Maxtor One Touch 4 Mini 250GB Review
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Update: Although it is mentioned in the review, I must stress that USB hubs internal and external have a good chance of not giving enough power to this device. You will know when this occurs because obviously the device won't work, but more importantly you will hear a very faint clicking sound coming from the drive. I have found that if you are running this device to your front USB panels, make sure that these USB ports are powered from the motherboard USB headers and not through an internal USB hub, if so it probably won't work off your front USB ports
With the growing amount of users armed with iPods and Digital Cameras, it goes without saying that adequate Hard Drive space is becoming more and more valuable. Most people I know are going the route of external hard drives for numerous reasons: portability, HD space, and product size.One external hard drive I purchased a few months ago was the Maxtor One Touch 4 Mini USB 2.0, it is 250GB.
Currently, I have it formatted as FAT32 because I use it between my Mac and PC. If you are just a PC user, I would suggest formatting it as NTFS because you will then have a super high file size limit compared to the 4GB file size limit of FAT32.
Overall it works great, I like how small and sturdy it feels. It has a nice grippy bottom that makes it hold steady on any surface. It is very quiet and doesn't get too hot.
A bit dusty in this picture, I have a better product shot below.
I even tried using it as a shared network drive for my media server. It worked okay, but I wouldn't suggest using this drive for that kind of purpose because you will run into Write Delay errors if you are trying to stream video files from it through your network or even if you are using it as a shared network drive to download data on from a P2P or Torrent. But this was pushing the drive to the extreme on a network that also had it's own bottle necks, so again, this was not what the drive was meant for and it still held up okay.
But if you are just plugging it into your machine directly and using it, it is a great drive.
I especially like the fact that it doesn't require a AC power, it is self-powered by USB and has a split USB cable to help it generate more power if the USB port you plug it into doesn't have enough power. I actually tested this when my USB hub wasn't giving it enough power and it didn't work, it may be because the USB hub sucks.
I highly suggest this drive for people who need a portable, easy to use external drive. I currently use it to store my MP3s, Videos, and Pictures. I plug it into my computer and am ready to go.
It also comes with Maxtor Safety Drill which allows you to backup your data and even create an image of your system so that you can restore it, I haven't used this software, but it is good to know you can make quick backups just by pressing the button which also doubles as the light on the drive.
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You are right about eSATA, but as I stated in the review, I was pushing it way beyond it`s intention, the NexStar3 SATA enclosure I have came with a PCI eSATA card, so I am sure that one is blazing fast. Read review here if you missed it: http://www.feelthefunk.com/past_posts.php?sid=146
Thats the problem with externals you dont want to use them for nothing too extreme using USB externals now using eSata works way better because its the same thing as using sata internally its just a cord on the inside of your comp plugging into your sata port and it has an adapter on a pci slot on the pack of ur comp that you plug a cord into and it does speeds exactly the same it works great thats how im running my 500gig external right now is with eSata.
theres a big difference between usb 2.0 and sata.. sata has a capability of 1.5 or 3.0 Gb/s transfer speed while usb only has 480 mbps transfer speed along with that it involves the speed of the drive if you run a solid state external and use it with eSata that would be perfect because you have no speed limitations solid states are faster than regular harddrives read and write speeds. now if you using a small external hdd its probably using a laptop hdd at 5400 rpm and the read and write speeds are alot slower it could also be using memory thats built into chips on a board inside it just all depends on the kind of external you got .. I built mine myself for 120.00 I bought my own external enclosure and own hdd.. (western digital ftw)
thats my 2 cents.
Brian just be careful not to fill it up all the way, don`t want it to get too heavy for you. =o)
I bought a WD 720 gig external and it is great to add my HD vids, jpegs, mp3`s and porn. I need an external i can take to peoples houses and steal their goodies. i think ill look into one of these. Thanks Beijing