Storage Solutions Suggestions for home storage strategy

V

vader

Disciple
I have been following the Storage threads for a while now to plan my "storage strategy" for my home. Still not sure how to proceed so thought I'd ask the gurus out here.

Requirements: The stuff I need to store can be classified as (1) Photos from my digital camera (about 15GB) (2) Documents such as letters, bills, etc. that can easily be backed up onto CD/DVD, (about 3-4GB) (3) Videos from my VHS days as well as the newer digital ones (about 30-40GB and growing), and (4) mp3 collection that I cannot afford to lose (about 50GB of compressed and uncompressed)

Currently I have them on a 160GB Maxtor that I bought in 2003 in the US but that seems to be running into issues -- occasionally lose a few files after CHKDSK runs. I also have an older 40GB Maxtor that I use as temp storage and a brand new 80GB Seagate that I use for OS, programs, etc. and is my primary drive.

As you can see, my secondary storage drives are old and I am losing faith in them. I am thinking of the following options for a new setup.

My system setup is rather dated but I don't plan to upgrade unless I absolutely have to. A7N8X-Deluxe, Athlon 2200+, 1GB Kingston. Motherboard supports SATA1.

Option 1:
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2 x 200 or 250GB Raid1 setup using my motherboard) and Win2k.

Option 2:
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1 x 200 or 250GB storage drive internal and the second one external acting as backup/portable storage

Option 3:
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1 x 400GB storage with two partitions and redundant copies of documents + backup important stuff to DVD/CD.

From what I can see all the above options are likely to cost similar. But any suggestions or feedback. Any other ideas are equally welcome.

Thanks

V
 
From your post, I see that you want some kind of redundancy in your storage. It's a very good idea these days to invest in some kind of redundancy for your data due to the enormous amount of data that one can potentially lose. My views are.

1. Don't consider 200GB. The 250GB is just a hundred or so rupees more.

2. A 400GB with two partitions will only give logical redundancy i.e. if your drive physically fails, you may or may not be able to recover all your data. So, IMO, it's not the best option.

3. A 2 X 250GB RAID 1 setup will provide you physical redundancy, save you the problem of manually backing up your data and save you the mess of wires that accompanies an external 250GB drive. But, you may have to remove your old drives from your cabby to accomodate the new drive. You need to have extra power and a SATA/PATA channel free.

4. An externalized 250GB HDD and one HDD sitting internally in your system is good if you want to control what needs to be backed up and when and maybe even achieve portability with your data via the external drive. But, externalized 3.5 inch HDDs a a little messy due to both power and data cables running to them. You might want to consider externalized 2.5 inch laptop drives running on USB power. They are very small and much easier to handle. But they are costlier and the largest capacity available currently is 160GB. Also, this 2.5 inch HDD segment is one wherein pricing is not structured and has seen huge price drops so these HDDs bought might lose their resale value as newer drives come out.

Finally, put worthless data on DVDs. The price per GB for a HDD is very high vs a cheap DVD. If you don't care about some data, you can put it on DVDs. But then again, too many DVDs around the house might drive you nuts(at least for me ;) ).
 
Hi sydras,

You make some very good points! Thank you.

Regarding running 2.5 inch external drives on USB power I find that my current 80GB 2.5inch external drive (Seagate inside a Transcend case) runs fine from my laptop USB but requires two USB ports to run from my desktop.

And if portability for me means that I unplug once a week or two at max, then the tangle of wires for a 3.5 inch drive may be ok compared to the capacity and cost issues for a 2.5inch.

I think I am more inclined towards an internal and an external drive of 250GB each. I can selectively backup/archive stuff and in a pinch can also connect to my laptops if needed.

Thanks again!

V
 
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