External Hard Drives

When practicing photography it is essential to look into the different forms of storage available as it is very easy to take large quantities of photographs within one shoot. The first form of storage I am going to look at is external hard drives, this form of storage is a popular method of storage as users can find a single external hard drive to hold up to 1TB of storage or more. Having the ability to have a vast amount of storage on a removable and portable device is very useful for photographers as it allows you to gain access to your photos and files a numerous computer devices. It also allows for you to organise your own file structure within the hard drive when you access it on a computer. 

The security of data on an external hard drive is very high as now companies such as Seagate, provide a linked data cloud account that allows you to duplicate all your photos and files onto their cloud system. Meaning if there was any loss or damage to the external hard drive the files would be backed up online and can be restored easily. 

The hardware and software involved in using an external hard drive as simple as connecting the hard drive via a computer usb port and then gaining access to all files using the computer browser tool. Also available is a downloadable dashboard from companies such as Seagate, that is included with the hard drive. This means you can view the files from the dashboard and export files to the cloud for extra safety. 

The connectivity of external hard drives are really the only disadvantage of using this method as storage, as using a usb port can be dangerous towards the safety of the storage. If the hard drive isn't ejected from the computer device properly then the user can find that some files may be corrupted. 

External hard drives are very portable for the amount of storage they hold, having the ability to have 500GB of data in a thin slim device is very handy for photographers. Although the size of external hard drives do vary the amount of portable small devices with large storage facilities on the market mean there is never any difficulty finding one to purchase.

The cost of external hard drives can also vary depending on their size and amount of storage, I looked upon the website store of Maplin which feature a range of different hard drives at a variety of prices. As you can see the range begins normally at around £50 but does increase into the hundreds when the size of the external hard drive gets bigger.