USB drives or external USB hard drive?

[Mombo323]

I assume these are the way to go now for backing up data? Also for saving diagnostic programs and utilities to use on other computers? I can get a 512 or 1 gig I guess, not sure, haven't seen whats out there yet.
Had a girl ask me... "How many pictures can you get on a 512 MB USB drive? I told her I assumed it depended on the size and type of images. I told her "about 355 floppys... she was confused right there... Whats the overall opinion on these "USB drives" Perhaps an external USB hard drive is better, or does it all depend on how much you want to store. I want to store several utilities and diagnostic programs for when my friends call and tell me there computer is acting goofy. Mine is tweaked to perfection and they are jealous.. Thanks

[ShawnD1]

Buy a hard drive enclosure for $20 and put your own hard drive in it. Doing so will cost half as much as buying something sold as an "external hard drive", but it will work exactly the same (connects using USB).

Also, solid state (no moving parts) USB devices are not faster than USB hard drives. Test this in Sandra if you don't believe me. Sandra's own reference benchmarks show this:
80GB external hard drive= ~27MB/s
1GB SD card = ~17MB/s


The only reason for buying USB storage with no moving parts is because it's less likely to fail. Then again, what is the chance of both your normal and backup drive failing at the same time? That has to be like one in a billion.