Hard Drive Giveaway #2: I've Got 3350 GB of Storage to Give Away

[Jason Dunn]

<p><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/dht/auto/1250370548.usr1.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #d2d2bb;" /></p><p>OK, here we go with contest #2! If you haven't already read up on why I'm giving these hard drives away, <a href="http://www.digitalhomethoughts.com/news/show/94866/hard-drive-giveaway-i-ve-got-3350-gb-of-storage-to-give-away.html" target="_blank">please check out the first contest giveaway</a>.</p><p>All you have to do is post a message telling me how you'd use the hard drive. Will you replace the hard drive in a current computer? What size is your current drive? Or add it to a current system as a backup drive? Or will you put the drive in an enclosure? Post one message in the discussion thread (it can be the same text from the first content).</p><p>I'll select the winner at random. Once you win one of the contests, you're out of the running for the next contests in this series. Each winner will be contacted via private forum message and they'll have 72 hours to respond to claim their prize - so be sure email notifications are turned on for your forum account. The last contest I ran someone missed out on winning a prize because they didn't reply to my message for two weeks!</p><p>The drive I'm giving away in this second contest is a <strong>Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500 GB (SATA)</strong>. This contest will close on Friday the 4th of September at 12 noon GMT -7. Enter now!</p><p><strong>UPDATE:</strong> The contest is now over, and the winner is...<a class="bigusername" href="http://forums.thoughtsmedia.com/members/cmchavez/">cmchavez</a>. Here's what he posted: <em></em></p><p><em>"</em><em>Currently I have a 200 gig system drive that I back up only the personal documents and settings folders to a separate, external 160 gig drive; basically my CYA drive to prevent my wife from killing me over digital photos that haven't yet been burned to backup disks.&nbsp; I'd probably swap out the main system drive for a larger drive, then use the 200 gig drive as a secondary storage drive with a recurring Robocopy task to provide a secondary backup copy of all the essential files. Definitely would make things better on the family computer!</em></p><p>Congrats <em>cmchavez</em>! Stay tuned for more contests everyone...</p>

[jeffd]

whoo hoo... a post for every contest.. time to inflate the old post counter. ;)

barracuda huh, looks like a pretty high performance drive this time around.

[uzziah0]

This would replace BOTH of my internal HDs, and still be bigger.
I have a 40GB and and 80 GB internal.
But, I also don't have an SATA, my PC has just an IDE controller; so I'd probably get a box from NewEgg or Frys to put it into. I'll probably get rid of the 40 GB drive, and just use the 80 for the OS, and the "new" one for everything else.

[cmchavez]

Currently I have a 200 gig system drive that I back up only the personal documents and settings folders to a separate, external 160 gig drive; basically my CYA drive to prevent my wife from killing me over digital photos that haven't yet been burned to backup disks.

I'd probably swap out the main system drive for a larger drive, then use the 200 gig drive as a secondary storage drive with a recurring Robocopy task to provide a secondary backup copy of all the essential files.

Definitely would make things better on the family computer!

[paschott]

External drive - definitely. I don't really need another internal 500 GB Drive right now, but could use a portable to backup important docs and have a spare copy around as needed. It would be well worth it.

Thanks.

[joffreyharin]

I'd buy the popcorn hour c-200 and use it as it's main storage. This since the media PC i'm currently using runs quite hot in it's new cupboard.

[oguime]

I still wanna build a WHS machine, and a second 500GB HD would be nice.

[whataboutbob]

Actually, this couldn't be more timely. Initially, I had two 250GB drives because I was doing some video editing (home movies) and really needed the space. One of my drives stopped functioning so the addition of a 500GB HD would be more than welcome. The idea of putting it in an enclosure and using it as an external drive does sound mighty appealing. I've always wanted to try it but the only spare drives I have lying around are 6GB HD's and it didn't seem worth it to purchase an an enclosure for them. Expanding on this idea - I thought of maybe giving it to my father who uses a laptop as his primary computer but it only has a 40GB drive. It would be great for backups. Anyway, that's my two cents.

[EscapePod]

I'd use it to complete the RAID 1 I need. It would go perfect with the single Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500 GB (SATA) I already have.

[Cold Flame]

Hey Jason,

As before, I intend to replace my main drive on my home PC with this newer one and relegate my ~6 year old drive to a temporary storage place for items I need to burn. I don't put a lot of faith in that drive anymore, yet it's currently my OS drive and storage drive as it's partitioned. Scary!

[andrew_lee]

I'd probably put it in an enclosure to use as an external drive.

[Kacey Green]

I'd pop it in the WHS and use it as backup and regular network attached storage.

[ptyork]

I've got two 160 GB SATA I drives that store my media (backed up to WHS). This would serve as a replacement for both, which I'd take to school to serve as a shared, RAID'ed container for storing VM's that I use in my classes.

[Kursplat]

Most likely, an external enclosure.

[Master Loon]

Wow, I would add them to my current unit maxed at 250 GB and add the rest to an old pc and use the rest for a home server usindg an old pc in the basement...I have no hard drives for it now....this would be great. I lost pictures and music and videos , i belive due to messing with Kazaa Years back. This would eliminate losses

[bsieve]

sadly same as last time replace two backup drives into a single drive for backup.

[Bob Christensen]

Love the contests! My daughter's computer needs the additional storage.

[The Yaz]

Jason,

I'm, in the process of updating my network and adding another 50GB drive to the NAS box I just got would be awesome. I'll need to ,make it an external drive but it would be nice to go from 200GB to 1.5TB in one upgrade!

Steve

[bcre8v2]

I'd buy another enclosure and connect it to my WHS with the other 750 GB.
You can never have enough storage, especially where backups are concerned.

-Steve

[dtanderson]

I would use it to replace the data drive in my media server. The current drive is too small and almost full.

[gstenger]

I would replace the boot drive on my aging Dell with this puppy and probably wait for Windows 7 to make the jump and do a clean install. Sweeeeeeeet.

[darinu]

I would add HDD this to my Windows Home Server. I'm running very low on space for pictures, TV shows and videos.

[dbng]

I'll get an enclosure and add some much needed backup....

[Joel Crane]

I'd pop it into a USB enclosure and pretty much quadruple my storage!

[Ploobers]

External enclosure to protect my photos!

[tabi13]

Since I plan to do the exact same thing with drive as I did with the drive in the previous competition, had I won it, my answer will be the same.

I currently have a 500gb drive in my system which is quickly filling up due to my main 2 interests

1. Photography (shooting with a Canon 40d)
2. PC games

I could REALLY use this drive as a dedicated disk to hold all my pictures.

[Reid Kistler]

Decisions, decisions....

500GB would make a nice upgrade to my personal system, replacing the current main drive (250GB), which would then move to the home "server / backup" machine (rather Old, but LOTS of drive bays :)).

[Larchi]

Same as before - I'll replace my 200GB drive that I use for editing raw video.

[jlafount]

I'll add it to my backup machine as a place to store important applications and data files for when a hard drive dies

[gschlau]

my current drive is making would curls your toes. Time before death probably measured in days not weeks. Help--I need a new drive!

[timmy]

I'd swap my 99% full 250GB external harddrive and insert the 500GB disk into the usb enclosure. Would make life easier than choosing which files to delete ;)

[Jason Dunn]

The contest is now over, and the winner is...

cmchavez (http://forums.thoughtsmedia.com/members/cmchavez/)

"Currently I have a 200 gig system drive that I back up only the personal documents and settings folders to a separate, external 160 gig drive; basically my CYA drive to prevent my wife from killing me over digital photos that haven't yet been burned to backup disks. I'd probably swap out the main system drive for a larger drive, then use the 200 gig drive as a secondary storage drive with a recurring Robocopy task to provide a secondary backup copy of all the essential files. Definitely would make things better on the family computer!

Congrats cmchavez! Stay tuned for the next giveaway contest...