Factors to Take Into Account When Buying a Portable Hard Drive

With all the information that we have access to on a day to day basis, there no way to save them unless you have a portable hard drive with you at all times. A regular PC or laptop typically has 200 GB to 750 GB of internal memory, but as many of us have experienced this is not enough over time; many of our work or home related files like pictures, emails, videos and such can eat a lot of space. For that reason, a lot of portable hard drive manufacturers try to stand out from the competition with varying characteristics and features.

People who aim to get the an amazing portable hard drive should take a handful of factors into account, another great decision maker would be a number of best portable hard drive 2017 reviews found online.

1. Usage: Before anything else, you need to decide how the portable hard drive will be used; for work or leisure. Is there a need to actually extend the memory of the internal portable hard drive since you’re low on space? Are there any sensitive data such as bank accounts and tax information that you’d rather store offline to better protect them? Maybe you want to share some helpful homemade videos to friends and family without actually giving them access to your PC or handing them your laptop? Depending on your usage, you have to decide how much capacity you actually need; of course you’ll need a higher capacity for videos compared to only storing emails and word files.

2. Software Capabilities: almost all the newest versions of portable hard drives have already included applications that can back up and restore data; others can also add passwords to files and folders. The drivers, or some of them, can be quickly configured in order to tell the software run in the background; the software handles the updates. Since files are restored alongside the latest updates, all data can be restores in case something went wrong; this is crucial for business or for people who stored critical data.

3. Power Source: you know it’s a great portable hard drive when it offers a plug and play feature. Portable hard drives like these are manufactured and created in a way that it won’t require installation when plugged to a computer; the portable hard drive would readily receive data. The bigger portable hard drives will require a separate power outlet but the smaller ones can function from the power source provided by the USB ports. For those of you who travel a lot and want to bring their portable hard drive, make sure to choose the ones that won’t need an entirely different power source, especially if power sources are not readily available.