USB2.0 to USB 3.0 ExpressCard help needed for new external HDD

DianaD 74 · 08 Mar 2011

Hi all, I hope I'm posting in the correct forum.
I also tried a search within this forum with no luck.

I'm looking to purchase a larger 3.5" external HDD for Imaging and storage. My current EXT HDD is 120GB which has become much too small for my current needs.
I've done some reading about usb 3.0 transfer rates and some articles say that the rate is much slower when using an Express card adapter.

I'd would really like to hear some advice on the performance of a 2.0 to 3.0 upgrade VIA an Express/54 laptop card or if there is another way to upgrade to USB 3.0... Possibly using an existing USB 2.0 port???

I'd also love to hear from members that have purchased 1TB or larger USB 3.0 EXT HDD's (I'm leaning towards a 1TB drive because of the cost) and how the transfer rate is with the 2.0 to 3.0 adapter card.

I have an HP DV6885SE laptop/Win7 Pro with the Express/54 card slot and 3 USB 2.0 slots.

I'll be using Acronis True Image for the backups.
Thanks to all for any help and hardware suggestions.
D. :)

DeaconFrost · 08 Mar 2011

Since you have a laptop, you'll only get USB 3.0 one of two ways. Either by a built-in USB 3.0 port, or an Express Card add-in. I would say that an Express Card add-in would still be quite a bit faster than a USB 2.0 port, so I wouldn't have any worries about it.

You definitely won't find an adapter for a USB 2.0 port, because the data still has to flow through the USB 2.0 port. I don't know iff hand the performance capabilities of Express Card, but you could easily compare the throughput of a USB 2.0 port to the stated throughput of the USB 3.0 Express Card.

Luckystar · 08 Mar 2011

Unless you are going to to use a SSD inside the case, there really is not much point.

At the moment, there are no HDD's on the market that can fill all the bandwidth of USB 3.0.

IMO, i would stick with USB 2.0 unless you are going to purchase a big SSD (Which by the way, bigger than 250GB, is getting on about (In your money) probably $4 -500)

I have asked a similar question before - Transfer speed test - eSata vs USB 3.0

Sorry to burst your bubble -best go for something like this - My Passport Essential SE 1 TB External hard drive - 5.0 Gbps (SuperSpeed USB) that is my opinion.

Lucky

DianaD 74 · 08 Mar 2011

DeaconFrost said:

Since you have a laptop, you'll only get USB 3.0 one of two ways. Either by a built-in USB 3.0 port, or an Express Card add-in. I would say that an Express Card add-in would still be quite a bit faster than a USB 2.0 port, so I wouldn't have any worries about it.

You definitely won't find an adapter for a USB 2.0 port, because the data still has to flow through the USB 2.0 port. I don't know iff hand the performance capabilities of Express Card, but you could easily compare the throughput of a USB 2.0 port to the stated throughput of the USB 3.0 Express Card.

Luckystar said:

Unless you are going to to use a SSD inside the case, there really is not much point.

At the moment, there are no HDD's on the market that can fill all the bandwidth of USB 3.0.

IMO, i would stick with USB 2.0 unless you are going to purchase a big SSD (Which by the way, bigger than 250GB, is getting on about (In your money) probably $4 -500)

I have asked a similar question before - Transfer speed test - eSata vs USB 3.0

Sorry to burst your bubble -best go for something like this - My Passport Essential SE 1 TB External hard drive - 5.0 Gbps (SuperSpeed USB) that is my opinion.

Lucky

Thanks you both very much. The few 2.0 to 3.0 cards I've researched in general seem to be junk according to the reviews. Either they need an additional 5Volt supply to operate or they don't even work at all.

Can anybody recommend a reliable, inexpensive 1 or 2 TB USB 2.0 or USB 3.0 since 3.0 would still be a good idea in case the technology changes (or if I ever catch up with it) for use down the road.
I'd like to keep the price under $150.... is this unreasonable for a 1TB or possibly a 2TB drive?

Thanks again
Diana.

Ponmayilal · 08 Mar 2011

[QUOTE=DianaD 74;1281555]

DeaconFrost said:

........Can anybody recommend a reliable, inexpensive 1 or 2 TB USB 2.0 or USB 3.0 since 3.0 would still be a good idea in case the technology changes (or if I ever catch up with it) for use down the road.
I'd like to keep the price under $150.... is this unreasonable for a 1TB or possibly a 2TB drive?

Thanks again
Diana.

You may just have a look at my post here . I have a Seagate GoFlex 1.5TB Ultraportable USB external drive that comes with a GoFlex USB3 adapter/cable with which the trial was done. Western Digital also have a large USB3 external drive. I went in for Seagate GoFlex since interchangeable adapter/cables are available for esata,firewire, USB2 etc.,

Note: Since I have a desktop, I used a PCIe USB3 expansion card plugged into PCIe slot in the motherboard.

DianaD 74 · 10 Mar 2011

Ponmayilal said:

You may just have a look at my post here .

I'm no guru by any means but from what I read in your link it seems the express cards don't perform all that well.

Maybe I'll just buy a 1 or 2 TB USB 2.0 external HDD and live with it.
Thanks for the help all!
D.

pparks1 · 10 Mar 2011

Luckystar said:

Unless you are going to to use a SSD inside the case, there really is not much point.

At the moment, there are no HDD's on the market that can fill all the bandwidth of USB 3.0.

Huh....A standard mechanical hard drive might be able to provide 80MB-120MB/sec throughput. However, in a USB 2.0 port, it might get 30MB/sec at best. If USB 3.0 is available, that might become 60-90MB/sec. Thus going at least 2x-3X as fast as it was previously.

You don't need an SSD to take advantage of USB 3.0.

Have you considered adding a eSATA card to your laptop and then buying an eSATA external hard drive? These eSATA cards might perform better or be more stable as they have been around longer.

whs · 10 Mar 2011

I would advise to stay with USB2. My comparisons making images with free Macrium showed only a 30% speed increase of USB3 over USB2 - and my USB3 ports came with the Viao laptop.

But then you run into another problem. The Linux recovery program that you run to recover from the image does not recognize USB3. So you are back to USB2 for the recovery. It's really not worth it.

pparks1 · 10 Mar 2011

I just ran a test, as I needed to grab an image anyway. I did the testing on a Dell Latitude E6400 with onboard USB 2.0 and eSATA connections to a ThermalTake BlacX dock that does both USB 2.0 and eSATA. And I just so happen to use Acronis True Image 2010 on my boxes. The hard drive I am using is a 2TB Samsung SpinPoint F4 at 5,400RPM.

My C drive on my computer has approx 70GB worth of stuff on it, and the System Reserved partition was included as well (100MB).

The following tests were performed with default settings, which include Normal Compression Level and a Backup Priority of Low.

Time to image using Acronis TIH with USB 2.0 connection: 40:16, file size of 47,098,308KB
Time to image using Acronis TIH with eSATA connection: 17:23, file size of 47,105,308KB

So, as you can see, the eSATA connection was 2.3x faster using USB 2.

mjf · 10 Mar 2011

whs,
with imaging you have a mix of processing and link speed (ie. USB2/3) factors. If it was straight link speed then given ext HDD are typically sata drives I'd expect x2-3 speed increase. Your 30% figure suggests processing is a big factor.

If you're buying another usb ext hdd what would the general feeling be - only buy usb3 from now on?