I run 3 externals constantly. 1 1TB and 2 300GB. Never had any trouble. My specs are 1.7GHz Intel Pentium M, 1 GB DDR2 RAM. 4 USB2 slots.

Depends on your specs. As you can see my main sharing computer doesn't have much power and doesn't need it either.

PickaxeFairy

First off, my PC is older than yours and I have five external USB hard drives and one external USB DVD writer.

I bought my PC in October 2002 and it had only 4 x USB1.1 ports (as well as a 60GB HD C:\ drive and only 512MB ram), I eventually added 2 x PCI to USB2.0 cards which gave me 8 x USB2.0 external ports and it is these ports that my five external USB hard drives are connected to. And as I said in my previous post, I have had no problems with any of them, i.e 2 x 160GB, 2 x 250GB and 1 x 500GB.

Just out of interest, I have changed my original 60GB HD for a 300GB one and added a second internal 500GB HD, and I have had absolutely no power problems.

So, connecting any external drives to your set up, whether they are 1TB USB HDs, 2 x 250GB HDs, etc., they will not cause you any problems whatsoever.

Finally, as you can imagine I am constantly swapping data/info between my externals, my internals to externals and back again, also without any problems.

Hope this helps



UK Bob

Thanks for your reply Bob - much appreciated.

Your answer is most encouraging - I've been at sixes and sevens for a while now over this....
Various different *experts* have been giving me all these various *should dos and shouldn't dos*....
It's doing my head in!

I hasten to add - I refer not to all the helpful peeps on here
You all obviously know what you're talking about - and you've been worth your weight in gold to me in the past....

Who I'm talking about is the *I proclaim to know everything pc related - but in reality I don't actually know what the hell I'm talking about* guys they send when you've got an extended warranty. Oh come on - you've gotta laugh!
You've all been helpful to me in your own different ways, believe me.

I still haven't quite made up my mind as to whether I'll upgrade my 160GB drive to a 500GB or 1TB - or whether I'll keep things as they are and just use a couple of 250/500GB external drives....

Whatever I end up doing - all suggestions, advice and info will be a big part of my final decision....

Thanks all!

Little update if anyone's interested

I ended up going with a couple of 320GB external drives in the end - one to download to and one to back up to....
(PC World have got a pretty good deal on WD 320GB external hard drives atm if anyone's interested )

I have to say though.... I do notice quite a difference in Limewire's performance when I download to an external, as opposed to my pc's main drive.... There's quite a bit of crashing and freezing tends to go on - which I can't say I ever experienced when I was downloading to my main drive.
Having said that though - I kinda feel 'safer' downloading to an external and not my pc hard drive. Though maybe that's just me....

Stating the obvious here - if something major happens with your pc and you've got no copes of anything.... well you're up the proverbial creek without that all important paddle!
I find it quite unbelievable how many people *still* don't back up - then whinge and moan when all their documents, photos and music are lost....

about the only time they are truly lost is when the HDD completely dies....

if the OS dies, then you have various options as how to retrieve data from the drive..

I use a dual boot system with the OS's on separate HDDs and if one goes south, I just need boot into the other OS and retrieve the data from the drive before I reformat it and install a new copy of the OS...

one can also buy another HDD, install the OS on it and then view the other drive and get files off of it, remove all traces of the old OS and then use the drive as a data drive...

there are of course also data recovery tools

__________________


So Long and Thanks for All the Files
_____________________________________________

Beware of the big 3 insurance companies in Texas! Read your policies carefully (maybe you'll need a lawyer) Allstate, Farmers & State Farm are overextended and their 'coverage' is worthless...a true waste of your money Read This

Thanks for the tips Peerless. At least I'll know what to do now if things should go a bit awry...


Who am I kidding??! As if I'd know the first place to start....
I'll just get my *male* mate to sort it out. Simples!

PickaxeFairy

You said: I am somewhat surprised, especially as I have never (ever) experienced this slowing down in performance, crashing and freezing you are experiencing.

I've just looked at the USB drive you are using, it looks great, but I can't tell if it has an external power supply unit.

BUY THE WD Portable Storage ONLINE AT PC WORLD.

If it hasn't, I would strongly suggest that you change your drives for ones that do.



UK Bob

External drives tend not to be active 100% of time & that upsets LW.

yep...the occasional signal sent to a sleeping drive and awaiting it to respond can send a lot of programs (and even the OS) into fits...

__________________


So Long and Thanks for All the Files
_____________________________________________

Beware of the big 3 insurance companies in Texas! Read your policies carefully (maybe you'll need a lawyer) Allstate, Farmers & State Farm are overextended and their 'coverage' is worthless...a true waste of your money Read This

You're not kidding!

My OS seems to go scatty when I've got an external plugged in....

If I should want to go onto Google, for instance - well it's just ridiculous the time it takes. It's got to the point now where I don't even bother even attempting to open up other windows when I've got Limewire going and an external plugged in. Which - if I should happen to be on Limewire for a rather long period of time - which is quite regularly, I hasten to add.... well you can imagine. It's an absolute pain in the rear!

Even something simple like being in my download window and going to check my upload window, or vice versa. There's this ridiculous delay....

And god forbid if I should happen to be downloading at the time....
When my pc finally sees its way clear to sorting itself out, that host I was downloading that got to have track or album from has gone off-line.