Manufacturers usually talk about the read and write speeds of hard drives and describe them in megabytes per second (MBps). However, modern hard drives are so fast that you probably won’t notice a massive difference in speed unless you are moving large video files. When it comes to hard drives, as in many things in life and tech, faster is better. If you’re currently working on a laptop with 512 gigabytes of storage, that’s about half a terabyte. You can think of a single terabyte as storing about 250,000 photos taken with a 12 megapixel camera 250 movies or 500 hours of HD video or 6.5 million document pages. The external hard drives on our list are available in sizes ranging from 1 to 12 terabytes, though there are even larger ones on the market that are more expensive and overkill for the average home user.Ī terabyte (TB) is a unit of digital data that is equal to about 1 trillion bytes of information. Most desktop hard drives are powered through a separate power adapter. The difference is desktop hard drives are bigger and a little bulkier than portable drives, but you usually get a lot more storage for the same amount of money. On the other hand, if you are just going to keep your hard drive connected to a computer at all times, choose a desktop model. Play icon The triangle icon that indicates to play The smallest portable drive on our list, the Samsung SSD T7, is smaller than a deck of playing cards. The downside is that portable hard drives tend to have smaller capacities than desktop models and are usually powered through the USB port on your computer. These models are smaller and more rugged than desktop hard drives. If you plan to haul your external hard drive around in a backpack or bag when traveling or commuting, then a portable hard drive is the way to go. What to Look for in an External Hard Drive Portable or Desktop? Since then, I’ve been a devotee of external hard drives.

And about two years ago, when a problem surfaced that could have ended badly, I was able restore my whole operating system with minimal fuss. After not one but many unfortunate losses, I finally learned how important it is to own an external hard drive. Over the years, I have lost critical files several times due to either malfunctions or viruses.

Show more The Expert: As a tech journalist whose work has appeared in outlets such as The Los Angeles Times, Reuters, Time, and The Atlantic, I’m very protective of my writing and photography.

Best solid state external drive for mac