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Toshiba External Hard Disk

Toshiba External Hard Disk

Submitted by Peter on Tue Dec 27 2005 12:29 over 3 years ago

For Christmas I also treated myself to a Toshiba 160G external USB hard disk. I decided against Freecom as the one I use at work isn't the greatest quality and I figured a toshiba would be nicer, and I was right, it is a nice little thing, good build quality. So far it has Just Worked and when video editing with my Dell D410 laptop it was certainly fast enough (7200rpm spin speed, faster than the Dell's 5400rpm internal disk).

The video I was working with was 13G long in it's raw .avi format and I only have 20G free in the partition on the laptop, hence I used the external disk. This also had the advantage that I could plug the disk into my desktop system and use that to blow a video CD (Pinnacle Studio doesn't recognise the CD in the laptop). It is running as I type but the rendering is very slow: looks like a frame every five seconds or so. The Dell ran much faster when generating an mpeg to the Toshiba hard disk, maybe five times faster.

I didn't realise how fast the Dell D410 was, or how slow the Desktop is.

I might set up the D410 docking station to use it as a desktop PC and automate backups to the Toshiba which came with some backup software that I haven't played with yet.

Filed under: backup pinnacle video windows

C Says:

Sun Jan 14 2007 22:22 about 1 year ago

I have a 400GB one with OnSpec security or something that only works on Windows and Mac. Do you also have that problem?

Peter Says:

Mon Jan 15 2007 08:34 about 1 year ago

I don't remember seeing anything about OnSpec security.

Peter

Binu Nair Says:

Wed Jun 25 2008 10:33 6 months ago

Hello Peter,

I have a just got a new 200GB Toshiba external HDD, i brought it home, but it isnt getting detected in my laptop. I tried plugging it into different desktop & laptop, also tried giving it the external power supply no luck.

It starts with a Redlight & later that turns into a blue light. Any Idea as what would be the issue.

Peter Says:

Wed Jun 25 2008 11:18 6 months ago

Assuming you are on windows 2000, XP, vista, go into control panel/Administrative Tools/Computer Management. From here select 'Disk Management' from the tree on the left (under Storage).

You should find your new disk listed here at the bottom right. You may need to format it and give it a drive letter before you can use it. Right click on the disk and choose the options.

Sometimes disks that are plugged into usb get assigned the same drive letter as something that is already on the system (such as a mapped network drive) so you can't see them. From the Disk Management it is possible to give the disk it's own permanent drive letter.

If the disk isn't listed in Disk Management then it is probably broken.

Peter

Binu Nair Says:

Thu Jun 26 2008 07:20 6 months ago

Peter,

I had tried this on the first day itslef, I cannot see the disk under the CM window too :(

Peter Skipp Says:

Sun Aug 10 2008 12:10 4 months ago

I have had a Toshiba 250GB external hard disc for two years. Binu Nair is right: more often than not it fails to be recognised, or is recognised as an "unknown device". It is hit and miss...

This is baffling, since I am hooking it up to a Toshiba laptop. Toshiba (whose support centre I phoned) had no idea what to suggest, other than return the drive to the shop.

What I do, with differing degrees of luck, is go to Control Panel, System, Hardware, click on the USB drives, turn the HDD on and off a few times, and ta-raa! It gets going. At times, I am forced to "hot-unplug" and "hot-plug" the USB connector in case that helps (sometimes, it does...)

I feel Toshiba should have supplied an installation CD/DVD with the HDD so that it could be branded into the system as a peripheral. On the other hand, since the HDD is intended to be removable (hence, portable to another computer), an installation CD would have been a drag.

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