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What is a external harddrive?

Updated: 10/3/2023
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12y ago

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A hard drive is a computer component that holds data. Every computer needs at least one hard drive to store its operating system, programs and user information. This drive is usually internal, however, as computer systems have evolved and different needs, threats, and circumstances have arisen, the additional external hard drive has become extremely popular
It is any hard with respect to computer that is outside of the computer case. Usually external drives have enclosure and can be connected through USB, Firewire or E-Sata.

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8y ago
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14y ago

A portable or external hard drive is a type of hard disk drive which is connected to a computer by a USB cable or other means. It allows the user to back up or store important information separate from the main internal hard drive. It is portable and operates on a plug-and-play basis. Any computer with USB or Firewire capability will recognize the external hard drive as a storage device, and assign it a letter to designate it. The drive can then be accessed like a normal internal hard drive.

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14y ago

An external data storage device is one that is not located inside the computer, but is connected outside of the case via a port or cable. There are many such devices, including USB Flash drives, hard drives, floppy drives, and tape drives. They can be connected through a variety of ports, including USB, FireWire, eSATA, or the parallel port.

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7y ago

An external hard disk drive is a type of hard disk drive which is connected to a computer by a USB cable or other means. Modern entries into the market consist of standard SATA, IDE, or SCSI hard drives in portable disk enclosures with USB, eSATAp, eSATA, SCSI, IEEE 1394 Firewire client interfaces to connect to the host computer.
The internal structure of external hard disk drives is similar to normal hard disk drives; in fact, they include a normal hard disk drive which is mounted in a disk enclosure. In a 2009 Computer Shopper comparison of 5 top external hard drives, the capacities ranged from 160 GB to 4TB and the cost per gigabyte value varied between ~0.16-0.38 USD. Larger models often include full-sized 3.5" PATA or SATA desktop hard drives, are available in the same size ranges, and generally carry a similar cost. More pricey models, especially drives with biometric security or multiple interfaces, generally cost considerably more per gigabyte. Smaller, portable 2.5" drives intended for laptop and embedded devices are slightly more expensive in cost per GB compared with larger capacity 3.5" drives. Small MP3 players, previously built aroun: partitionwizard.com/resizepartition/resize-external-hard-drive.html

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12y ago

A hard drive is a computer component that holds data. Every computer needs at least one harddrive to store its operating system, programs and user information. This drive usually is internal, or built into the computer, but as computer systems have evolved and different needs, threats and circumstances have arisen, external hard drives have become more popular. External hard drives usually are used in addition to internal hard drives in order to store more data. They also allow the user to put sensitive, confidential or otherwise important information on them, then disconnect them and store them in secure locations.

They are usually the same device used inside the computer, but put inside a separate case and connected via the USB port.

Just plug one in, and in a few seconds it will be accepted by the operating system and given a logical device letter, like 'E' drive. You can see it in 'My Computer' as a another drive.

You can then 'copy and paste', or 'click and drag' files across to it.

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11y ago

A hard drive on a computer is the part that stores all of your saved data. The difference between internal and external hard drives is that an internal hard drive is inside the casing of your computer and an external hard drive is on the outside.

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14y ago

A harddrive that is almost always connected via USB cable. Instead of it being inside the case, it's outside, and portable.

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