Anyone use one to back up?  Ups and downs?

What do you guys think about this?

http://www.adorama.com/MMHG120.html

Sharon

How timely, I just asked this yesterday in ask Rick's forum and this is the response I got.

http://forums.mpix.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=100978

AKS

I got that email also.  I haven't used it but I do know other photographers who use it or similar ones.  Generally at weddings...large events...traveling.  Their comments vary on it.  Some love it.  It enables them to free up their cards.  It can also be used as a backup in traveling but that is not what these people use it for....they use their laptops.

Some have complained that it is a distraction to attempt to use it at a wedding or big event.  They say they don't have the time needed to transfer the cards, they are concerned about leaving the unit on its own for fear of theft and they don't want to keep an assistant on guard duty.

I guess it depends on how and where you intend to use it. 

I've been thinking about getting one of those for the last couple months - it seems like it would be a better addition than a handful of memory cards.  Sorry, I don't have a helpful comment ... just interested in hearing answers to your questions ....

-Mel

I have several portable hard drives and use them for all data not just photos.  I do not take one with my but when I download photos from cards it is to the portable hard drive.  This way if for some reason your computer crashes or freezes you can just move the hard drive to another computer and it is fine.  I have one main hard drive I use only for data and one I use to back up.  I can restore my computer at any time and only have to reload programs not got throught the pain of worrying about lost data.  This also frees up space on my main computer because I do a lot with videos and they require a lot of space.  When videos are finished I move them to a portable drive.  It saves a lot of time and a lot of fears once your computer becomes a problem.

a friend uses one, and I'm in the market for one as well after using his. These are perfect for those who don't want to lug around a laptop. The one I am looking at is actually a kit, it has everything except the drive (i have several notebook HDDs laying about....).

You can xfer them to your cpu at home via firewire/usb2 which beats the snot outta swapping all those cards. Better, you can preview and even work on them BEFORE you xfer them, deleting the dogs before you xfer them.

Only caution I would make is that it IS a rotating disk drive, so when it is active severe bumps and drops could be harmful. Handle it like your camera and you should be fine.

I always copy one version to my harddrive and then copy that to the external hardrive before I even touch the images. In the link above you will see that Rick is answering what he uses and I looked it up and it is small and yet powerful and fairly afforadable. I am going to invest in that.

AKS

we seem to have two slighly different answers here. The original is a portable hard drive WITH card transfer built-in.

Rick is talking about (best I can tell) a simple portable HDD. A simple portable HDD does no good whatsoever without being attached to a computer, notebook or otherwise.

The original psot is referring to a "digital wallet" (one particular brand of the device), which contains a portable battery powered HDD AND an assortment of card slots. When a card is inserted into a slot, the device recognizes it and xfers the files to the HDD within seconds, clearing the card. It does NOT need to be attached to a computer except to offload once you get home.

We used the digital wallet kind (Super Digibin) and it was nice, especially when CF cards were $$$.

The batteries didn't last very long, but I got an external battery pack and it worked well. We did have 1 drive fail, but it was user replacable.

We didn't lose any data, but it was a scary thought - after that, we decided to stick with the CF cards, especially since the prices are so low now.

As for backing up data, the only concern I would have would be the fact that they are portable makes them an easy target for damage. You can get a 1TB (that's 1000 GB) Network Attached Storage for under $1000, and they have features like RAID for data security. Not nearly as easy to transport, but more secure.

The fact that I'm recovering a hard drive now may skew my answers a bit, too.

Ah well! At least it is all recoverable, and I have it backed up if it isn't.

Good luck!
Shan

thanks guys for your input.  I'll have to think about this one.

Sharon