How to Buy 2TB external hard drive

I am thinking aboutr WD, Western Digital, because I have had nothing but problems with the Seagate Backup Plus.

But on Amazon there are several variants of the WD 2TB external HDD, with a huge spread in price.

https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_nr_p_n_feature_five_bro_0?fst=as%3Aoff%2Cp90x%3A1&rh=n%3A172282%2Cn%3A541966%2Cn%3A1292110011%2Cn%3A595048%2Ck%3Awestern+digital+external+hard+drive%2Cp_n_feature_two_browse-bin%3A7817230011%2Cp_89%3AWestern+Digital%2Cp_n_feature_five_browse-bin%3A2419645011&keywords=western+digital+external+hard+drive&ie=UTF8&qid=1520541325&rnid=2419643011

I am wondering what the differences mean. I am willing spend the money to get something that really works reliably

system Sony Vaio Laptop(2011) 500 GB

Linux Mint 18.3 new install

Questions:

What files system should I get the drive formatted for?  Should I reformat?  so does the files system it comes with matter?

The names of the different hard drives are "Elements" "My Passport"

One model is label "gaming storage"

Another model is labelled for Mac

Some are described as having USB 3.0  I think my computer is USB 2.0

One HDD is wireless. Would this be secure and would it work with an older laptop? A lot problems I have had with my Seagate Backup Plus had to do with the USB connection.

Any recommendations on choosing the more reliable product would be welcomed.

 WD_EXTERNAL_HDD.pdf   1.12MB   3 downloads

pay no attention to all the descriptions......its just marketing non-sense.....

your basically buying a hard drive in a box

you can buy them seperately if you want......just buy the hard drive you want, then buy an enclosure

Edited by mikey11, 08 March 2018 - 03:55 PM.

I'll also put in two observations:

1.  I have had better luck, much better luck, with the longevity of portable USB powered external hard drives than with desktop models with an external power supply.  

2.  My Toshiba Canvio portable hard drive has been running for about 5 years now, has been used to back up 5 different machines, and has suffered some drops of less than 18" on to a carpeted surface and just keeps going and going and going.

If you intend on using on a constant basis consider getting an enclosure with a fan, some will argue but heat is not your friend.  I have seen a few of these puppies die early.

Getting dropped is what usually kills these portables

Edited by Joe C, 09 March 2018 - 07:30 AM.

pay no attention to all the descriptions......its just marketing non-sense.....

 

your basically buying a hard drive in a box

 

you can buy them seperately if you want......just buy the hard drive you want, then buy an enclosure

The price spread is between $69 and $300 for what they call a "pro"

There must be some difference between them.

What should  expect to pay for a good drive?

The WD Pro uses a Thunderbolt cable, if your pc does not have a Thunderbolt connector on the motherboard, then do not buy it

The price spread is between $69 and $300 for what they call a "pro"

 

There must be some difference between them.

 

What should  expect to pay for a good drive?

 

im not sure where your located.....where i am i can get a 2TB WD drive for about $60USD

and a USB enclosure with power supply for as little as $25 USD

Brian mentioned the Toshiba Canvio Pro 3TB, I have an old T drive that has been great.  I Googled the reviews o the one he mentioned looks like the still make a good drive.

By the way. A Toshiba Canvio Pro 3TB, in an aluminium clad enclosure, can be had on Amazon for under $100.

Thanks alot for this tip. I found it.

Do you know if it will it work with Linux?

I am getting irritated at these tech companies that make their stuff compatible with only Mac and Windows. So I have to hope that Mac OS is close enought to linux that stuff will work.

Would I have to reformat it?

I am thinking that that might have been the problem with the seagate I have now, is that I did not reformat.

Edited by Achaemenid, 11 March 2018 - 07:59 PM.

Hard drives don't care what you stuff on them!

The Mac / Windows thing is only advertising hype.

I got a 1 tb passport drive real cheap from someone on Craigslist  because they could not use it for windows....It only took a simple format to make it a NTFS file system for windows

Since Linux has native support for NTFS it will work with any drive that's preformatted for Windows.   Were it a drive formatted for Mac you would have to reformat it.

It is Apple, and Apple alone, that uses a file system that, well, only it uses.  [I can't say proprietary as NTFS is, technically, but for all practical intents and purposes . . .]

By the way, if you anticipate using a drive on both Windows and Mac then reformat it as exFAT to begin with and both will be perfectly happy with it.

Edited by britechguy, 11 March 2018 - 09:07 PM.
Added note on exFAT