Seagate ST302504FDA1E1-RK FreeAgent Desktop 250 GB 3.5" USB 2.0 External Hard Drive
by Seagate
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List Price: Our Price: $45.00 You Save: $104.99 (70%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: CE See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Seagate ST302504FDA1E1-RK FreeAgent Desktop 250 GB 3.5" USB 2.0 External Hard Drive
Customer Review: Very, very easy to use
Summary: 5 Stars
I've owned this drive since August 2007 and have had no problems with it yet. Buying a hard drive, especially an external unit, is always something of a crapshoot, because the mechanical parts are always more liable to failure than most other parts of a PC, but if you do your homework and buy from a manufacturer you've had success with in the past, you'll do all right most of the time. I've been buying hard drives, internal and external, for nearly 14 years now and have never had one fail outright on me (though one was DOA and a couple of others have acquired bad sectors over time). It helps to bear in mind that external hard drives, advertising notwithstanding, aren't really intended for heavy-duty program work; they're meant for backup and data storage.
This drive is, as other reviewers have noted, extremely easy to set up. My particular model only requires one USB cable to connect but users who have a two-cable model can get an add-on USB hub (powered models can be had from $20 up) to get more USB ports. IIRC the drive came formatted NTFS out of the box, so no conversion or reformatting was necessary. Unless you run Linux or Mac, or still stick with an older version of Windows on at least one of your active machines, you'll not need to reformat your drive. The drive, which has its own AC adapter, powers down automatically after a period of inactivity to save wear and tear and reduce heat issues, so do be prepared to wait a couple of seconds if you access the drive after it's been idle for a lengthy period of time.
Customer Review: Exellent
Summary: 5 Stars
Anyone that is looking for an inexpensive external hard drive, this is a great choice. It is top quality. This product is very quiet compared to my dad's 300GB Lacie hard drive and is much nicer looking. It is very small, only about 7.5 inches high, and three inches wide including the base. The only thing I would complain about is the backup utility that comes on the drive. I would suggest finding a different utility online somewhere. For Mac users Apple.com has a load of choices, but PC users might have to look around. Overall this is a great drive, small, very quiet, and great looking.
UPDATE: Originally bought February of '08
Current date: October 2010
I've had this drive almost 3 years and it still runs strong. Granted all it has done is sit on my desk, never gets moved. Plus I regularly run maintenance on it. It is still extremely quite, the only noise it makes is on first start up, otherwise it is virtually noiseless.
It is only 320gb, but I still have over 200gb left, I have 10gb partitioned to some archives, but the rest is dedicated to Time Machine and backs up everything.
Basically, when this one dies, or I need more space (unlikely) I will most definitely be buying another Seagate drive.
Customer Review: Werks gud 4 me!
Summary: 5 Stars
This is just to balance some of the negative reviews here. I got one a week ago ($50 after rebate from Office Depot) and it's been absolutely glitch-free. Moronically easy to set up, 'puter recognized the drive immediately, transferred 60+ GB from another external with no glitches except for a couple files that wouldn't copy because -- I suspect -- they were virus-infected and AVG Free prevented the transfer. Anyway, I looked at the files, realized they were nothing I ever created, used or wanted, and so I deleted them. No probs with the transfer after that.
It's been running fine for a week now. I do shut my computer down at night, so I never run it more than about 12-16 hours at a stretch.
As to the lack of backup software -- good point if you need it. I use something I wrote myself (a QuickBasic MS-DOS program that still runs under XP, believe it or not) so I've never used anything else.
I use external hard drives for all my data, never any data on the C: drive. That way if the computer dies, or you want to pass it on or sell it, no hassles about getting the data off. Just unplug the external and you're in business.
For what it's worth.
Stan Jones
Anchorage, Alaska
Customer Review: Seagate FreeAgent: An Excellent Option
Summary: 5 Stars
On something of a whim, I purchased this drive primarily to store my music and backup my notebook hard drive. Upon opening the package, which was immaculate and well-thought out, I found the sleek FreeAgent Desktop. The instructions were more comical than informative, but this is moot, because the hard drive is so absurdly easy to set up. Plug and play in every sense of the word.
I've read that this drive can become very hot during use, but I have not sensed anything other than a reassuring warmness during operation, not to mention the awesome glowing orange activity light on the front of the unit.
As for its performance, I don't really have anything to stack it to, but in my view, the drive operates much faster than my notebook hard drive, and efficiently deals with anything I throw at it.
Seagate has developed an fast-performing, aesthetically pleasing, and affordable external hard drive at last. I cannot yet attest to its reliability, as I've had it for only about a month now, but its five year warranty lends itself to some degree of peace of mind. I don't anticipate any problems at all with this unit.
Customer Review: Pretty easy even for a middle aged amateur like me!
Summary: 5 Stars
Well I own a Mac G4 laptop and I have been filling up my laptop with music, videos, etc. so I decided to look for a external hard drive solution. After some research I found the Seagate 256 GB and thought it would be a good fit for me. It was for sale at my local national electronics store for $129. I hopped on Amazon and got it for $89! Great price. OK, now for the tech install. The drive was recognized right away by my G4, but I am not so good with MAC (I only use it for Itunes , pix and stuff- I still rely on my Dell Windows based laptop for all else). Anyway I pretty much messed up changing the Itunes on my G4, so I had to go to the local Apple store and the guy fixed it to do what I wanted it to do ( put all my music and stuff on the Seagate) in about 20 minutes. Now it works great, if you are a more Mac friendly user, then I bet you will do fine transfering your music to your new Seagate, or save the hassle and go to your Apple store and have the Apple Genius guy do it!
All in all, after two weeks I am very happy with this drive!