External Hard Drives Reviews

Maxtor OneTouch 4 Mini (250GB, 7,200 rpm)

Small enough to snuggle comfortably inside a coat or even a suit pocket, the Maxtor OneTouch 4 Mini (250GB) ($129.99 direct) has received a nice speed boost (from 5,400 to 7,200 rpm) over last year’s Editors’ Choice 160GB model. Suitable for transporting and syncing data between multiple machines (laptop and home PC, or home and work PC), the OneTouch 4 Mini stands out from rivals like the Toshiba HDDR320E03X and the Western Digital My Passport Elite, thanks to a design that lets it be used for either data backup or disaster recovery. Although its disaster-recovery is only for Windows XP or Vista users with NTFS-formatted drives, the OneTouch 4 Mini is one of the best portable drives available, and it once again earns our Editors’ Choice.

The OneTouch 4 Mini is relatively small, measuring 0.6 by 4.9 by 3.2 inches (HWD). Its brushed-aluminum top, thick plastic sides, and rubberized bottom convey a sense of security, and the backlit OneTouch button doesn’t protrude too far from the drive. I prefer the OneTouch 4 Mini’s sturdier appearance to the aesthetics of the Western Digital Passport Elite. Packed with the OneTouch 4 Mini is a Y-shaped USB cable. One of the USB ports is strictly dedicated to powering the drive, with the other for data transfer. I needed to use both while running the OneTouch 4 Mini with the Sony VAIO VGC-LT29U and our test bed.
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Maxtor’s backup software is installed on the drive itself. The OneTouch utility’s simple, clean interface gives you the option to back up an entire drive (or specific folders) and the ability to sync between two PCs, as long as they’re running the same OS. Those (like me) who use multiple operating systems will be disappointed to find that you can’t sync between a computer that runs Windows Vista and one with XP. Maxtor DrivePass features a powerful AES 256-bit encryption and will create a password-protected folder to store files. When the drive is attached to another computer, DrivePass will restrict data access to it.

The SafetyDrill utility, which creates an image of your PC’s drive and backs it up to the OneTouch 4 Mini, is still limited to NTFS drives, leaving FAT32 users in the cold. (This affects primarily Windows users whose machines are more than a few years old.) Mac users also can’t use SafetyDrill. They’re left with the OneTouch 4′s data-only backup option; Leopard users won’t need SafetyDrill anyway because they’ll be fine with Time Capsule.

The OneTouch 4 Mini 250GB is a speedy little drive. It took a brisk 49 seconds to back up our 1.22GB test folder using a drag-and-drop technique, and 50 seconds to back up using the OneTouch utility. Despite the increase in rpm, these times are nearly identical to those of the previous OneTouch 4 Mini, yet they’re still impressive. The drive also scored very well on the PC Mark05 test (which determines the overall input/output efficiency), posting a score of 3,050. The latest USB 2.0 pocket drives have tested in the 2,600 to 3,200 range.

Western Digital My Passport Studio (320 GB)

MacBook users, your portable hard drive has arrived. The Western Digital My Passport Studio ($220 list) is the Mac OS version of the WD My Passport Elite. It has the same compact case (albeit in a slightly more silver hue), protective port cover, and velvet-like drawstring bag. It comes in 160GB, 250GB, and the 320GB version tested here. It is an optimal choice for Mac OS X Leopard (10.5) users who want a portable drive for their Time Machine backups.

Since MacBook Pro 17-inch notebooks top out at 300GB, and the other MacBooks and MacBook Pros top out at 250GB, the My Passport Studio’s 320GB is capable of backing up your entire hard drive, with plenty of room left for future Time Machine backups. It will work with iMacs and Mac Pros, too, but for those I’d recommend a larger-capacity, desktop-class drive like the LaCie Little Big Disk Quadra or the Drobo.
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The Studio comes in the same 0.6-by-5-by-3.1-inch (HWD) size case as the Passport Elite drive, with a similar sliding port cover (it’s shorter to leave room for the additional FireWire port). Four white LEDs shine through the cover to show you power, drive capacity, and drive activity status. You’ll still need to install WD Drive Manager software to make the capacity LEDs work (the software also puts a WD menu in your menu bar with a status/capacity indicator), but at least this time it is Mac-compatible. The drive will work fine on its own without the WD Drive Manager software). It comes formatted as HFS+, the Mac native format, so all you have to do is plug it in. This means it won’t be readable on a Windows-based PC unless you reformat to FAT32 or NTFS.

The first time I plugged the Studio into my Mac test bed, the system asked me to make the Studio into a Time Machine backup drive. (I clicked OK, and the system did the rest.) This procedure makes setting up regular backups easy if you’re using Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard). Although the drive is compatible with 10.4 Tiger, you’ll have to get a copy of some other backup software with Tiger, since Time Machine comes only with Leopard.

The Studio has a 5,400-rpm drive mechanism (average for a notebook-class drive) with an 8MB cache and an internal SATA interface. It comes with both USB 2.0 (a standard single USB A to mini USB B) and FireWire 400 cables. The Y-shaped FireWire cable connects to both the FireWire four-pin port and the mini USB port. (It needs the USB to power the drive, since four-pin FireWire connectors lack power leads.)

Though the USB 2.0 interface theoretically has a faster throughput (480 megabits per second versus 400 Mbps for FireWire), it was a little slower in my testing. Transferring our 1.2GB test folder to the Studio over FireWire 400 took 41 seconds, and USB 2.0 took 49 seconds. Transfers were done in the Finder with drag-and-drop, since Time Machine backups are automatic.

Using the FireWire interface also opens up a few Mac-specific benefits. MacBooks have only two to three USB ports, so using the FireWire port frees up the USB ports for other peripherals. FireWire is also the interface of choice for creating bootable discs (in case you want to install Mac OS X on an external drive for data recovery, testing, or troubleshooting). And since FireWire 400 is faster for file transfers, it’s the more useful interface for this drive.

The Studio lists at $20 more than the WD Passport Elite, but you should be able to find both for less than their list price online. The Studio comes with all the Mac-specific stuff that a MacHead could want, as long as he or she is using Leopard. The drive is smaller than that of competitors like the Buffalo Ministation and Fujitsu RE25U300J 300GB drive, and doesn’t have to be reformatted for Mac use.

If you have a MacBook or MacBook Pro, get the My Passport Studio. It is optimized for Mac OS X 10.4 and 10.5 use, and looks nice next to your aluminum MacBook Pro or black MacBook.

Overall, the Maxtor OneTouch 4 Mini—also available in a 320GB version for $179.99 (direct)—stacks up favorably against its rivals. Its data backup utilities work with both PCs and Macs, which can’t be said for the Western Digital My Passport Elite. The Toshiba HDDR320E03X doesn’t provide comparable image creation or backup capabilities. The 250GB Maxtor OneTouch 4 Mini costs about $20 less than competing drives with the same capacity yet has a more robust software package. Even though PC users are the only beneficiaries of its disaster-recovery utility, the Maxtor OneTouch 4 Mini remains the hard drive to beat.

500GB SimpleTech SimpleDrive

The 500GB SimpleDrive ($169.99 list) by SimpleTech may not be as portable as the pocket-sized Maxtor OneTouch 4 Mini, and it’s not quite as spacious as Seagate’s 750GB FreeAgent Pro drive. Even so, its price per gigabyte, solid performance, and contemporary design are a winning combination that merits an Editors’ Choice.

As with the 250GB SimpleDrive model, the 500GB drive is housed in a sleek, tapered case styled by Ferrari sports car designer Pininfarina. Weighing 2 pounds and measuring 8.2 by 5.1 by 1.5 inches (HWD), this drive is meant for shuttling between systems rather than traveling in your laptop bag. The housing is done up in a glossy black finish (keep a polishing cloth handy to wipe away those fingerprint smudges) and is adorned with the Pininfarina signature logo on both sides. A One-Click Backup button on the top of the unit sports the SimpleTech logo and is surrounded by an illuminated, oval capacity meter. I love this meter because it tells you at a glance roughly how much space is left on the drive by how much of the meter is lit up. (Fully lit means that full capacity is available). Even better, the meter flashes red when less than 10 percent of the total storage capacity remains.

The 3.5-inch drive spins at 7,200 rpm, has an 8MB cache buffer, and connects to your PC via a USB port, which is located on the back of the case along with a power switch and DC jack. One of the knocks against the 250GB model was the oddball size of the CD disc containing the backup software. (Its 3cm discs were prone to getting snagged in slot-loading optical drives.) I’m happy to report that this time around, the folks at SimpleTech decided to load the software—ArcSoft’s TotalMedia Backup & Record (for Windows users) and TotalMedia Backup (for Mac users)—on the actual drive. All you have to do is click the setup icon to install it on the host system.

TotalMedia Backup & Record makes it easy to perform full or incremental backups of your photos, music, and video files, or you can choose the Personal Documents selection to archive e-mail, MS Office and Works files, IE Favorites, Web pages, and ACT! contact files. The Advanced Backup menu lets you select specific files for backup from an Explorer-type menu. You can add comments to the backup sets and password-protect them. If you decide to back up your data to CD or DVD media instead of to the SimpleDrive, ArcSoft tells you how many discs of each type of recordable media you will need to backup your file selection. Scheduled backups are as easy as choosing the files you want to archive and selecting how often you’d like them backed up (daily, weekly, or monthly). You can also choose specific days and times to perform each backup. Once you’ve scheduled a backup session, you can use the One-Click button to execute the process immediately rather than waiting for the scheduled time. All files backed up to the SimpleDrive or any other location can be easily recovered using the Restore option.

Unfortunately, the software can’t create a full, bootable backup of your operating system. Also, unlike SafetyDrill—which ships with the Maxtor OneTouch 4 Plus drive as well as the Mini—it won’t back up your system settings. Nonetheless, it does allow you to create a disc image and burn it to a CD or DVD. As an added bonus, TotalMedia Backup and Record will rip and burn audio CDs and duplicate discs, and create a video DVD from a VIDEO_TS folder.

The SimpleDrive is fast, thanks in part to its 7,200-rpm rotational speed. Using drag-and-drop, I backed up my 1.2GB test folder in 52 seconds, a result that’s pretty much on a par with the speedy Maxtor OneTouch 4 Mini. But performance took a nosedive while using the ArcSoft application to back up the same folder: 2 minutes 5 seconds to complete the task. Not surprisingly, results were similar using the One-Click option, which is actually just another way of accessing the ArcSoft application. The difference in timing occurred because the ArcSoft program performs a file comparison (in the background) after the data is transferred, which in this case added an extra 55 seconds to the process. Without counting the file comparison time, it took 1 minute 10 seconds to transfer the folder using the backup software and One-Click methods.

The SimpleDrive is covered by a one-year warranty, which is quite stingy compared with Seagate’s five-year coverage for its FreeAgent Go portable drives. Toll-free telephone support is available weekdays from 6:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. You also get a free 2GB online Fabrik Ultimate Backup storage account on myfabrik.com, where you can store and manage photos, music, and other data, and share these things with invited guests.

Despite its cheap warranty program and somewhat clunky software, the 500GB SimpleTech SimpleDrive is an outstanding value. Quick transfer rates, an elegant design, and an attractive price point make this an ideal personal backup solution for both the home and office.
Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB

Seagate’s FreeAgent Pro 750GB drive ($340 direct) stands out on two fronts: its innovative software pack-ins and its physical design. Its software is a solid group of programs for the user who doesn’t already have a backup solution (that is, most of you). The FreeAgent Pro’s design is rather unusual, so you’ll really have to like it to go with it. This drive’s pluses include eSATA compatibility, FireWire 400 compatibility, and speedy transfer speeds. Its massive capacity makes it a drive for the avid digital collector (you know who you are).

The hard drive’s mostly metal case is shaped and colored like a prop from a high-budget science-fiction movie. The tapered parallelogram-shaped slab stands firmly on top of a non-removable base. It looks as if it is created from a single block of metal. This is one of the potential problems with the drive. Because the base is permanently attached, you’re stuck with its vertical position. You can’t turn it on its side and keep the drive in a horizontal orientation to save height. If you can live with the vertical slab, you’ll find a lot to like, but also a couple more nits.

The modular external port connector—which differentiates the FreeAgent Pro from the less-expensive, USB-only FreeAgent Go—holds the drive’s mini USB 2.0 port and an eSATA port, and it’s easily removable using a coin. The port module pops out of the bottom of the base just like a cartridge. But reattaching that module or attaching the included FireWire 400 port module is a bit tricky. This is because the drive doesn’t lie completely flat on a surface. The modules themselves look as if they could break after too many installation cycles. As the coin-operated screw is a bit tough to reengage, that makes port switching a task you hope you don’t have to do often. A spring-loaded screw would have made it easier to figure out if the port module is secure.

The FreeAgent Pro’s 750GB drive can hold a few hundred thousand MP3s or JPEG digital photos, or almost 200 DVD-quality movies. Though I don’t expect too many people to have music collections that ridiculously large, I can certainly see downloaded video files taking up a lot of space on the 80GB to 160GB hard drive you may have in your PC. The 750GB is a lot of space for different versions of backups (more on that later). You could also image your entire hard drive using a utility such as Norton Ghost, creating bit-for-bit complete backups of your C: drive. The FreeAgent Pro comes formatted for NTFS, which means that you’d have to reformat the drive to use it on a Mac. (A Mac will still read the data on it but can’t write to NTFS drives.) This isn’t a problem for the majority of Microsoft Windows XP and Vista users out there, but a bit of an annoyance for the Mac folk.

When you first attach the FreeAgent Pro with the mini USB cable to a Windows PC, the drive automatically asks you to install the utility software. The FreeAgent software is the driver software and contains wellness monitoring and a connector to Seagate’s online service. Also included is Memeo’s AutoBackup software.

AutoBackup will dynamically back up folders of your choice, or it will back up your main document folders (My Documents, Music, Pictures, and so on) by default. The setup wizard makes good default choices, and a reasonably tech-savvy person should be able to set up the drive in a few minutes. Once set up, the programs stay in your taskbar, constantly monitoring your C: drive as well as the FreeAgent drive. AutoBackup saves a few versions of your files by default, but you can set more generations, up to the capacity of the drive. This will help you if you determine that the backup version of the file you want is from two weeks ago, rather than last night’s version. You can even use the software to take “snapshots” of your hard drive. This can save your hide if important files or settings fall prey to malware or viruses. All in all, it’s a good bunch of software, run by a reasonably easy-to-use setup wizard.

AutoBackup can also copy really important files to an online backup service such as Seagate’s 500MB Seagate Internet Drive service (free for 6 months), or send your pictures to your Shutterfly account, where they can be viewed on the Internet. The software can even recognize and back up to an Apple iPod, which is good if you have a 60GB or 80GB one with a lot of extra room on it. The FreeAgent and AutoBackup software handle all the traffic duties, so you don’t have to keep track of which version of which files are on which device.

The drive itself is a speedy one. It copied our 1.2GB test folder in just over a minute (1:03) with the AutoBackup software, exactly 1 minute with the FireWire 400 module, about 50 seconds over USB 2.0, and 42 seconds with eSATA. The eSATA and FireWire interfaces have the added benefit of being hot-swappable. (The data cable is removable without having to hit an Eject command.) You will still need to use Win XP or Vista’s “Safely Remove Hardware” command while using USB. A mini USB cable and a FireWire 400 cable are included, but no eSATA cable. Bear in mind that since this is a desktop-class drive, you’ll need to use the included AC adapter to power the drive.

There’s a lot to like in the Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB drive, including a very good software load, speedy transfers, and large capacity. I have only a few issues with it, primarily the flaws in the connector module, the lack of Mac support, and the drive’s vertical orientation (though the design is attractive) detract from its final score. I’d rate the FreeAgent Pro as good, with some reservations. But if you’re an avid digital collector, take a look at this drive as a vast repository for your digital life.