Data Storage ?

[Washac]

After having an external HDD fail over the weekend with loads of stuff on it I was wondering what would be a safer external data storage option non mechanical preferably ?

My machine specs are below that helps.

EDIT: If I go back down the HDD external anybody have any recommendations as to best options
as in make model etc ?

 

[keysofanxiety]

After having an external HDD fail over the weekend with loads of stuff on it I was wondering what would be a safer external data storage option non mechanical preferably ?

My machine specs are below that helps.

You can consider cloud storage, such as Dropbox.

Otherwise external data storage will always be physical. An SSD is quite expensive for this purpose only, so it may be best to get another mechanical hard-drive. However you can constantly monitor the hard-drive's health to ensure that if it is in the early stages of failure, you can identify it before it dies.

The first thing to do would be enabling SMART monitoring for external drives by downloading and installing this, then restarting the machine.

Secondly if you install a SMART monitoring tool such as SMART Utility. Use this link if you're on OS X 10.9 or later; otherwise, if you're on OS X 10.8 or earlier, download this one.

TL;DR: you did get unlucky with your drive failing, though ultimately it comes with the territory and there aren't any real financially viable alternatives -- so hopefully SMART monitoring should give you a little peace of mind for future.

 

[Washac]

You can consider cloud storage, such as Dropbox.

Otherwise external data storage will always be physical. An SSD is quite expensive for this purpose only, so it may be best to get another mechanical hard-drive. However you can constantly monitor the hard-drive's health to ensure that if it is in the early stages of failure, you can identify it before it dies.

The first thing to do would be enabling SMART monitoring for external drives by downloading and installing this, then restarting the machine.

Secondly if you install a SMART monitoring tool such as SMART Utility. Use this link if you're on OS X 10.9 or later; otherwise, if you're on OS X 10.8 or earlier, download this one.

TL;DR: you did get unlucky with your drive failing, though ultimately it comes with the territory and there aren't any real financially viable alternatives -- so hopefully SMART monitoring should give you a little peace of mind for future.

So firstly I install SMART Monitoring using your first link, then I install and use SMART utility in your second link ?

Or do I use one or the other ?

 

[keysofanxiety]

So firstly I install SMART Monitoring using your first link, then I install and use SMART utility in your second link ?

Or do I use one or the other ?

That's right, SMART monitoring & then install SMART Utility. Basically SMART Utility will not be able to monitor SMART data for external drives without the first driver.

 

[Washac]

That's right, SMART monitoring & then install SMART Utility. Basically SMART Utility will not be able to monitor SMART data for external drives without the first driver.

OK, thank you very much for your reply

Since you replied I added this -

If I go back down the HDD external anybody have any recommendations as to best options
as in make model etc ?

 

[matreya]

I'd recommend Toshiba external drives, but also I would suggest that you get a 2nd drive to completely backup the first.

No make of drive is infallible so having a backup scheme is very important.

 

[Fishrrman]

Well, hard drives (platter based or SSD) can fail at any time.

The best protection against loss of data due to drive failure is something called "a backup".

So... if you have an external drive "with loads of stuff on it" that you will miss when the drive fails -- BACK IT UP to ANOTHER drive, or better yet, to TWO drives (one stored nearby and another stored "off-site" in another building).

Absolutely the best method for backing up one external drive to another is CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper.
Nothing easier!

What has "failed" about the drive?
Tell us more.

 

[mildocjr]

Depending on the size of the drive you might look at cloud storage. Mega.co.nz gives you 50 GB for free, most other providers can give you a TB of storage relatively cheap. Plus they provide their own failover and backups so you don't have to worry about your data being lost. I'd only be concerned if the files you are storing are illegal.

To add to S.M.A.R.T. monitoring, I use a free tool called Onyx that checks the S.M.A.R.T. status of your drive along with a lot of other features for cleaning out old logs and caches. I wouldn't use it too much and like everything else, if you don't know exactly what an option does, don't touch it.

 

[arggg14]

I only use WD drives, I haven't had a failure in 10 years.

 

[mildocjr]

I only use WD drives, I haven't had a failure in 10 years.

WD does make good drives, only had one failure in all my WD drives over the past 14 years and that drive was sitting as a network drive that was always on.

 

[Washac]

Depending on the size of the drive you might look at cloud storage. Mega.co.nz gives you 50 GB for free, most other providers can give you a TB of storage relatively cheap. Plus they provide their own failover and backups so you don't have to worry about your data being lost. I'd only be concerned if the files you are storing are illegal.

To add to S.M.A.R.T. monitoring, I use a free tool called Onyx that checks the S.M.A.R.T. status of your drive along with a lot of other features for cleaning out old logs and caches. I wouldn't use it too much and like everything else, if you don't know exactly what an option does, don't touch it.

Thanks for the pointer towards Onyx

This only seems to check the main startup disk.


[doublepost=1459843790][/doublepost]

Well, hard drives (platter based or SSD) can fail at any time.

The best protection against loss of data due to drive failure is something called "a backup".

So... if you have an external drive "with loads of stuff on it" that you will miss when the drive fails -- BACK IT UP to ANOTHER drive, or better yet, to TWO drives (one stored nearby and another stored "off-site" in another building).

Absolutely the best method for backing up one external drive to another is CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper.
Nothing easier!

What has "failed" about the drive?
Tell us more.

The drive is not spinning up and just sits there faintly clicking.