Western Digital My Passport Essential 320 GB USB 2.0 Portable Hard Drive WDME3200TN (Midnight Black)

The Western Digital My Passport Essential 320GB USB 2.0 Portable Hard Drive (Midnight Black) is the largest capacity in the portable essentials line-up. This comes in a variety of colors including Pink, Real Red, Artic White and Intense Blue. They say that this is the update to the regular Western Digital 320 GB Passport Hard Drive and I own both of them. In fact I also own many other portable hard drives in the Western Digital passport lineup and so far I couldn't be happier. All of these are great for mobile backups of data, though slower to copy large backups than their A/C powered MyBook big-brothers.

Some will be considering the Western Digital My Passport Essential 250GB and the Western Digital My Passport Essential 160 GB sizes of these drives. I started with the 160 GB and have owned multiple versions in all sizes, and capacity aside these drives are basically the same. If you are on the fence between a smaller or larger size, the decision will come down to what you really need most. If you need a drive for complete backups, don't box yourself in purchasing a 160 GB model when your hard drive is 120 GB. Give yourself some room and go with the 320 if you can.

For those with backup needs of 80 GB or smaller, look into the other capacities. Periodic specials are being run on some of the smaller sizes, making them very attractive. Plus a 500 GB model should be on the way soon. So if you need the largest size, then by all means get the 320 GB version. But if you can make do with the smaller size, then the value pricing may entice you. Weigh your options but whatever size you pick now make sure it's enough to meet your needs right now and for at least the next 6 months. In fact, some people who are extremely picky like me are going to want to buy at least 2 drives so that they can have 2 copies of their backups, just in case.

Pros
+ Great capacity options at good prices available in this line of products
+ Nice portable form factor that easily connects via USB
+ USB powered, no A/C required, which is great for portability
+ Works well on Windows Vista, XP and Mac OS X
+ Easy to set up disk encryption for security and privacy
+ Nice looks, and cool color options for those that care about that
+ Turns on and off with your computer or easily ejected via system tray
+ Easy plug-and-play installation
+ Integrates nicely with my growing stable of WD MyBook drives
+ Included software may be useful for some novices
+ Drives are sufficiently durable holding up to normal use over time
+ 320 GB capacity is just about right for most users

Cons
- Somewhat slow file transfer speeds for larger backups
- Included software not useful for power users
- Shiny body attracts scratch, fingerprints and dust
- Only USB, so look to the LaCie 250 GB Rugged Hard Disk if you need fire-wire ports too
- Only up to 320 GB right now, so look to the LaCie 500 GB Rugged Hard Disk with FireWire and USB if you need more capacity in a portable drive
- Have to spend your cash to get a case that should have been included

The Looks

The drive has a nice shiny exterior. The case can scratch in transit and the surface also attracts fingerprints and dust. But the look is still nice and you can easily purchase a case or holder for the drive if it bothers you. Most versions don't ship with the case included, but you can pick up the CaseLogic Small External Hard Drive Case (Black) for $10 or $15.

The Features

I had no problem connecting this drive to any computer, including Windows XP, Vista and Mac OS X. Keep in mind this is a USB 2.0 device so ancient computers may not yield the same results.

Transfer speeds are ok but definitely slower than the A/C powered MyBooks. This guy is still limited by the 480 Mbs connection speed of USB 2.0, but performs somewhat slower than this when performing large backups. The USB 2.0 speed rating can not really be achieved in production and you will get a fraction of that. But it's a trade-off that's worth it since it's USB-powered. Check out the LaCie 250 GB Rugged hard disk if you need fire-wire ports too. Or try the LaCie 500 GB Rugged hard disk if you need more portable capacity.

The software utilities included with this device will be most useful for beginners. I tested the backup software in particular but found it to be slow and impractical. I mean REALLY slow. It works, but cutting and pasting is better. Take my advice: don't use these utilities and just do cut and paste backups and saves to this drive.

Reliability

I've had good luck with the passport line of drives. They seem to have lower failure rates than many MyBook drives, though I also own those and haven't had issues there either. Maybe my gentle care has helped me to get lucky with these guys so far. Maybe it's because these drives are generally off when in transit. Regardless, these guys have held up fine.

Conclusion

This drive is great or those who want a portable drive for backups on the run. It's nice getting the 320GB capacity in one drive. There are smaller drives but other than capacity there is no real difference between them. Watch the price changes and choose the sized drive that's right for you.

Enjoy!

Iomega Prestige 1 TB USB 2.0 Desktop External Hard Drive 34275

Amazon offers this unit for less than some big-box stores. Another good reason to buy from Amazon.

Always remember that outfits like iomega, LaCie, Fantom and others are packagers, not hard drive manufacturers. There are only a few hard drive manufacturers and all of them turn out good products. This does not mean that hard drives don't fail - they do and anyone who keeps only one copy of critical data is a fool.

The units I purchased both had current models of Seagate Barracuda drives installed: excellent devices. Right now, the drives themselves from some sources cost only a few dollars less than the iomega unit, so you are getting the external housing for just a few dollars.

The housing has a power switch, very nice at a time when other manufacturers are eliminating such "frills" and a white activity light on the side, which strikes me as a strange place for it. Since the housing has no fan, there is no fan noise. The noise from the drive itself should be imperceptible. (If it isn't, return the unit immediately.)The housing remains cool to the touch in use.

The unit size is nice and a plastic base is included for those who prefer a vertical mounting.

A power supply and USB cable round out the package.

One of the very nice aspects of this unit is that there is no software installed on the drive - nor is any included in the box. Yea! The drive comes NTFS formatted and, for use with an Apple Macintosh, must be reformatted.

Intel Core LGA1366 Processor

I upgraded to the i7 from an Intel Core 2 Duo E8400. The main reasons I made the upgrade were:

1. Low power consumption (significantly lower than a Q6600 which is about $100 cheaper than the i7)
2. 8 logical cores available (quad core + hyper threading)
3. The ability to play cutting edge games that take advantage of all 8 cores.
4. The potential ability to load share between CPU & GPU once Windows 7 is released.

The upgrade might have been a bit premature, as the primary reason to buy an I7 processor won't be possible until Windows 7 is released. Windows 7 will allow load sharing between GPU (graphics card) and CPU. This will enable some really nice performance gains in games, or other graphic intensive applications like video editing software. Allegedly, games like Crysis will get a 20-30 percent performance increase. However, I heard that before when Windows stated that Vista would provide significant performance gains for DirectX10 games, which has not proved to be the case.

Regardless, the i7 920 is truly an amazing CPU. I've yet to experiment with overclocking much, but I do have it running at 3.12ghz stable and with a core temperature of 41C at idle and around 60C under load. I'll likely push things further in the coming weeks, and I'll give updates on temperatures and performance when I do.

Combining this card with two 4870hd 512mb graphics cards in Crossfire mode produced a 3DMark06 score of just over 19,000! That is a 5,000 point gain from my previous rig, and is in about the top 4% of all systems out there. That is pretty phenomenal performance. In Crysis with all settings at very high and DX10, I average over 50 frames at 1980x1200. This CPU is a gaming beast.

If you plan to overclock this card even a little, invest in an aftermarket heat sink and some Arctic Silver thermal compound. The heatsink provided with the retail package is small and ineffective at cooling an overclocked card. I recommend this Zalman Cpu Cooler for moderate overclocking. It is a very quite and very effective fan.

If your in the market for a 'future-proof' processor, this is a great option at a reasonable price point. The ceiling speed of processors is growing increasingly unimportant as multi-thread programing become the norm in both games and applications. You could spend a lot more for a higher GHZ CPU, but you're not really gaining as much performance as the jump from 2 to 4 cores, and then quad core to octo core. This processor will eat anything you throw at it and come back for more. Just make sure your mother board supports i7 chips before you buy one

Windows Vista Ultimate with SP1 Upgrade

I finally upgraded to Vista and it was a long time coming. I must admit for the longest time I felt envious of people who were operating on a system newer than mine, but I also felt secretly satisfied that XP was more secure and faster. No eye candy though. However, as both a Mac and a PC user, I had all the eye candy one would want with Leopard and it doesn't slow anything down.

What I don't understand is why Vista has to come in so many editions:

Windows Vista Home Basic
Windows Vista Home Premium
Windows Vista Business
Windows Vista Ultimate

Plus all the upgrade versions. Why not just one version that does it all, you know, the way they do it in the Mac world.

Okay, all that aside, I have two PCs, both desktops, one at work (which is actually mine, not my employers) and one at home. At work I installed Home Premium and at home I installed Vista Ultimate. I didn't time the installation in either place as I was doing other stuff during the process, but neither install took more than an hour.

I did not do clean installs in either case, instead opting for the upgrade option, just to see if it worked. Besides, I have lots of back up hard drives so I wasn't worried and it appears I didn't need to, because both installs went swimmingly. I understand others have not been so lucky, but I was.

After choosing my local time, currency, keyboard layout, user name, icon, wallpaper and password Vista decided my computers were good to go and they were.

Right off the bat I have to say, I like the Aero interface. Is it better than Leopard's, not really, but it's not worse either, just different. I've got four gigs of ram in both computers and though maybe Vista might have been a tad slower doing some photoshop work than XP, it wasn't all that noticeable. Some things may have been a bit slower opening, but not enough to make me miss XP. All in all, I have to say I'm okay with Vista.

Windows Vista Home Premium with SP1

I thought I would write this review since a lot of people seem to be wondering if some games will work with vista. Just a short list of games I have played on Vista with no problems. All played great with no crashing problems installing problems or otherwise.

1.Half Life Orange Box
2.Far Cry (original version)
3.Stalker
4.The Witcher
5.Quake 4
6.Crysis
7.Oblivion IV
8.Planescape
9.Fear
10.Unreal Tournament 3 (gold / 2 / and original ut)
11.Alien vs Predator 2
12.Doom 3
13.Portal
I went from win 98 to the windows Vista so for me it has been an incredible improvement. I really like Vista and haven't had any problems worth mentioning. I wonder if people having problems with vista don't have systems strong enough to run it. (just a thought I really don't know).
I'm running an HP Media center w/ AMD 64x2 3000+ / EVGA Gforce 9600 oc / with 4 Gig ram. Sorry to here about all the people having problems with it we all know how frustrating a quirky computer can be but all in all I'm very happy with vista.
Added note: My Vista home premium came preinstalled when I purchased computer. I have always felt I would just be fooling myself to think I could put a system together that would be as good as one put together with the combined efforts of 1000's of very intelligent people. I give both Vista and HP 5 stars.

LG Super Multi Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD-ROM Drive (GGC-H20L)

Product Description
Product Description
Blu-ray Disc & HD DVD are the next generation in optical storage, offering 15GB to 30GB (HD DVD) and 25GB to 50GB (Blu-ray Disc) of storage capacity on a disc. Serial ATA is a 1.5Gbps evolutionary replacement for the Parallel ATA physical storage interface used to connect storage devices, such as hard disks, DVD and CD rewriters to the PC motherboard. Serial ATA is scalable, enables design of smaller PCs, and will allow future enhancements to the computing platform. Create silkscreen-quality disc labels direct from your PC with LightScribe. LightScribe is a laser printing technology on the exclusive LightScribe disc. It provides a complete, convenient, cost effective system for labeling discs. Simply “burn” the data to a LightScribe disc, flip the disc over, place it back in the drive, and “burn” the label.

Product Description
PRODUCT FEATURES:Blu-ray Disc and HD Dvd-rom drive6x BD-R read speed3x HD DVD read speed16x DVD write speedLightScribe

This works as advertised - you can play HD-DVD and Blu-Ray movies. Cyberlink software for playing both types of movie is included. The downside is that you need a computer to put it in to get a complete player, but this unit plus a computer is still cheaper than the other dual format players out there.

Iomega 34270 USB 2.0 500GB Prestige Desktop Hard Drive

Product Description
Product Description
The Iomega Prestige Desktop Hard Drive USB 2.0, 500GB provides a simple and affordable solution for all your storage needs. Ideal for adding capacity to your system, this stylish drive offers a sturdy aluminum construction and included stand. It's the easiest way to save photos, music, videos and more, in addition the Prestige Desktop Hard Drive is powered by an Energy Star qualified adapter for a better environment! Included free with your Iomega hard drive purchase, choose either EMC Retrospect Express or Retrospect Express HD for PC or Mac for easy file backup (software via download). Also included is free MozyHome Online Backup (2GB online capacity).

Product Description
The Iomega Prestige Desktop Hard Drive USB 2.0 provides a simple and affordable solution for all your storage needs. Ideal for adding capacity to your system, this stylish drive offers a sturdy aluminum construction and included stand. It's the easiest way to save photos, music, videos and more, plus the Prestige Desktop Hard Drive is powered by an Energy Star qualified adapter for a better environment. EMC Retrospect HD (PC) software license is included for easy file backup (software via download).

I've had the Prestige for a little over 2 weeks now. It works great.
-There's No annoying software (like my friend's WD Mybook)
-Runs super quiet
-I've had it on for hours at a time and it only gets a little warm
-It's got a cool stand
-It has a power switch

I've been very impressed thus far and would highly recommend this hard drive. Only downside is its actually about 465 gigs, but most hard drives are like that. The reason I say so far is externals seem to be prone to crashing if you read reviews. Hopefully it lasts forever though.

Again, Sweet hard drive.