How often should I change my external drive

No need to apologize to me, Computer0304. :)

As a normal "user" you are allowed to choose your own preferences and hardware. If you want a certain a drive, like you said you did prefer a WD one, and can't find it in stores, try online. If that is not possible, I am sorry. Try and consult with friends, reviews and the Internet, as a whole, to find something else you would like. :)

Otherwise, there are many third party programs for drive health stats and check ups. You could also use chkdsk.

You should check the drive depending on how much you use it. If you are using it that rarely, then I'd say once before each time you use it.

And about SMART on external drives, I think Lmiller7 and others have already answered . :)

Still, sometimes such programs and SMART stats can't detect every error that could occur on a drive, especially if it's a mechanical problem. That's why you need multiple back ups. I would suggest two external drives and online back up.

Cheers! :)

CK_WD

Thanks CKWD for understanding. The only place I can get a WD drive seems to be from online stores where third parties sell products. I can't trust something from third parties that I will put my precious pictures on. Well, so far, my first and only Seagate drive in my old desktop has worked for over 6 years. And, well, if they had horrible products, they would not be able to sell their products and compete with Toshiba and WD.

Of course, it's better to be secure in your choices and purchases. I could only advice you to research and ask for recommendations. :)

CK_WD

Acronis Drive Monitor, free from acronis.com, watches not only SMART but also temperature. I disabled the rest of the watching-doodads.

I have an old Western Digital External, and I've had it for about 7 years now, working fantastically still, never had a problem with it. I have another one as a 2nd backup, just to be careful, and maybe I've just been lucky with my original one, but I love it. As long as you're careful with it, and you don't get a bad one, it should last as long as you need it to.

RolandJS said:

Acronis Drive Monitor, free from acronis.com, watches not only SMART but also temperature. I disabled the rest of the watching-doodads.

Well, I have tried two other utilities and they don't seem to work on it. Only the WD software seem to work.

shadow2201 said:

I have an old Western Digital External, and I've had it for about 7 years now, working fantastically still, never had a problem with it. I have another one as a 2nd backup, just to be careful, and maybe I've just been lucky with my original one, but I love it. As long as you're careful with it, and you don't get a bad one, it should last as long as you need it to.

Yeah, I'm going to get another one just in case.

Computer0304 said:

RolandJS said:

Acronis Drive Monitor, free from acronis.com, watches not only SMART but also temperature. I disabled the rest of the watching-doodads.

Well, I have tried two other utilities and they don't seem to work on it. Only the WD software seem to work...

I tried the Acronis earlier today and was underwhelmed. It wouldn't read the drives running off my HBA card (mutter mutter, mumble mumble) and claimed my SSD health was only 32%, even though the SMART readings were all Good. Speccy says the SSD is Good and Magician says its health is 91%.

Computer0304 said:

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shadow2201 said:

I have an old Western Digital External, and I've had it for about 7 years now, working fantastically still, never had a problem with it. I have another one as a 2nd backup, just to be careful, and maybe I've just been lucky with my original one, but I love it. As long as you're careful with it, and you don't get a bad one, it should last as long as you need it to.

Yeah, I'm going to get another one just in case.

Wise decision. Just make sure you keep both backups up to date. May I suggest Macrium Reflect Free (here is a good tutorial on how to use Macrium Reflect) for imaging your C: drive/partition and FreeFileSync for backing up your data drives/partitions.

I had an old 120GB WD external drive I used for five years without a problem. I retired it because I outgrew it and it was starting to grind a tiny bit.

The only bum drive (out of about 20) I ever had was a Seagate. But my most rugged drive is an 8 year old 2.5" Fujitsu. That thing got carried around all over the world and never failed (knock on wood). I now rely more on SSDs. They are safer. But for mass storage they are still expensive. The cheapest 500GB drive I saw was $180.

Well, Samsung(Seagate) seems to be my only choice unless I get an SSD.

Computer0304 said:

Well, Samsung(Seagate) seems to be my only choice unless I get an SSD.

Why would you think that is your only choice?