Consolidating Drives

Alright I got a bunch of drives, when I mean a bunch I do mean a BUNCH. Well maybe a lot to most people but not to some others.

In my server, i think i'll start loading it up more here in the near future, currently I have a 1TB drive and a 640Gig drive active, and so far it can backup rather successfully to a 1TB drive. Though I got 3x 320Gigs on standby to activate at any time.

Though with me moving forward with larger scale backups, and now my server should be on 100% of the time Im going to have to step up my game a little.

So for external backup solutions im looking at some larger drives. What would be a good suggestion for a 1.5-2TB drive for replacement? I have 2 e-SATA cases to house my drives (currently a 1TB for the server and a 640Gig on my main system). I'd like to replace those both possibly to put them into use in the physical server and have larger backup drives.

So whats the best options for a 1.5-2TB Drive. Unless there are larger ones out there that don't cost a dang fortune. I've been out of the loop on mechanical drives for a while now, last time I looked was over 1 year ago.

Hey, not sure if you have fixed this yet but in case you haven't here are my two cents...There are a ton of 1.5-2Tb drives out there. I know that they have 2-4Tb ones out there, just becareful because Windows doens't play nice with 3Tb (not sure if that is only booting/internal HDD). You can always play it safe and go with WD or Seagate (I use a 2Tb WD over firewire). A point you made with putting the two drives internal, are you going to raid them? If so, and i am sure you know, RAID doesn't work on different sizes...Good Luck!

Na in this setup no raids, it will be backed up to a drive that is powered on only for such. As mentioned by others, like Raid1 does help with harddrive failure (transparency) but doesn't account for issues like virus's or deleting a file by accident. So thats why I went with a backup solution and stayed away from Raids when dealing with vast storage (only performance I'll use raid).

I just purchased a 2TB drive for my main system but might use that as an easy ways to do backup of my Server and Main rig that will easily cover my needs right now. Along with a spare 1TB drive as an extra backup solution yup should be good to go for a while I think. Got a 2x 5.25" bay that will house 3 removable/power on/off 3.5" HDD's. So I think I'll have a 2TB, 1TB and 640Gig in this housing. That should be more than enough for my needs.

Though think I'll still be working on ways to get the server to have more space as needed in the future. Think when I take apart my server might put my other 640gig in there that I have and remove the 320gigs and place them on a for sale spot.