New
#1
Trying to decide about backup drive.
I already asked this in the thread linked below but I thought this might get more traction in the General section
Questions about setting up a network drive
Until now I have been using a 2TB WD My Cloud as a network drive and a 3TB WD My Book as a backup drive with Karen's Replicator doing a file by file backup every night.
Some while ago I noticed that my files weren't being backed up so I did a bunch of experimenting and found that it would work if I re-booted the My Book it would work OK for a few weeks and I'd have to re-boot it again. The last few times it wouldn't re-boot until I disconnected it, gave it a few gentle taps and re-connected it so I'm pretty sure the HDD in it is on the way out.
The My Cloud is older and gets more use so I was thinking I probably needed to replace both of them before I have a big problem but I did some research and learned that the the My Cloud comes with a WD Red HDD (known for longevity so as long as I have a reliable backup I can leave it alone if it is working OK).
But I need to do something about the My Book. What I found about the My Book said they come with whatever HDD WD have a lot of on hand at time of manufacture, usually Blue or Green but some pages claim that some of them came with Red drives with white labels. I opened my My Book and it has a Green HDD.
Apparently the Red ones are designed for use in network drives where they are on 24/7 for their entire life but they also work well as internal hard drives in computers and other applications.
I have come up with several options:
- 4TB red HDD from WD's Amazon store for about $100 CAD. If I'm reading things right one of those should last a long time in the My Book.
- New 4TB My Book (different case design from the one I have) for $120
- 4TB WD Elements desktop external drive (similar case to my My Book) for $115.
- 4TB WD My Passport portable external SSD for $118
- There are also several 4TB external drives from Seagate, Toshiba &c in the same price range.
I really don't know much about this sort of thing so I'd like some other opinions before I make a final decision.