Portable Hard Drives

Rewired

I need get large video files to and from school. Does anybody have any good (or bad) experience with portable hard drives? I'm looking forsomething small enough to fit into a coat pocket. I'm considering the Seagate 100gig Portable Hard Drive for about $225. http://www.ecost.com/ecost/shop/detail.asp?dpno=648063&store=ecost&source=ECOSTPG&adcampaign=email,ECOSTPG
What do you think? Are there any other good options out there?

I can't really get a good perception of how big these drives are because they never show em next to anything.

shwaip

usually, it's a better deal to pick up an internal IDE drive and then buy an external enclosure. Enclosures usually run about $30, and you can find hard drives at < $0.50 / GB these days.

Rewired

If I went that route would the drive have a USB port? Would it be portable? Please elaborate your idea. Thanks for help.

shwaip

This is an example of an enclosure.
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=17-155-505&depa=0

You can get them with USB2 or FireWire connections. Usually, they require an external power source (included with the enclosure). This makes them a little less portable.

Another option is to buy a laptop hard drive (more expensive) and a smaller enclosure. These are powered by the USB connector, so you won't need an external power supply.

How big are the files that you are looking to transport back and forth? You could also get a flash drive if they're less than 1GB.

Tex

But he needs one more like mine that uses a laptop drive if he wants it to fit into his shirt pocket. The laptop ones are like half an inch thich and maybe an inch taller then a pack of smokes... they also require no bulky power connector.

You can get a 20gb or 40gb drive cheap on ebay and the enclosures are like 10 bucks.

The ones for 3.5 ide drives like he linked are to big to fit ina coat pocket (at least and require a clunky power poverter cable thing.

Laptop ones are sleek and cool and power comes off the usb port.

Tex