Hi Carol, If you get one of those nice 250GB Toughbook Pro hard disks, you don't need no mains. Just plug into the USB and go. All the best Steve -----Original Message----- From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carol Pearson Sent: Friday 3 October 2008 13:22 To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: [access-uk] Re: Question on external hard drive Chris, I wouldn't advise it either. I have an external USB drive and from time to time the mains plug just falls out of drive so it doesn't show till I give it some power etc. Wouldn't want you to get caught not being able to get in ... -- Carol carol.pearson29@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx George Bell wrote: > Hi Chris, > > For what it's worth, my own preference, if you can, would be > to split the laptop drive into two partitions. > > 1) For Operating system and Programs. > 2) For Data. > > I'd then create an image of the first drive, since this > would only suffer major changes when you added or removed > programs. You could even keep that image on the external > drive if needs be. > > The external drive can then be used as a total backup of the > Data drive. > > To be honest, I very much doubt that running programs from > the external drive will be any quicker. A USB 2 drive is > certainly not faster in terms of data transfer than an > internal drive. > > And to cap it all, if you did configure things that way, > you'd then be essentially married to the external drive and > have to take it with you if you wanted to travel anywhere. > > George. > > -----Original Message----- > From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx > [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Chris > Hallsworth > Sent: 01 October 2008 16:19 > To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx > Subject: [access-uk] Question on external hard drive > > Hi all, I've just ordered a Trekstor 160 GB external hard > drive from > www.dabs.com. I had an idea on how to use it, but I'd like > your thoughts on > this please. I'd like to run all my software, except Windows > and associated > programmes, on the drive. What will it be like in terms of > stability, > reliability, etc, because I hear that if you install and run > software on an > external hard drive, Windows won't have to use so much > virtual memory and > nor will it need to access the internal hard drive much, > hence the perhaps > increased stability and reliability. I'm not saying my Vista > laptop isn't > stable nor reliable; it's completely the opposite, but > thought maybe I could > increase the performance and decrease the hard drive > thrashing by doing what > I plan to do. All my data will be backed up to this drive as > well. Thanks in > advance for any comments regarding this. ** To leave the list, click on the immediately-following link:- ** [mailto:access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?subject=unsubscribe] ** If this link doesn't work then send a message to: ** access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ** and in the Subject line type ** unsubscribe ** For other list commands such as vacation mode, click on the ** immediately-following link:- ** [mailto:access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?subject=faq] ** or send a message, to ** access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the Subject:- faq ** To leave the list, click on the immediately-following link:- ** [mailto:access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?subject=unsubscribe] ** If this link doesn't work then send a message to: ** access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ** and in the Subject line type ** unsubscribe ** For other list commands such as vacation mode, click on the ** immediately-following link:- ** [mailto:access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?subject=faq] ** or send a message, to ** access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the Subject:- faq