Best External Hard Drive 2019

How many times have you turned on your computer or mac to find the icon whirring away in the background as you have run out of memory on your machine?

Although in today’s computing world the package of memory included on most machines is quite substantial.

Also in today’s internet world the possibilities for filling that memory is probably a million fold.

External Hard Drive	Max Storage Capacity	Technology
WD 4TB Black My Passport	4TB	HDD
WD Expander Hard Drive	1TB	-
Toshiba HDTB4	1TB	3.0 USB
Seagate Portable External Drive	4TB	3.0 USB
Silicon Power A30	1TB	3.0 USB
Seagate Portable External Drive - Wireless	2TB	Wifi
WD 4TB Elements	4TB	3.0 USB
Seagate Expansion 4TB	4TB	3.0 USB
Fantom Drives 5TB	5TB	3.0/3.1 USB

Take another scenario, you sit back in your chair, you turn on your PC or Mac to find a virus infection and your total hard drive is rendered useless.

All that work and apps and other programs are nonvalid, yes you would probably tear your hair out!

This is where an external hard drive might save you loads of angst, and could be a solution for the two scenarios painted above.

An external hard drive is a portable storage device that can be attached to your computer through the USB port or wirelessly.

An external hard drive usually has high storage capacities and are often used as back up for computers or can serve as a network drive.

A network is a storage device on a local access network ( LAN ) within a business or home setting.

At a basic level, a desktop external hard drive needs to be plugged into a power socket to work.

With a portable external hard drive, it draws its power requirements from the USB port on your computer when it is connected.

The desktop hard drives use a 3.5-inch drive and operate at 7200 rpm, while an external portable hard drive uses a 2.5-inch drive and operates at 5400 rpm.

What is the difference between Internal & External Hard Drives?

While both types of drives share a lot of similarities, there are differences to consider.

While all computers are manufactured and bought with an internal hard drive, you need to decide before buying an external drive whether it is worth your hard earned cash.

What external hard drives can do is give your existing PC or Mac hard drive added protection.

The obvious main difference between an internal and external hard drive is located.

What is the difference between Internal & External Hard Drives?

While both types of drives share a lot of similarities, there are differences to consider.

While all computers are manufactured and bought with an internal hard drive, you need to decide before buying an external drive whether it is worth your hard earned cash.

What external hard drives can do is give your existing PC or Mac hard drive added protection.

The obvious main difference between an internal and external hard drive is located.

Internal drives are built into your machine and allow you to store files, data, and media.

However, these files on your computer can become corrupted by virus attack or even accidentally deleted.

Where an external drive comes in is that it can provide extra protection to your computers internal drive in case loss or corruption takes place.

While both devices can store data, only your external hard drive is safe from computer malfunctions.

One other plus factor for purchasing an external drive is that it can free up space on your everyday computer.

It is quite tricky to install a new hard drive in a stand-alone machine. On the other hand, installing an external hard drive is relatively easy just using a USB cable into your USB port.

Once connected your computer should recognize it straight away.

One popular question on using external hard drives is their life expectancy compared to the hard drive on your standalone machine?

Unless you are mistreating your external hard drive, there is no reason why it should not last as long as an internal drive.

You will also find that most external hard drives will come with a warranty that will last for at least 5 years.

Things to Look For In An External Hard Drive:

The most obvious one is storage capacity. The typical storage capacity of an external hard drive is from 500Gb to 4Tb ( Terra Bite ).

If you compare this to the storage capacity of a USB device that can only hold 2 – 64Gb, it provides a massive boost of memory.

How Much Do I Need?
Most everyday users would typically be fine with between 250Gb and 320Gb of storage.

As an example, 250Gb will give your storage capacity for 30,000 average sized images. However, if you are a movie buff and plan on storing movies you would probably need at least 500Gb to 1 Tb.

For example, watching streamed movies from Netflix, you will need about a 1Gb of data per hour and up to 3Gb if you are streaming in HD.

Which is best SDD or HDD?
In its simplistic form SDD is flash storage and has no moving parts, however, SDD is much faster than HDD equivalent.

HDD, on the other hand, uses magnetic tape and has mechanical parts and operate slower than SDD.

Transfer Speed:
Larger sized external drives do not always equate to speedy transfer.
Transfer time is important as you don’t want to wait for ages for your files to transfer back and forth between machine and external hard drive.

The two main factors in transfer time are the storage technology used and the type of connector used.

As discussed earlier SSD is quicker than HDD in transfer time due to the technology used.

However, HDD tends to be more expensive than SDD and often has less storage capacity.

As for the connection, most external hard drives now use a USB connection, even here though can make a difference to transfer time.

USB 2.0 is the old standard and should be avoided if possible. USB 3.0 offers substantial increases in speed 5Gps whereas USB 3.1 is becoming more common with speeds up to 10Gps.

Is size important?
If you want to keep your external drive with you where ever you go then size and portability is important.

You will want it to be light and small enough to fit in laptop bags or pockets. Ideally, you want one that does not need an external power supply.

SDD tend to be smaller than HDD drives and more durable due to the non-moving parts that make up the device.

Best External Hard Drive 2019.
In our review, we have tried to find the stars of 2019 that can offer an affordable but robust solution for your external hard drive needs.

There is stiff competition and it is sometimes hard to select an appropriate external hard drive.

Some now offer Wi-Fi connectivity and others have longer warrenties, we highlight these features it they are present in our review.

WD 4TB Black My Passport  Portable External Hard Drive

My Passport portable hard drive comes in an array of vibrant colors not just the black shown here.

The sleek style of the hard drive means that it can fit in the palm of your hand, thus easy to carry around.

The unit comes with auto back up and password protection.

Being a Western Digital product brings with it the WD discovery software and drive utilities.

Being equipped with Western Digital automatic back up software so you can easily back up your photos, videos and music files.

Another piece of software supplied with Western Digital products is their 256 bit AES encryption software meaning you can keep your content safe and sound. One feature connected to this is that you can add a ‘return if found’ message as a password prompt if you ever loose you’re My Passport.

Once you buy the product it comes ready to use straight out of the box, so you can start transferring files and backing up as soon as.

You start by connecting your USB cable supplied by My Passport to your Windows or Mac PC.

Then you open My Passport and install WD Discovery straight from the drive.

The final step is to activate WD Backup and WD Password to protect your flles.

Having a storage capacity of 4TB ( 4 Terra Bytes) means that for most every day users there is ample storage, which includes massive storage for video and picture files.

The included WD Discovery software means you can also connect to popular cloud storage services like Dropbox, Google drive and Facebook.

The My Passport range of external hard drives uses HDD technology and USB 3.0/2.0 interface.

In summary My Passport is the trusted, portable storage that perfectly complements your on-the-go lifestyle. It comes packaged in a very durable external casing and as mentioned before an array of startling colours.

It is designed to fit in the palm of your hand, and has  plenty of space to store a massive amount of photos, videos, music and documents. Perfectly paired with WD Backup software and password protection, the My Passport drive helps keep your files safe. If your system includes a PCI Express slot, you can achieve higher data transfer rates by installing a PCI Express adapter car.

4TB Capacity	USB Cable can be a little short
3 Year Warranty
Ok For Games Consoles

WD 1TB My Book AV DVR Expander External Hard Drive 

Another product from Western Digital to make our short list is the WD 1TB Expander External hard drive.

Made specifically for DVR it allows you to store more of your favourite TV shows or allows you to transfer and store videos from a compatible camcorder/camera to free up space to give you more recording space.

It can also be used with game consoles such as PS4 or Xbox.

The DVR expander is a  convenient storage companion for your camcorder It allows you to transfer your videos to your My Book AV drive without a computer to make room for more recording. You can even use the camcorder to play back the videos stored on the My Book AV drive.

The My Book AV DVR expander is an external hard drive with a difference.

My Book AV DVR Expander offers smooth video recording and playback with SilkStream technology (available via eSATA connection only). Built with WD GreenPower Technology, the drive inside is optimized for the demands of reading and writing video as well as the high temperatures often found in entertainment centers.

The small My Book form factor fits neatly in your entertainment center. It can stand upright or lie horizontally, making it easy to neatly position your drive near your AV devices while maximizing airflow and minimizing heat around the drive.

When used with a DVR, the My Book AV drive expands the recording capacity of a single DVR and cannot be also used as an expander with multiple DVRs or as storage for other AV devices.

The product is compatible with an array of both camcorders, blu-ray disc players and gaming consoles.

Works with most DVR & AV	Only 1TB memory
AV optimised for smooth recording
Storage for your compatible camcorder

Toshiba HDTB410-XK3AA 

The Toshiba HDTB4 is a popular choice when it comes to external hard drives.

The unit is of sleek profile design and matte smudge resistance finish, so looks good attached to any lap top or PC.

It offers high storage capacity and can be purchased with various permutations of memory from 1TB to 4TB.

Being plug and play it is easy to set up and comes ready for quick accessibility to your stored content.

The various storage solutions give you plenty of storage for your picture, video and music files.

Powered by USB 3.0 technology these hard drives are super fast at transfer, however, they are still compatible with USB 2.0. There is no software to install and it is easy to transfer files through drop and drag.

The unit comes configured for Windows and is easily configured for use with your Mac and has an auto cut off to close it down when not in use.

If there is a criticism of this budget-priced external hard drive is that the transfer can be slow in that it might take slightly longer than other models but if you can cope with waiting a few more seconds then it should not be such a problem.

I suppose to finish, being Toshiba you are getting the backing of a
well -known technology brand and the quality that comes with a well recognized, well built quality product.

Sleek portable design	Can be slow transfer
Plug and Play
USB 3.0 & 2.0 Compatible

Seagate Portable 4TB External Hard

For general backups and storage purposes the Seagate Portable 4TB external hard drive is a good a choice as any to deliver what you want from a portable storage device.

The Seagate comes in a basic drive box and weighs on 8.6 ounces. With a black satin finish and disk activity light, the box is finished off with the well known Seagate logo etched in the black satin box.

The box lacks feet so can have a habit of sliding of non flat surfaces.

There is a USB 3.0 port and the unit comes complete with a USB 3.0 cable in the box.

The drive will work straight away if you have a windows machine, if you have a Mac you will need to install the included NTFS driver.

The Seagate comes with a set up program which also installs the Seagate dashboard. The Seagate utility lets you back up data, share your pictures on social media as well as save your pictures from your social media channels.

Seagate also includes a free subscription to 200GB of cloud storage on Microsoft One Drive service.

When we did our drag and drop test on the Seagate it took 12 seconds which is better than average for a 3.0 USB drive.

With a 4.0 TB of storage the cost per gigabyte works out similar to other models on the market of a similar price.

The Seagate Backup Plus Portable Drive is one of the largest-capacity portable drives available today. Adding to the appeal are the drive’s speed, extra features like the Lyve personal cloud service, and a relatively inexpensive cost per gigabyte.

 It’s a much-less-expensive way to store your files locally than on cloud-based services or buying a NAS for your home. The Seagate Backup Plus Fast is a bit faster on some benchmark tests, but its double the price per gigabyte; unless you’re using it as a scratch disk for video projects, that extra speed is not worth the difference in cost.

Fast Transfer	Price
Drag and Drop
Plug n Play

Silicon Power 1TB Rugged Portable External Hard Drive Armor A30

Even under the most normal circumstances having a rugged hard drive might be a good idea.

However, if you have an occupation that takes you travelling to remote areas such a photographer or travel correspondent then having a rugged, compact hard drive might be a necessity.

One of the most respected manufacturers of rugged hard drives is Silicon Power.

The A30 is probably one of its older models that is still going strong today, and today we take a look at it against the others in our external hard drive review of 2019.

The Armor A30 comes in three memory sizes 1TB, 2TB and 4TB.

The drive uses the regular 3.0 USB and comes with the cable supplied, which is tucked around the enclosure. Its main feature is that it boasts of being military grade shock proof capability.

The A30 incorporates an internal suspension system to enable a perfect buffer for any physical event that may occur.  The A30 has also passed the US military MIL_STD (transit drop test) that guarantees shockproof protection.

In fact to test the shockproof, during the time we were testing the unit it was knocked off my desk while plugged into my Mac and I also dropped ( it accidently!) while preparing the USB to load some images.

Through all that it kept on operating as if nothing had happened.

The Silicon Power A30 1TB capacity is a great storage solution for those needing a decent amount of capacity is a rugged storage device.

The unit also has a distinguished hexagonal pattern surface that also adds to the durability against scratches and infractions.

The performance of the drive was also pretty good in regards it read and write speeds.

The A30 is available in black and orange as shown or also grey and white which are quite striking a probably a matter of taste.

Overall the rugged Armor A30 is a great hard drive that delivers good performance, Silicon Power put a lot of effort into ensuring their drives are rugged and as indestructible as possible.

Well protected	Design might be unattractive to some
Costs slightly more
Available with USB C Cable

Seagate Wireless Plus 2TB Portable Hard Drive

Now we are moving towards the first of our selected wi-fi devices. In today’s market the hunt for wi-fi connectivity is hotting up in the external hard drive marketplace.

Seagate’s second generation Wireless Plus HDD is one of few on the market that can offer wireless connectivity with a stunning 2TB of storage capacity.

The Seagate comes ready supplied with a 50cm USB 3.0 cable, a 10W wall charger and three interchangeable plugs. It has two LED inidicators one for power and the other for wi-fi connection.

It is claimed that the portable HDD should deliver up to 10 hours which is pretty impressive, but like all drives that depends on usage.

It can be charged via your PC but the quickest way is to use the wall plug that will only take 3 hours to charge as opposed to 16 using your PC.

You can connect the Seagate Wireless Plus to the internet and then share with up to seven devices.

You can also share content stored on the device with up to 8 devices and it will practically stream anything from it.

The Seagate Wireless Plus offers an impressive amount of storage space, however the price point might prove a disadvantage for some. With the ability to sync to Dropbox and Google Drive it does offer a top end solution.

The unit is well designed and for its size gives impressive storage capacity. However, it is pricey and also could do with a power usage indicator to show how much charge is left.

Compact	Comes at a price
Fast and easy to use
Good battery life
Good storage

WD 4TB Elements Portable External Hard Drive

The WD elements hard drive is compact with high storage capacity and it won’t burn a hole in your pocket price wise.

The 1TB model is probably one of the cheapest around, the only downside being that it is probably not as fast as it’s more expensive counterparts.

It carry’s a short 1 year warranty and  has no added security add ons that some of the other models in our review has.

Like the Seagate range the WD has a simple design1-year and it works well with both computers and game consoles. It looks very similar to other carries drives and is small and compact enough to tuck away in your laptop bag or pocket.

On the inside it houses a standard laptop hard drive that spins at approx. 5,400 rpm which is generally slower than other drives that spin at 7,200 rpm, hence it’s slightly slower performance.

It comes pre-loaded with a trial version of WD Smartware Pro which is on a 30 day free trial then you have to pay $20 if you want to carry on using it.

It comes preformatted for Windows but for Mac use you would have to reformat to HFS+.

Using USB 3.0 the WD Elements is s no-nonsense high capacity storage unit to take on the go. Its no-nonsense features can be a good thing as it can offer massive capacity for massive consumer use.

The WD Element is a suitable alternative to the Seagate Expansion for those that are budget conscious. While the two drives are similar in many respects the Expansion is faster but the Element is cheaper.

If you don’t plan on using it to store sensitive data then this drive is an excellent everyday hard drive to carry around with you.

Price	No security
Portability	Slow transfer speed
Storage

Seagate Expansion 4TB Portable External Hard Drive USB 3.0

The Seagate Expansion drive is a fast and affordable external hard drive and is suitable for those that are looking for easy transportability as it will easily fit in pockets and computer bags.

The Seagate Expansion is an excellent no frills way of adding extra storage to your laptop or desktop computer. As it comes ‘no frills’ there is no security add on or encryption support and also has a short 12 month warranty.  

The Expansion comes in a retail packet that includes the drive itself and 12 inch USB 3.0 cable, but that is all you need to get the hard drive up and running in minutes.

It is pre-formatted for Windows but you can easily get it to reformat to HFS+ to enable you to use it effectively with your Mac.

The drive works with both computers and games consoles and was easily recognized by games consoles which gives you the ability to save games and apps and a whole host of other media.

As there is no security feature this might limit what you store on it. For example an if you lost it would be easy for others to access your data files and whatever else you had inches good, so don’t store security-sensitive information on it.

The performance of the drive was excellent. In both the copy speed and reading speed put it in the top performers when it comes to data transfer.

The drive also worked comfortably with USB 2.0 also giving good performance.

So if you are looking for a fast performer at a low cost then you can’t go much wrong buying the Seagate Expansion. It is a great drive no matter if you are a Windows or Mac user.

However, if your primary concern is security of data then it probably is not the drive for you, you might be better looking at the Backup Plus Slim or the WD My Passport.

This is a good hard drive to buy for the reasons outlines and features as our editors pick.

Fast transfer	No security app
Portable
Price

Fantom Drives 5TB External Hard Drive

We finish our review with a mother of a drive in the Fantom.

Made traditionally for the gaming market the Fantom delivers a massive 5TB of storage being able to store up to 125 games games ( 50GB ) of any Xbox or Playstation.

There is a USB unit built directly into the unit circumventing the need for USB cables, there is also no power cable as it piggy backs of the game console to gains its power.

It also doubles as a USB port hub allowing you to charge game controllers and even attach additional storage if you feel the need.

The units are made of a sturdy brushed black aluminum casing and are fan free so you don’t get that annoying whirring noise in the background.

Its massive storage capacity allows you to store any form of media and is literally plug and play so easy to set up and get going with.

In the box the Fantom uses Seagate Barracuda 5TB hard drives with a 128 Mb cache.

The only downside is the warranty given is 1 year as opposed if you bought the Seagate drives

Great for gaming	Price
Large storage

To conclude that brings us to the end of our review of the top external hard drives for 2019.

The competition for external hard drives has certainly stepped up over the last few years with more manufacturers coming onto the scene.

The current move seems to be more towards wireless transfer and portability, but there are still some great products to be had to help your storage situations at a reasonable cost.