External hard drive

[RandomFool]

I'm looking for a external hard drive so I can take all my junk on the road with me. I was looking at the wd passports because they're small and a friend on mine seemed happy with his. I'm a little worried about it over heating or getting damaged somehow because that case can't have much protection in it. Does anyone have experience with this drive? Would this work ok for watching movies, and playing music off of them? I've only got Usb 1.1 on one of my computers so I'm assuming that is going to slow things waay down transfering files and might give me some issues with media play back but Usb 2 should be fine right?

 

[ch33zw1z]

I don't have experience with the passports directly, but people I know seem to like them. USB2.0 can keep up with music and movie playback, but USB1.1 may cause some problems. You could always purchase a drive and external enclosure on your own.

 

[RandomFool]

I was thinking about getting my own drive but I liked the small package of the passport.

 

[Roguestar]

Drive and external enclosure is superior in terms of speed, capacity and cost. You need to weigh those against physical size of "proper" portable hard drives.

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

I have had mine for aa while now, and I haven't had any problems. I have never noticed the drive even being warm to the touch, despite leaving it on to transfer 50+ gigs at a time. Playing music off of it via USB 2.0 is no problem, but I haven't tried video. I'm sure it wouldn't be a problem. I would definitely upgrade that machine to USB 2.0 if you are going to use it.

 

[rb56]

I have a 120gb passport that I have been using for about 6 mo. My main use is for backups but I do keep music and videos on it also. I have no problems with either and after watching video for quite a while I can't remember it really even being warm to the touch. The thing that sold me though was the size, a lot of gigs in a small package.

 

[hardbench]

Yes, you might want to stick with USB 2.0 for video.