Back Up For Mac/ 500 Mb

[THAIPHUKET]

500 MB backup required, what brand do you trust, where to buy, approx price?

[JusMe]

I've got a couple of ACER 1 terrabyte external drives. Work well and am satisfied with them.

Bought one in a shop in Pantip Plaza, and the other the IT Store that advertises here on TV.

About 3000 baht for 1 terrabyte.

[steve187]

some 2.5" 500gb external (no power supply needed) with 5 year warranty are 1830 baht , here

[sfokevin]

As an alternative backup check out the website Dropbox It give you 2GB cloud drive.

I find it great as a desktop drive that I can save files on and access from any of my computers.

[Dante99]

500Mb backup??? get a thumb drive, get two or three in case you loose one

[nikster]

500Mb backup??? get a thumb drive, get two or three in case you loose one

What... oh... whoa, I hadn't even realized he's talking about MB...do you really have 500 megabytes to back up? Or 500GB?

I have a little cheap WD Elements external drive with 1.5GB, I think it cost around 4000 baht. It works well. If you have 500GB to back up you should get a drive that's a bit bigger than that. For using TimeMachine, at least 1GB so you can do incremental backups. The reason to use TimeMachine is that it's very easy and very fast.

And yes it you really only have 500 MB, get a 1GB thumb drive for around 200 Baht

Edited December 22, 2010 by nikster

[THAIPHUKET]

my mistake, back up is for Mac Mini 320 GB , i.e. 500GB is what I want. Yes , I use time machine.

The cloud is tempting too. Dont understand, however, who guarantees it'll be running in x years time?

Here cc from industryweek

Risks of Cloud Computing Outweigh Benefits

Close to half of U.S. IT professionals say that the risks of cloud computing outweigh the benefits, according to the first annual ISACA IT Risk/Reward Barometer survey.

CXOs are increasingly interested in cloud computing because of its potential to deliver lower total cost of ownership (TCO), higher return on investment (ROI), increased efficiency and pay-as-you-go services. Analyst firm IDC says that cloud services will outpace traditional IT spending over the next five years and will represent $44.2 billion by 2013.

Yet IT professionals see risks in entrusting information assets to the cloud, according to the survey of 1,809 U.S. IT professionals who are members of ISACA. The IT Risk/Reward Barometer found that only 10% of respondents' organizations plan to use cloud computing for mission-critical IT services and one in four (26%) do not plan to use it for any IT services.

Consistent with this attitude is the appetite for overall IT-related risk in 2010. In the face of continued economic uncertainty and despite the potential to drive greater rewards, more than three-quarters of those surveyed believe that projects should offer the same or lower level of risk in 2010. Similarly, 79% will invest the same amount or only slightly more in risk management and compliance in 2010.

"The cloud represents a major change in how computing resources will be utilized, so it's not surprising that IT professionals have concerns about risk vs. reward trade-offs," says Robert Stroud, international vice president of ISACA and vice president of IT service management and governance for the service management business unit at CA Inc. "But risk and value are two sides of the same coin. If cloud computing is treated as a major governance initiative involving a broad set of stakeholders, it has the potential to yield benefits that can equal or outweigh the risks."

IT Risk Management

The online survey also gauged organizations' attitudes and behaviors related to IT risk management. According to IT professionals, only 22% of organizations are very effective at integrating IT risk management with their overall business risk management. The most common reason for practicing IT risk management was regulatory compliance (28%) versus business drivers such as improving the balance of risk taking with risk avoidance to improve return (8%).

"While compliance is critical, it is unfortunate that more enterprises do not see performance improvement as a primary reason for implementing effective risk management," said Brian Barnier, principal at ValueBridge Advisors. "On the performance side, about 16% see cost management as a driver for risk management; 9% see business change as the most important driver; and 8% choose improving risk-return balance. From the CFO, COO, CEO or board perspective -- just like in personal investing or sports -- the main driver should be balancing risk vs. return to drive profitable growth. As the one-third of IT professionals who are more business-focused already seem to know, robust risk management is a powerful tool to create that value. We hope to see more enterprises shift from a compliance to performance view of risk management."

View article on one page

INTERIM CONCLUSION FOR ME

1. continue back up drive via TImeMachine

2. test cloud computing,

question is, does it consume more time through uploading? It should, e.g. when uploading big tif photos.

Will take for ever.

Accessibility wherever I want is a bonus.

Any other thoughts?

[mcgriffith]

Moved to Computer forum, with live link remaining on CM.

[astral]

Sony has some nice 500Gb 2.5" disks, powered off the usb,

or 1Tb and 2Tb disks that need external power.

[howto]

For the past 2+ weeks I've researched for exactly the same item.

After reading several reviews, round-ups, shoot-outs and user forums...

the winner is...

Western Digital Scorpio Blue, 500GB, SATA 3Gbs, model "WD5000BEVT"

It's a laptop drive, commonly available here, costs <1900 bt.

This placed into a external case with SATA to USB2 (<300 bt), and you are good to go.

I plan to do exactly this during these holidays.

One fact emerged during my research: all usb ports are not created equal.

Some laptop usb ports don't have enough power for external HDD's,

expecially at spin-up (5 seconds) where the drive can draw close to 1 amp.

Most usb ports are rated at 500ma.

In this event one has 2 choices:

1) a usb "Y Cable" which draws power from 2 usb ports or

2) a external power adapter.

Any drive larger than 2.5 inch will certainly require external power.

The 'branded" WD portable HDD unit, is the

Western Digital "My Passport Essential" or "My Passport Essential SE".

Both easily available here, 500GB units are around 2100 bt.

Down side to these: many report the micro-usb connector is fragile,

and that it is propriatory and

the sata-usb conversion is on the drive itself (not in the case),

which rules out using the case in a later upgrade.

[THAIPHUKET]

This is perfect info, wonderful and happy that I didn't buy yet.

Almost a xmas present :-)

Thanks

[nikster]

For the past 2+ weeks I've researched for exactly the same item.

After reading several reviews, round-ups, shoot-outs and user forums...

the winner is...

Western Digital Scorpio Blue, 500GB, SATA 3Gbs, model "WD5000BEVT"

It's a laptop drive, commonly available here, costs <1900 bt.

This placed into a external case with SATA to USB2 (<300 bt), and you are good to go.

I plan to do exactly this during these holidays.

One fact emerged during my research: all usb ports are not created equal.

Some laptop usb ports don't have enough power for external HDD's,

expecially at spin-up (5 seconds) where the drive can draw close to 1 amp.

Most usb ports are rated at 500ma.

In this event one has 2 choices:

1) a usb "Y Cable" which draws power from 2 usb ports or

2) a external power adapter.

Any drive larger than 2.5 inch will certainly require external power.

The 'branded" WD portable HDD unit, is the

Western Digital "My Passport Essential" or "My Passport Essential SE".

Both easily available here, 500GB units are around 2100 bt.

Down side to these: many report the micro-usb connector is fragile,

and that it is propriatory and

the sata-usb conversion is on the drive itself (not in the case),

which rules out using the case in a later upgrade.

I agree there's nothing wrong at all with a WD hard disk - and they're pretty easy to get here in Thailand. WD currently has a very good reputation for reliability which is really the only thing that matters for external disks.

But I would recommend the "branded" box. First of all, in two years or whenever when you update, the box will probably be of limited use. Second, I have had many a bad experience with the external boxes - there's a reason they cost 200 baht - you get what you pay for. Or actually I also bought some 400 baht ones which then didn't work, and had huge problems with power draw. During my time in Thailand I've had about 4 or 5 no name boxes die on me - one even took the HD with it when it went.

The branded versions are tested and sold in the west as well, and have the brand name behind it which ensures that the company takes a certain responsibility for them. They are going to be better than some no name brand that people only buy because it's the cheapest available.

Good experience with branded drives from WD, Buffalo, and Toshiba. Buffalo is a Japanese brand with a good reputation, my 500GB backup drive has been working flawlessly for 2 years. I also have a WD Elements but that's a desktop drive (3.5" / 1.5TB) and has a normal size USB connector so it won't have the problem you said WD's branded portables have.