (i.e. sata/ata etc etc)?

I'm in love with Hitachi at the moment - their Deskstar/Travelstar series are just blimmin excellent value for money and they are ultra reliable. I'd even say better than Seagate/Western Digital at the moment...

500GB Hitachi Deskstar comes in at around £45 - £56 depending on the connector type (sata is cheaper).

1TB drives start to get pricey though and would be over your budget unless you shopped around.

Also, don't forget that storing so much data is going to mean you really need to consider somewhere to backup your data so it may be a wiser investment to buy 2 of the same drive and backup to one of those on a regular basis...

You can get a 500GB one for £55 - http://www.dabs.com/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=4L6H&CategorySelectedId=11154&PageMode=1&NavigationKey=11154,41610000

There are two types of connections you can get for hard drives, SATA and ATA (also known as IDE). Depending on the age of your PC, SATA being the current technology, so make sure you get the right one.

Ah cheers, yeah 3.5"

Yeah i really need to back up my data, as none of it is at the moment, i jsut prey nothing goes wrong, but its getting the the point where my music collection is becoming very extencive and personal and difficult to replace.

Is it okay haveing a fixed hd to back up onto is it safe from virus/crash etc, or would a external disconnectable one be safer?

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/130454

Awesome Hard drive for the money. Have about 3 of them in a couple of pc's at home.

I have a wide thin ribbond cable, ATA if im correct in thinking? If so that samsung you suggested wouldnt work as its SATA?

I have a wide thin ribbond cable, ATA if im correct in thinking? If so that samsung you suggested wouldnt work as its SATA?

Crap. The one I posted is sata.

I have a wide thin ribbond cable, ATA if im correct in thinking? If so that samsung you suggested wouldnt work as its SATA?

That's correct IDE aka. ATA

the way i see it is; theres no point in having an external one unless you are going to put it in a different building for fire protection otherwise get another internal one back up onto them

also you could look at running raid in a form where it will back up for you over the drives.

EDIT: crap no sata forget that!

Ok so is the one sam posted good, that samsung one "looked" nice, do they not make a IDE version?

If i get a virus or a hd error, not that i get spyware or virus im carfull about what i dl, is there any way it could move over to my backed up hd?

depends what you are asking? as long as the drive doesnt corrupt then yes you can normaly slavage the data before you reinstall your OS (im guessing you use windows) but you would need to have a working computer to be able to salvage from or yet another hard drive which you could install from

Yeah several other comps available. Yeah i run windows, its just eaiser tbh, i'd like a mac in a year or so when i go to uni but dont have the money for a whole new pc atm.

do you have any sata ports on your m/b mate?

James

Run a couple of HDDs in your pc, the main drive partition into 2 drives or more then use C drive for OS/Progs only, anything else on the other partition or the new HDD, that way if you do have any virus etc etc problems you wont be risking your vids/music/po...... etc etc ;)

Nope no SATA ports. only IDE.

Can anyone reccomend me a IDE 500Gb hd for £50 that will streem music/vids with no probs as tbh i dont have a clue what to look for.

Baz - Cheers, il do that. Probs keep the 200gb hd i currently have with the OS on it, with general other rubbish i ammas and then use this 500 for all my important stuff..

Most motherboards only have 2 IDE slots, and each slot can support 2 devices. This includes CD drives, so if you have a load of drives or a load of hdds already in there you may have to lose something to free up an IDE connection.

It only has two, but it the hardware manager, it said i can have

Primanry
Seconday
Via Bus Master IDE Controler



Can i have 3? If not i guess itl be byebye the smaller hd