Most Reliable USB Bus powered Hard drive

[Scidd0w]

[...]
Mine is set to spin down after 10 minutes and I haven't had any trouble with it waking up when I go to use it.

I still need to receive my touch but can this be set in the touch itself or do you need a special harddrive tool for this?

[jean2]

I still need to receive my touch but can this be set in the touch itself or do you need a special harddrive tool for this?

With the Toshiba, I did not have to do anything, it worked right out of the box. I can't determine what is the spin down time, because the drive is so quiet.

As far as I am aware, there does not seem to be any setting in the Touch itself.

Good luck...

Jean

[Scidd0w]

Thank you for the reply.
I also ordered the Toshiba drive you have so all should be good!

[Altec]

Nice thread! I have the exact same question - I need a usb powered hard drive, less than 500GB would do. So what should I buy, WD or Toshiba? (or something else?) I googled some of the recommended hard drives and got scared from all the bad reviews (I would like to keep my hard drive for more than 6 months...). What about memory sticks, cards etc. - is that an option and are they better for this purpose? I would like one that is able to power down and one that just works without delays and other problems.

Please post the full name of recommended hard drives incl. model number so that I/we get the right one. Thanks!

[spamtom]

Hi Altec

I havnt looked into this thread for a while, so dont know if you will see this now but the toshiba drive recomended in this thread is great. I have used it now for 2 months and it works great. Its a 320gb, but the range does go upto 600gb, so i dont see why a bigger size would not work. If you live in europe you would get protected for 10days to send back no matter the reason if it didnt work, although im not sure how that stuff works in the states though. Here is the link on amazon to a 500gb version http://www.amazon.co.uk/Toshiba-HDDR...im_computers_4

Cheers

[Altec]

Hi spamtom

Thanks very much - that is good info. I live in Europe so I can use their guaranty if necessary. I like that drive and it even looks nice too so I think I just buy that one. Is it fast enough/the response time ok and is it ready within a short time when you turn on the Touch? Does it power up and down as it should so that it doesn't spin when you don't use it?

[808htfan]

I'm using a Toshiba 640GB 2.5" external hard drive, powered by the Touch USB bus. Model number HDDR640E04XK. I've been using it since April and the drive itself has not given me any trouble. Power saving even seems to works properly. The black model visually goes very well with the Touch, almost the same finish.

http://sdd.toshiba.com/main.aspx?Pat...Ext_Hard_Drive

Just in case anyone is interested, Amazon has this 640GB Toshiba (Black) for $66.34 at the moment. I think the newer Toshiba Canivo 750GB was about $80.

[RGibran]

Today Only 12/03 the newer Toshiba Canvio 750GB model is featured on eBay home page for $64.99 with free shipping! They are going fast!!!

RG

[jean2]

I can second the Toshiba drives as not giving me any issues. I have a 320GB, a 500GB, a 640GB, and the new Canvio 1TB USB drive all working well with Touch.

By the way, for those like me trying to keeping track of all those Toshiba drives and all the technical details... Note that the specs on Toshiba web site are not very helpful, so those are my guesses...

The original Toshiba external drives are still available in the usual places and are well tested with the Touch. The drive has a single wave on them. The largest 2 platter is 640GB, the 1T was a 3 platters design.

The Canvio drives are also now well tested with the Touch and widely available. The drives have fairly large squares on them. It looks like the largest 2 platter is still 640GB (like the original Toshiba external drives), the 750GB and 1T seems to be 3 platters designs.

However, I see that on the Toshiba web site there are new Canvio models, the Canvio 3.0 and Canvio Basics, those seems to already available in some places (but quite expensive). The 3.0 has very small squares on them, the basic seems all black. Obviously, those have not been tested with the Touch and I would like to have feedback on those before recommending them, hopefully Toshiba did not change the formula. The 3.0 is overkill for the Touch, as the Touch does not support USB 3.0, and I would worry about the encryption feature. For those drives, it looks like the largest 2 platters is 750GB and only the 1TB is 3 platters.

Note that the number of bare/internal drives at 5400rpm on Toshiba web site is much more limited, so I'm assuming that most of those external drives use the same drive inside, and the only changes are the enclosure and the software...

Good luck...

Jean

[MrSpigot]

I've been using a Seagate FreeAgent Go 250GB for several months. It's small, light and very quiet. The drive sleeps with no problems, just a few seconds delay on wake up. The period before sleeping can be configured by attaching to a PC and running the Seagate config software.
Just another option - it's not only Toshiba's that work!