Shopping For External Storage - The external hard drive
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For your dollar you'll get the most memory from an external hard drive, and as a bonus it is hard to lose or destroy, so it has a pretty solid chance of meeting the test of time without any major damage or loss of your data. Currently they come in sizes up to a terabyte or more, so you can store just about anything on them if you buy the right size -- even your collection of all of the most amazing movies of the 1980s. They will connect to your computer via a USB cable, but are as heavy as a laptop, so you shouldn't have any problems carrying one around from one computer to the next.
Now that we have settled on an external hard drive, we are going to have to talk about how to shop for one of these devices. As it turns out, the words "external hard drive" can cover a surprising range of products, from the $250 terabyte drive you can get at a major electronics retailer, to some extra memory your cousin put into a case that he had laying around in his basement. In order to keep you from getting fleeced, there is a shopping guide below designed to help you make the best decision (no matter how cute the sales girl or guy is*).
The first step is to figure out how much you need. I know it sounds like that could be really tricky, but it's not, provided, of course, that you are willing to do a little math. It won't even be Algebra,** I promise.
If your life has remained pretty much the same...figure out how much memory you use in a year by dividing the amount of memory used by the number of years you have had the system, to get a rough estimate. If you have had the computer less than a year, you are going to have to divide the amount by the number of months you have had it, and then multiply it by 12 to get your yearly usage. It is not an exact science, but it will do.
Next you need to figure out how long you are going to need to keep your files. This is an individual choice, so just make it, based on what you are storing.
If your life just changed -- if you just left school or started working at home, for example -- then your usage may be in the process of changing dramatically, so you can't rely on long term data. Use whatever portion of time you can and multiply as needed to get the annual number. Then you can figure out your time line as above.
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