[ale] usb external drive recommendations needed

[Greg Freemyer]

If portability is high on the priority list consider getting an
external USB2 unit that holds a laptop drive.  They are physically
very small.  And at least one I have seen is powered straight from the
USB so you don't need one of those power bricks.

I don't know how big you can get, but I would expect at least 120GB, maybe more.

If you need bigger, we just bought a 500GB external last week for around $250.

Things to consider:
Some distros default to mounting USB drives in "sync" mode.  Makes it
very safe, but very slow.  SuSE 10.1 / 10.2 offer a special FAT32
mount option.  I think it is "flush" or something.  They use that
option by default.  Not quite as safe as sync, but much faster.  With
flush you really should still manually unmount before you disconnect.
OTOH, the kernel supposidly makes an effort to empty the write cache
as fast as it can, so if you don't see any write activity on the drive
it should be safe to pull the drive.

I don't know if any other distro's default to flush.  Do a mount and
see what options are in use.

FYI: Firewire 800 is faster than USB2 if you can use it (and afford
it).  eSata 300 is the fastest thing out there currently (and not a
bad price, but I don't know how stable the drivers etc. are).  I have
not used either much.

HTH
Greg

On 2/12/07, Preston Boyington <preston.lists at gmail.com> wrote:
> as the subject indicates...
>
> i am having to do some video editing and conversion (VHS and 8mm to DVD)
> of my daughter's birth / birthday's / etc. for my ex-wife so i will need
> a sizable drive and would like it reasonably portable so maybe it could
> fit into my backpack with my laptop.  a good deal would be high up on my
> list too...
>
> also, has anyone had issues with syncing, data loss, etc. with using usb
> external drives?  having one of these large files corrupt because of
> some transfer issue would not make for a happy day.
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> Ale at ale.org
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>


-- 
Greg Freemyer
The Norcross Group
Forensics for the 21st Century