Whats a good external HD?

If you want something portable go for the Western Digital Passport .If you want something just for backup I would get the cheap Lacie External HD

I currently own a SimpleDrive Portable Designed by Pininfarina which has been very useful and really good choice for me.

I have a seagate 100gb for just that purpose I paid about $70 a year ago at Sams Club. I have never had any problems with it. It also allows me to easily share my library between computers.

second mirza on the wd-I have the 250GB and it’s awesome; can’t say the same for LaCie-burned up 3 of them and their cust. service was lousy.

Also had good luck with Other World Computing externals (OWC)-they use wd HDDs in their enclosures. On the high end check out Rocstor drives-reliable enclosures and tech support.

This is outside your price range but hear me out, I’m talking about this because you’re referring to a backup drive. I’ve had some very sad losses in the past and have no intentions of losing my media again.

I purchased a Drobo and am quite happy with it. Its significantly more expensive than what you’re looking for but it has been worth every penny. It uses a backup redundancy setup something like RAID5 where the data is duplicated across the drives you place in it (up to four). A lot of people simply offload their media onto an external drive and consider it safe but as soon as that drive fails you’re screwed.

Incrementally copying your files is a bit better but you are then assuming that you will be prudent it keeping your files updated (I know I can’t do that). With a redundant external storage system you simply use it as a main storage container and let it handle the backups. Considering that SATA drives are stupid cheap these days the unit practically pays for itself in my opinion.

paul brings up a good point-btw it is possible (assuming mac os x leopard is what you’re running) to backup across ‘duplicate’ external hard drives in a manner similar to what the RAID5 is set up to do-for possibly less money.

Time Machine has the option to back up across several drives (as many as you designate) in a redundant fashion.