Suitable external harddrive for games

[Overread]

Ok so my main drive is getting rather bloated up, I've shifted most of my photos out to a separate drive, but now its time to shift the games out as well. Otherwise I'm simply going to run out of space.

However, whilst I know an internal drive would generally be best, I'd prefer (if possible) to get one which is external. I've got the space to fit it in plug wise and USB wise and it means I don't have to worry about cracking open the computer and fiddling around inside to get it all to work.

That said will an external have the info transfer speed suitable for running high-end games into the computer? If so any recommendations on a 1TB external drive?

 

[Kaladan]

IIRC external drives are pretty expensive. I use a USB caddy for SCSI HDDs and it worked out considerably cheaper than buying an external unit. The caddy was around £25 and I had a few old SCSI hard drives lying around. I can't imagine that a SATA caddy & hard drive would cost a lot more than it did for SCSI kit about 6 years back.

EDIT: Er, that said, if you buy a new HDD you may as well install it internally if you've got space and bypass the need for a caddy altogether. Assuming you're using a desktop, of course.

 

[Abernovo]

I've got a Maxtor 700GB external HDD, which I use to back everything up on and as excess storage. Personally, I think it's great, BUT the one area where it does fall a bit flat is transfer speed. I certainly couldn't play games from it.

That said, it is about three years old and more recent HDDs might have improved in this area. I've started to see those HD-ready Multimedia HDDs on sale and I think they're faster.

 

[Kaladan]

I think the speed issue is more likely with the USB connection than with the drive itself. I can play a 1.5GB (approx) movie straight from a 4GB USB stick through my Xbox or PC without any problems but I haven't used a PC for gaming in around 5 years. So now that you mention it I'm not sure if my original answer was any use, lol