i have my eyes on 2 very similar looking hard drives, in fact they happen to be of the same company! 1)western digital WDE1U5000U 500gb 3.5" elements external hard disk drive 2)western digital 500GB My Book 3.5" external hard drive I went through the site and it doesnt let me compare the two ( using the comparison option ) Both the drives have exactly the same feature and the only difference seem to be in the price, elements selling for 10 pounds lesser. elements has a rpm of 7200 spindle speed listed. my book doesnt have a speed listed . this is my first drive , so i dont really want to take a chance with a product that might get legac-ised ?? any ideas? any pointers whatsoever will b e highly appreciated. the discounts dont last for more than 4 days, so i am anxiously waiting for a quick response! xtreme work is rest

Neither. WD makes bad external drives. I've had problems with lots of WD external HDD. The best way to buy an external HDD is to buy a SATA or PATA 3.5 HDD and spend some money in a good external enclosure with heatsinks and maybe a fan. I'm just a shadow of my former self!

Which my book series drive is it you are considering. There are 8 different ones on the WD site. http://www.wdc.com/en/products/prod... http://www.wdc.com/en/products/inde...

thanks for the prompt reply! its the 500GB my book essential edition: http://www.wdc.com/en/products/prod... i thought about making the enclosures,which is always a better option, then realised it would be too much for me to do. i understand that external drives are usually lousy,but i thought WD was better than the "lacie" thing,,selling like hot cakes for now i believe..but bad reviews none the less. xtreme work is rest

The warranties appear to be different for one thing. Look at the link below for warranty info. http://support.wdc.com/warranty/pol... Some of the My Book units consist of two drives in one enclosure. They can be configured to backup in RAID 0 or 1 or can simply be used as two drives for single backup of all files. Most Lacie drives are also RAID compatible. The drive you linked to is a single drive unit. Some of the My Book drives are also Firewire capable, which is faster than USB 2.0 and if you have many USB devices may be a better choice, assuming you have a firewire 400 or 800 port.

ahhh thanks for pointing to the warranty page,,never really bothered to check that! (although both have the same warranty periods on closer examination ) raid....doesnt mention nything about this on either specs....wonder if that is the catch. xtreme work is rest

No, The drives you picked are single drive units. You need 2 or more disks to use RAID. As I stated, some of the units in that series are dual drive units. Also the Firewire option on some. Some of those are intended to serve as small network backup solutions. One other item I noticed. At least one of them automatically turns on when you start your computer. For myself that is NOT a good feature. I use an external drive with a separate on/off switch. Most of the time it is off.