There are those who need big honkin’ hard drives and those who don’t.

Typically, those that need the big-big drives do one or more of the following:

• Video editing. Camcorder, DV, DVR, Tivo, DVD ripping, etc.
• Multitrack audio editing. The raw WAV files are quite large.
• Gaming. Many newer games require a significant amount of space.
• Photography. Even on point-and-shoot digital camera photos, each photo can easily be over 3MB in size. If you take a lot of photos this can add up in size rather quickly.

Those that don’t do any of the above or only on a semi-regular basis typically don’t need the big-big drives (or just use an external when required).

With that being said, here are the numbers as of now for what you’d pay if you decide to add on a hard drive.

All prices are listed in US dollars. All drive types are standard 3.5-inch form factor with SATA connector. Links provided are lowest price offerings from NewEgg. Always remember to do your research with hard drives before buying one. Just because something is lowest price doesn’t mean it’s the best offering (obviously).

80GB: $35

It makes no sense to purchase a 40GB any longer because the 80GB versions are cheaper by a few bucks. This is the smallest and cheapest available offering for SATA.

If you are still going super-old-school with Windows 98, this is the drive you want because the 120GB versions are tough to come by new and that is the maximum ‘98 will recognize (technically it’s 137GB but you obviously can’t buy a 137GB drive).

160GB: $42

I have no idea why this size is still even offered. It’s too big for old-school operating systems and to small for newer ones. I’d skip it.

250GB: $50

I wouldn’t bother with this one either. See next listing.

320GB: $50

It’s amazing that for just 8 bucks more you double the size from 160GB to 320GB.

500GB: $55

Yes, you can go for the big guns for just 55 bucks. Most would agree that this is the start of big-big territory by current standards.

640GB: $70

The 640GB size is a bit of an oddity because the 750GB version is just 5 bucks more (see next listing).

750GB: $75

We started at $35. Forty dollars later we’re in 750GB territory.

1TB (1000GB): $100

Twenty-five bucks after that we’re in terabyte territory.

1.5TB (1500GB): $120

Twenty bucks beyond that is one-and-a-half terabyte territory.

…and this is where we end.

For now.

NewEgg currently doesn’t stock 2TB internal hard drives - but I’m sure they’re right around the corner and waiting to be sold in ‘09.

Is the terabyte range worth the price?

Yes. When it broke $200 it was worth the asking price.

However for most people that don’t do a ton of video stuff (be it DV and/or DVR, etc.), 500GB will fit the bill nicely.

Situation: You’ve decided that you’re going to build a new computer. You put your part list together (case, mainboard, RAM, hard drive, processor, etc.) and then come to the point where you have to purchase an optical drive.

Seems like a waste of money, doesn’t it?

On the Linux side of things, it has been proven that you can install a full version (meaning not "biz-card") of a Linux distro with absolutely no optical drive whatsoever.

In addition to that the vast majority of Linux apps are download-only territory, so there literally is no need for the optical at all. For backups you just plug in an external drive via USB or Firewire.

On the Windows side you are required to have an optical drive, but only for one thing - the installation of the Windows OS itself. However you could easily get away with using an external optical drive, install your OS then put the drive away until you need it (which will most likely be never).

For Windows gaming there are download options, the best (arguably) of which is Steam. No discs necessary and tons (and I mean tons) of really great games.

Also bear in mind there is a large push by the computer industry to "go cloud" as you’ve heard, such as with Windows Live applications. All that stuff is from the internet and no optical drive is necessary at any time.

On your next PC box build, could you go optical-less? Yes, absolutely. If doing it the Linux way, you don’t need the optical drive at all. If doing it the Windows way, all you need is an external to get the OS install out of the way and that’s that.

And what to do with that empty bay? You’d be better off putting in a card reader where the optical would otherwise go. You’ll probably get more use out of it than you would with the optical.

In previous articles and videos I’ve discussed how to get a "Live" mode (i.e. as if your computer were booting from CD) of Linux on a USB stick. Some people think this is cool but would rather have a full CD-sized distribution installation instead. And when I said "CD-sized" I’m referring to distributions that take up the entire contents of a CD (such as Ubuntu) and not "biz card" distros like Puppy Linux and Damn Small Linux.

To do this it isn’t dependent on the distribution you’re using (you can use any you like) but more so on your USB stick itself.

Consider it this way: You want to use your USB stick as a "hard drive", so to speak. Being that’s the case, you need a stick that exceeds the minimum requirements for the OS to work.

Using Ubuntu as an example, the minimum requirement according to its native installer is a drive that has at least 2048MB free. A 2GB USB stick isn’t enough because it doesn’t have enough minimum space - so you need a 4GB USB stick.

Side note: Think a 4GB USB stick is expensive? It’s isn’t. It’s 8 bucks. And I remember not more than 3 to 4 months ago they were $22. These things are getting so unbelievably cheap it’s ridiculous - and they all work.

My recommended method for installing a full Linux distro on a 4GB USB stick

Before continuing, yes the way I do it is complete overkill - but I like to have absolute 100% confirmation that the Linux install absolutely positively will not touch the internal hard drive of my system. You’ll understand what I mean by that in a moment.

1. Head into the BIOS of your computer and from the boot device order set the first to be CDROM and the second to be USB-FDD, USB-HDD or USB-CDROM.

If USB-FDD doesn’t work for a boot device, try USB-HDD. If USB-HDD doesn’t work, try USB-CDROM. One of them will eventually work. And if not, try plugging the USB stick directly into the back of the computer (as in use the USB ports that are directly off the motherboard and not the ones wired to the front of the case).

2. Power off your computer, open the case and physically disconnect the hard drive from the motherboard.

This is the overkill part. Not entirely necessary, but I don’t want GRUB to even know the internal hard drive exists - because even if you set the hard drive "not to exist" in your BIOS, the Linux installation will still "see" your internal hard drive on most motherboards. I go the extra mile by cracking open the case and unplugging the SATA connector from the motherboard physically.

Before rebooting the computer:

Pop in your Linux distro CD-ROM into the tray because you’ll need to boot from it to install the OS to the USB stick.

Insert the USB stick you want to install the OS to into one of your open USB ports.

3. Reboot and proceed with a normal Linux distro installation.

If all goes well, your computer will boot up, spin up the CD-ROM and launch Linux in a Live mode. From there you proceed with a normal installation. Being your hard drive is physically disconnected the OS will be forced to pick the USB stick as its only means of media to install the OS to.

When done, the OS will prompt you to eject the disc (which you do), then restart the computer.

4. Reboot and test the Linux OS off the USB stick to make sure everything works okay.

On reboot you should have a full Linux OS ready-to-rock. If so, you’re all done with that.

5. Shut down, power off the computer and reconnect the internal hard drive to the motherboard.

Once the USB stick has a full Linux OS on it you’re safe to reconnect your hard drive back to the motherboard.

6. Do a test boot with the USB stick inserted to see if it loads first before the internal hard drive does.

Your boot order should be CDROM, USB-FDD (or HDD or CDROM) then HDD. So what your computer should do is try to boot from the optical drive first, then the USB stick and then the internal hard drive.

If all goes well, whenever the USB stick is plugged into the computer and booted from a "cold start", it will always boot from the USB stick first whenever you want to go into Linux. When done you log out of Linux, shut down, power off, unplug the stick and reboot again to go back to the internal hard drive’s OS.

Final notes

You should bear in mind that by installing a Linux OS on a USB fashion it will not be portable. What this means is that the OS will set itself to use the computer it is first booted from and configure itself as such.

If you take the USB stick after a full install and boot, then bring it to another computer with different hardware and boot from that, chances are high that the internal settings of the OS on that stick will get all messed up because it’s "expecting" a different the computer it was first booted from. Sure, you can simply reconfigure everything and get it working again relatively quickly for anything messed up, but that’s a bit of a hassle.

For each computer you want to boot a full-install-on-USB-stick distro from, it’s recommended you get a separate USB stick dedicated to each computer. The sticks are cheap enough anyway so it’s not a big deal.

There are more than a few people out there who would find it quite handy to be able to run Windows XP off a USB stick (or hard drive in a caddy). I was also interested to know if this was possible to do.

The Big Question: Is it possible?

Answer: Yes.

However it is a humongous pain in the butt to get working.

The best write-up I found on how to get XP running off a flash drive is from Ngine.de, appropriately titled How to install and run a FULL Windows XP from a USB drive. It is very thorough.

The biggest hurdle to cross is the TXTSETUP.SIF file (as well as a few INF files). What XP does is attempt to load USB stuff on boot which in effect "kills" any USB-based installation, so you have to dig into a text editor and "correct" it manually.

If you’re determined enough, you can get this to work. I was going to try this myself, but after seeing all the b.s. involved I said "Nah".

There are other guides available on how to do this (including those that recommend using BartPE), but no matter how you look at it, it’s just a long laborious process.

I only recommend trying this to those who have time to kill.

Solid State Drives (SSD) are inevitably what are going to replace our existing hard disk drives. For those not aware of what the difference is between the two, traditional hard drives have moving parts on the inside while SSDs so not. You can consider them "big flash drives".

SSD is above and beyond superior to HDD in every way except space for the time being. The biggest one you can get within a reasonable price point is 128GB for just a tick over 400 USD.

However the single largest problem is that SSDs don’t exactly "agree" with BIOSes from several manufacturers. One of the more popular drives at present is the OCZ Core Series 128GB Sata II, however the customer feedback is less than stellar on this product. Some are reporting slow access times, spotty write methods and a whole host of other bad stuff. But it also should be noted some have had no issues at all.

OCZ has been on the ball with this product (as you’ll see from the link above) and has been responding as best they can to this evolving technology, urging people to discuss the product in their forums whether you think it’s good, bad or indifferent.

For those thinking about SSD, I do recommend reading up on what people have been saying about it. It’s still an expensive tech and is a good read for those thinking about plunking down a few hundred smacks just to be on the bleeding edge, so to speak.

Situation: You’re going to upgrade your primary hard drive to something bigger, better and faster - however the primary hard drive is obviously what holds your operating system.

So now you’re faced with a choice.

1. Reinstall the operating system on the new drive and reinstall all your apps.
2. Use drive imaging software to copy everything from the old drive to the new one.

Continued