considering purchasing an external hard drive with a new dell system

I'm considering a USB external hard drive (for backing up or copying
data) when I purchase a new dell system and wonder what the
approximate time would be to backup or copy say 1 gig of data on a usb
1.1 and usb 2.0 connection in actual time (not theoretical time)?

I presume if I get an external hard drive that they come with some
software to do this? Just curious, if you have one of these type
drives, how do you like it and what do you dislike about it? And how
do you backup your data? Appreciate the help

I use a Western Digital Premium MyBook external hard drive connected
to my computer via a FireWire connection. It comes with cables for
FireWire or UBS connection. W/D also makes a slightly cheaper unit
for just UBS connection. They have various size drives available from
120gb to 500gb. I use a 250gb. I looked at varius backup software and
settled on Norton Ghost which works fine. The W/D drive does come with
software which is on the drive rather than on a C/D. However, the W/D
backup program is rather limited and didn't appear to have all I wanted.

It installed with no problem and works just like another internal drive.
You can use it for backing up anything from your whole drive to
individual files. I haven't timed just l gb of data but backing up
about 25gb went fairly fast, likely less than 30 minutes.

All in all, I'm pleased with the drive and it appears to do everything I
wanted. It takes up little space sitting upright just like a book on my
desk. I purchased mine at Comp USA on sale. Walmart also carries
several models of this drive. My only complaint is I have to put a bit
of paper between the drive and my hard top desk to stop an bit of noise.
Don't know if all their drives would do this but it isn't a probem.










Doug wrote:
> I'm considering a USB external hard drive (for backing up or copying
> data) when I purchase a new dell system and wonder what the
> approximate time would be to backup or copy say 1 gig of data on a usb
> 1.1 and usb 2.0 connection in actual time (not theoretical time)?
>
> I presume if I get an external hard drive that they come with some
> software to do this? Just curious, if you have one of these type
> drives, how do you like it and what do you dislike about it? And how
> do you backup your data? Appreciate the help

<Doug> wrote in message news:...
> I'm considering a USB external hard drive (for backing up or copying
> data) when I purchase a new dell system and wonder what the
> approximate time would be to backup or copy say 1 gig of data on a usb
> 1.1 and usb 2.0 connection in actual time (not theoretical time)?
>
> I presume if I get an external hard drive that they come with some
> software to do this? Just curious, if you have one of these type
> drives, how do you like it and what do you dislike about it? And how
> do you backup your data? Appreciate the help


I can't give you actual times, however...I just purchased a Seagate 400GB
external and I have used it do full backups on both a laptop (USB 1.1) and a
desktop (USB 2.0). Backing up 1GB should only take a few minutes. However,
with the 1.1, it is S-L-O-W. The 1.1 rate is 12MB/sec and the 2.0 is
400+MB/sec. I am running on XP/home and chose not to use the backup software
that came with the HD. I am using the NTBACKUP.EXE program that is found in
the XP installation disk.

HTH. Harry