For what it is worth after going through many mental gymnastics and hulu hoops and researching a few web sites to find a replacement external back up drive. I found one at Micro Center that was on sale. It is a LaCie 1TB external drive that has both USB2.0 and the IEEE1394b (Firewire connection that I was looking for) it is on sale for $109.95

It comes pre-loaded with a back up utility software and will work with either Mac's or Window's based PC's.

For the price point I will give it The plus is that it is virtually silent.

 

I just ordered a Hitachi external drive 320GBS on Amazon for $39 plus shipping. Since my hard drive is 80GB it should do me fine.
The Western Digital I had didn't work worth a sh*t.

 

I haven't priced them but I'm told 400GB & 500GB are now is the $50 range. Seems like I paid that much for the 75GB I have now. Certainly the price of storage has come down.

 

How would you know? What was it doing?

 

It makes you wonder how there can be any unemployment when you look at the number of cables and connections that are in use today. This list is two years old and probably out of date.

http://www.hightech-edge.com/guide-to-comp...ons/2383/print/

 

Three reasons: First, the population in China is huge. It is difficult to keep everyone working. Second, the manufacturing jobs are concentrated at certain cities and the Chinese are not as mobile as US residents. Third, the well educated Chinese don't want to take manufacturing jobs.

 

I have a Western Digital "My Passport" external drive and it's been great.

The SimpleTech external drive I had/have has totally screwed up my photos. It has lost files, and moved various files from one file to another, from years ago. I try to get to a photo, see the thumbnail, and then file is empty.

 

I have a Transcend. I'm no tech'y (you figured that out didn't you) but it would seem to me it either would work or crash; it's just a hard drive... right? I am wondering if the problem wasn't the go-between software. I use SyncToy 2.0 and it's easy and always works as it should.

 

Well Dave, I beat you to it. I didn't replace my PC, but I did order a net book today. Samsung with 1 GB memory 250 GB hard drive, Windows 7 "starter". $249.00.

I had ordered on line for pick up at Best Buy, and got a confirmation, however after I left the house they emailed me telling me they didn't have one in the store.

No other nearby stores had one either. My brother in law will pick one up in NH for me this week. I think I'll have my sister UPS it to me as I won't be seeing them until after Christmas.

It will be good to have another computer available, and it won't take up much space in the S if we hit the road.

I'm just looking for email, surfing the web, and staying in touch if we are away from home. I'm sure I will need glasses at all times when using it (10" screen). I'll report in after I get it set up.


By the way, I did no research. My sister and brother in law did it all. I bought the same one they did.

 

The local Staples seems to usually have the Netbooks in stock....for about 250 bucks. As I noted 10 days ago, I got my little Acer "travel buddy" for 199 bucks. I first took it to HC II in SoCal and also used it in London/ Egypt.

Now Kathy has gotten to like having it in the kitchen....do a quick check of email, surf the web for a healthy recipe, etc.