At times, we may find ourselves running out of space as far as our internal hard disk drives are concerned. So you can turn to burning them to a DVD or CD but the thing is, how often can you do this practice? Are you sure that your burned files can still be accessed when you need to restore or access them?

It has always been better to store files and programs on a hard disk. Other than not having to worry about proper access of files, it is much convenient. PC users could care less how much files they have on their hard drive but the fact of the matter is that hard drives, external or internal, are better solutions for most.

External drives via USB connections pose as another storage device to which can be accessed. Such has been the gift of technology towards techie geeks these days and one thing you will notice is that you can bring it anywhere and plug them to any PC when you need your files to be safe and with you always.

The cost for getting one is not the expensive. In fact, with the right resources, you may be surprised that it can be close to the same amount of CD burners and discs. Further, you don’t have to worry about running out of space since hard disks are known to have larger storage spaces. So if you use it all up, you just buy a new hard drive, but that would really take some time compared to traditional optic storage drives capacity.

It is practically easy to buy a hard disk these days. With large storage capacity, you would have to consider what files you would place in them. If you are the hardcore techie freak, chances are you would be thinking videos and audio files to which you can easily download today over the web. But before we go a bit forward on everything, it would be best to potentially canvass and plan just how much capacity you really need.

Apparently, people will have no second guesses as far as what storage capacity to buy. The biggest of course! There would be only one thing in the way and normally it would be the area of price. These days, for a difference of a couple of dollars, you would surely get the next big storage capacity hard disk. No doubt that would be your first choice.

Next, many would consider the manufacturer. Normally it would be a toss up between:

1. Seagate
2. Maxtor
3. Fujitsu
4. Hitachi

You can really interchange which between Seagate and Maxtor would be your preference. Others turn to the little known brands, Fujitsu and Hitachi for saving and disregard on durability. They may cost less but if there is one thing that you have to consider is the fact that they may not necessarily be reliable especially in the long run. Bad sectors and warranty issues may come into play but knowing hard disks, it takes so much for them to be displaced and unreliable.

If you will notice in desktops, the feature that allows you to upgrade storage in the form of hard disks and optical media players bolsters the need of addressing storage issues. Unlike in laptops where hard disk changing may not always be present, the use of various hard drives such as SATA or SCSI has made all the difference in addressing the storage issue.

Storage for some desktop users would depend on what files they are pointing. Normally, it is not plainly about documents and spreadsheets. With technology offering a lot of things for the modern computer geek, audio, pictures and videos have likewise entered the fray. With that in mind, you can just imagine the space that these files would occupy and normally it can negate the usual gigabyte capacity of hard drives as well.

Laptops are not made for storage of large files. Some of these mobile computers have been equipped with higher capacity drives these days but you will notice the timing. They only offer larger storage after some time. At this age, we are already exposed to larger capacity drives, perhaps double than what laptops can carry. Why? For one thing, laptops are not designed to be storage space. They are made for assisting mobile users and not the hardcore programmer or designers.

So the next time you are wondering why desktops differ from laptops, just look beyond what they have to offer. The specifications are there but you need to look further. Storage is only one part of the entire picture for their variance.

When I was buying a new network card for my busted one, I couldn’t help overhear the new specs of current computer buyers today. One thing that struck me the most was the presence of a 500 Gigabyte hard drive. I sort of like told myself, “Whoa! Now that is STORAGE”. It takes me back in time where I was wondering how many 60 to 80 gigabyte hard disks a plain computer could handle but 500 gigabyte? That is like time 6 of previous storages of hard disks in the market.

Immediately you would think, what files you would place with such a big storage capacity. Never mind if it is a Seagate or a Maxtor, the point is you have more than enough data storage capacity to work on. In fact, it made me wonder, would people still need multiple hard disks where one is programmed to be assigned as the master hard disk while the other is a slave?

Unless of course if you are a crazy downloader of audio, video or even software files, having one 500 gigabyte hard disk is sufficient. But that is quite a lot of storage space and if you ask me, it would be best to partition it to avoid disk problems such as when the time comes you have to use tools such as Scan Disk or Defragmentation. Imagine the time you have to wait for if the whole 500 gigabyte were to be used? You are lucky if it doesn’t take days!

For some, the larger the storage, the better it is for them. This means more files and the luxury of storing large files like audio and video files can be accommodated. One thing that people have noticed these days is that the usual 40 to 160 gigabyte hard disks don’t last long. Attribute this to the fact that people have gone crazy placing or downloading videos into their computer, not wanting to burn them for fear that they may be damaged once they are transferred to the usual optical drives.

With that said, Verbatim has introduced a 640 gigabyte hard disk into the market. Wow! That is times 4 of the last maximum hard disk of 160 gigabyte and it makes you wonder on what to put in it. Imagine the number of videos you can place there. Indeed it does sound like a good development but do remember, maintenance may be an issue later on.

One thing about large storage is that if you don’t take care of them, they may crash and leave you weeping in tears with all the files you have in them. 160 gigabyte hard disks are hard enough so what the more if you use this 640 gigabyte hard disk? It will take longer to defragment (assuming you are the type who optimizes hard disk with disk defragmenter), and perhaps be harder to backup due to the large size.

With that said, is it good or bad? Depending on your use, you just have to consider if it is indeed still feasible to purchase.

Source

Today, the Windows Home Server Team has announced the availability of the Windows Home Server Power Pack 1 Release Candidate for download on Microsoft Connect. You can read Charlie Kindel's post announcing today's release on the Windows Home Server Team Blog.

Microsoft Connect: Windows Home Server

Power Pack 1 for Windows Home Server contains numerous bug fixes - including the data corruption issue - as well as many new enhancements to Windows Home Server many users will enjoy:

• Support for PCs running Windows Vista x64 editions
• Backup of Windows Home Server Shared Folders
• Easier, enhanced remote access capabilities
• Better energy efficiency
• Improved performance
• Chinese and Japanese versions

I'm currently running the Power Pack 1 Release Candidate on my HP MediaSmart Server and enjoying new functionality Power Pack 1 adds to my Windows Home Server. I recently added several harddrives putting my storage at 1.1TB. Having more storage allows me to utilize Folder Duplication for my Shared Folders. I also have 1 drive setup specifically for backups of my Shared Folders. I utilize my Shared Folders for quite a bit of data storage so I really appreciate having this functionality to ensure the data is safe (on top of Folder Duplication). Having more storage also lets me store my CompletePC Backups from my Windows Vista PCs on my Windows Home Server as well - but I will talk more about this in a later blog post. I am also enjoying the ability to backup my PCs to my Windows Home Server running Windows Vista Ultimate x64 with the Windows Home Server Connector that now runs on 64-bit versions of Windows Vista. On top of data storage and backups, I utilize my Windows Home Server for remote access when traveling as well.

Your testing of the Windows Home Server Power Pack 1 Release Candidate is very important to the Windows Home Server Team. They will not ship the final release of Power Pack 1 until the community validates their work in Power Pack 1.

Remember - Power Pack 1 is a Release Candidate and is not the final version - essentially it's a beta. If you choose to run the Release Candidate on your main Windows Home Server (aka your "production" Windows Home Server) you should make a backup of everything prior to installing the Power Pack 1 Release Candidate.

To leave feedback for the Windows Home Server Team - you can head on over to the public Windows Home Server Forums. Make sure you file any bugs you find with Power Pack 1 on Microsoft Connect.