Advice need on external harddrive

[MBP*]

I recently upgraded to a Macbook Pro from a Windows desktop. I had a collective 4TB of data on my desktop, and now I have about 4 HDs worth of data that I'd like to transfer to a single external HD.

I was planning on getting a standard 4TB external, but then came across some NAS drives from WD in the MyBook range. Reading the reviews it looks like the NAS drives aren't designed to be plugged into the PC directly via USB, so instead everything is accessed via ethernet. If this is the case, wouldn't it be less hassle in getting a standard USB3 external, otherwise I'd need a network to access the NAS drive over LAN.

Looking at:
WD 4TB My Cloud Personal Cloud Storage - NAS by Western Digital
vs.
WD My Book 4 TB USB 3.0 Hard Drive

 

[Astroboy907]

Yep, you need a network to access a NAS box (or some network trickery that can make it appear on a small network but be directly connected to a computers ethernet).

USB3 would be better for transfers because it has more throughput, but NAS would be better for accessing files over a network. E.g with a NAS you can access folders on your NAS anywhere in the world if it's connected to the internet. Pretty much a DIY dropbox.

If you're not looking for network connectivity, a USB3 drive would be a great fit for you.

Might want to check into RAID setups as well, which adds redundancy (but is not a true backup).

As always, best to keep important files on at least two separate drives.