Posted March 11, 2006 Ok I have a 152 GB Hard drive.... I am currently down to 10 GB....... Most of this is taken up by the 112 GB's of anime/anime music I have stored on it....... Now what would you suggest for solving my memory usage? An external Hard Drive? Investing in a DVD burner? Deleting (not) it (gunna) all (happen)? So yeah I want some advice...... Also remember I'm on a smallish budget because I'm saving to go to Japan in September. ^^; Thanks in advance. Edit: Make that 9GB I just started downloading some more anime...... ^^; Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 Buy a dvd burner they're quite cheap now, and temporarly you could go to system tools and do a disk cleaning (sometimes I get 2 GB more space! It's like magic!). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 Get an external hard drive. DVD's can sometimes be slow to play back video/music data if it's burned as a data disk. External hard drives are pretty cheap nowadays. I have this one, it's 250 GB and I gotta say it's really good. Plug it into a USB 2 port and it'll run just like a normal hard drive. I keep all my media and music on it to take a little work off my main drive. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 Pay £50 for an extra internal hard drive. You'll be able to get 200GB for that. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 I agree with Moria, just get another HDD Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 Yup, I third that. HDDs are cheap as chips. I recommend Seagate, although the Maxtor i have hasn't gave me any problems as of yet. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 i fourth the internal hdd option, and second the maxtor being decent and cheap option Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 I don't wanna be a killjoy, but you could always investigate the option of paying the producers of at least some of the aforementioned anime for their product on handy DVD storage. I know you're on a tight budget, but 112GB? Holy Spike Spiegal... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 Why don't you just delete them and buy them back when you're in japan? But seriously if you're using the files a lot. I'd recommend that you'll buy a new hard drive. If you just want them to be stored (e.g, only watch them occasionally) you should get a dvd burner. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 I got an external HD recently and I find it really useful. It could be especially useful for you if you want to exchange Animes with your friends. Take the HD to them, copy the files or leave the HD there. Otherwise an internal HD would be the best solution since it won't take up any extra room. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 11, 2006 Ok so internal = no.... No space for another internal. >.> External I'm only worried because I've heard of a lot of them crapping out.... And I don't want everything lost.... Someone give me advise? DVD burner..... Yah just scratches scare me...... As for the yeah go and pay for some of your anime ideas...... Errmm no.... The majority of my anime is not even out in the US let alone the UK........ If they want to provide me with a good quality sub then they can do so and I'll pay but otherwise ermmm no... I'm not gunna buy a Japanese DVD without english subs so I don't even understand what's going on. >.> Oh and ermmm I do have some anime on DVD. >.> As well as shelling out for other random anime stuff.... They do get money out of me. >.> Oh and I'm also not gunna pay for someone to give me a DVD with a load of fansubs on them........ As it says at the start... If you do that you're getting ripped off. >.> Also a 26 episode Anime series averages at 4GB.... That's 28 series....... Then include the fact that I have the whole of Bleach and the whole of Naruto on my PC and that number of series on my PC gets cut down..... Then again I do have more anime on my brothers PC a lot more...... Once again most of which isn't available to buy.... At all...... Outside of Japan.... In English..... So yeah... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 12, 2006 what about you get an internal HDD, but mount it in an external caddy. that way you get the reliability of an internal drive without tsaking up the space in your tower. i have a hdd set up like this and its great. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 12, 2006 Hmmm, would it be possible to take some pics of that set up? I'd really like to see. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 12, 2006 External drives are just regular drives stuck in caddies anyway. The only reason why they might fail more often is because people cart them about and knock them and such. If you handle it carefully there's no reason it should fail prematurely. Note prematurely; these are mechanical things, they will fail at some point. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 12, 2006 Note prematurely; these are mechanical things, they will fail at some point. As does the optical mediums also. After a while they'll start to lose their reflective properties. The best way to store files would be in a magnetic tape. Just don't let the tape get near magnets. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 13, 2006 External drives are just regular drives stuck in caddies anyway. The only reason why they might fail more often is because people cart them about and knock them and such. If you handle it carefully there's no reason it should fail prematurely. Note prematurely; these are mechanical things, they will fail at some point. Obviously.. I've just heard things about external drives failing within a matter of a year without them getting moved about at all......... :-/ I haven't heard of this kind of thing happening with internal hard drives....... Well, not as common place as well external.... :-/ Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 13, 2006 I've had an External for going on 2 years now and i haven't had any problems with it and I've taken it everywhere. You just gotta find a good brand name. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 13, 2006 The drive I linked to up there that I own is fantastic. I've had mine about a year and shove it in my backpack most days and bounce off to uni with it. No problems at all so far. Just like an internal but it's moveable. I've found it especially useful for carrying around huge uncompressed video files from my place to the editing suite at uni. As someone else mentioned, it's also good for going around to mates with if there are huge files you want to give them that'd take ages to transfer over the net. It's plug and play too so there's no software needed. I know i'm sounding like I work for the company that makes them now but I really couldn't recommend it more. Far more useful to me than another internal hard drive. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 15, 2006 How easy is it to install a hard drive, is it just unscrew the case and put it in or is there more to it? Off topic but what about a fan too, my computer could do with another. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 16, 2006 It's very easy as long as your power suply can support another, you have enough connections and there is a free space in your tower......... It pretty much is a plug and play thing really. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 16, 2006 Adding a new hard drive's piss easy. Open the case, stick it into a free slot, screw it in and plug the IDE (or SATA, if it's a posh new thing) and power cables in. Start up Windows, and if it doesn't appear in My Computer right off the bat, open the Disk Management tool to format it and assign a drive letter to it. You can do it all in less than ten minutes. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 16, 2006 How easy is it to install a hard drive, is it just unscrew the case and put it in or is there more to it? Off topic but what about a fan too, my computer could do with another. A hard drives installation is pretty much like this: Unscrew case --> Put the hard drive in place --> secure it with screws --> put the pata/sata cable and the power cable in place --> screw the cover of the case back again --> Boot--> run fdisk or a similar tool(the drive management in XP is easier to use), and format the new hdd for the filesystem you want. And it's finished. Fans are bit more straightforward, just find a suitable spot for it in your case, attach the power cable to the mobo(if it's a three pin connector) or straight to the plug which comes form your PSU. The plug which comes from the psu is the same as to the old pata (parallel ata, which has the reasonably wide data cable) drive's power cable. Or it could be the smaller one which is the same as the floppy power connector Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 16, 2006 Cheers guys. May pick up a new hard drive as I was trying to format and only apparently had 11% on my computer spare, not good. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 16, 2006 Remember to set the jumper if its an IDE drive... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted March 16, 2006 Nowadays the jumper is at cable select at default (I think...) So only bother with the jumper if you have an old IDE cable. And if you do have one, you should get a better one. The hard drives are slow enough without the cable restraining it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
