when i lose data form 1'st i will recopy from the 2'nd then scan for viruses
Just wanting to let you know that you want to do a full virus scan on any computer these drives come into contact with prior to connecting the drives. *If the drive has been being used on that system extra virus scans arent necessary but I'd suggest a daily scan. Its most important that a external that was separated from the system, the system itself verified to be clean before connecting the external.
By the way I saw a tut. about viruses on portable HDD and they said they can't harm ur hdd becouse virus goes to the system etc,anyway i will do what u said i will scan to be sure
Wherever you saw this info, its false... External Drives CAN get infected and they DO get infected from a system that has an infection if the nature of the code is to spread by removable media which external drives are. There are all sorts of virus's that spread this way, however most virus's out there are dependent on Windows OS and target Windows itself by altering Windows system files or nesting/rooting themselves in the system as a parasite leech. Most do not work independent of the OS and are heavily dependent on Windows to carry out an exploit or attack method. This is why a drive infected with a Virus from a Windows system can be brought to a Linux computer and the virus is inactive. The worst virus's that I know of are ones that attack the master boot record which is a low level attack/infection. Its able to run prior to Windows booting. I am not the best guru out there on Virus's but I do know how to protect yourself from them. They are constantly evolving and so you have to stay on your toes to keep systems free of them.
i want to watch 2 movies (4 hours),the movies are on my HDD Portable,what u advise me to do? copy both videos in my pc and run there? or run 4 hours directly from HDD Portable?
If your computer has the space available to copy to the local hard drive, I would then copy them and run them from there. Once you get your second external you could play from USB external drive, but right now if your external overheats or gets bumped you lose everything on it possibly, so until the 2nd external has a copy of the first external drives contents, I would minimize its use. And so I advise copying the files to local computers hard drive at this point and playing direct from there instead. * Some external drives heat up when they are in constant use. When they are connected and nothing reading and writing to them they stay cool, but is its constantly active it can heat up. Some external drives are poorly thermally designed and dont have proper ventilation for many hours of constant use. A drive that heats up inside its case with no ability to get rid of heat can damage the drive.
Why backup and not copy the files directly( simply copy & paste) to a 2'nd portable hdd?
Any part of the conversation where I may have stated backup, it was suppose to imply that the files are replicated (copied) from Drive #1 to Drive #2.
Here are DOS instructions that can be run once you get your second drive. You will need to figure out which drive is #1 and #2. In my example below Drive #1 is E: and Drive #2 is F:
It will copy all data from Drive 1 to Drive 2. You connect both external drives to a healthy computer that doesnt have any virus's on it, and then run this instruction. It can take quite a while for the data of drive #1 to Drive #2 initially. But after the initial copy from #1 to #2, future replications should take less time because it will only copy over files that have changed been edited or altered as well as new files. * This instruction though does not perform garbage clean up, and so if you delete files on say drive #1 and connect drive #2 and run this instruction to replicate, drive #1 to #2, Drive 2 will not be removed of the files. So anything that you want removed you will have to manually remove from drives.
To make a mirror copy of Drive #1 to Drive #2
xcopy E:\*.* F\*.* /h/s/d/yTo make a mirror copy of Drive #2 to Drive #1
xcopy F:\*.* E:\*.* /h/s/d/y*The above instructions will need to be adjusted for what drive letters your external drives are given. Its common for E: and F: to be used on a system with C: as hard drive and D: as optical drive. So before you run the instructions just be sure you know that the paths are correct for drive letters. This copies everything from E to F and F to E. You will never lose data with these, however if you have any files that were edited it will overwrite the old files. If you want to keep copies of old files its best to place then in their own directory or name them with a unique name so that they are protected from overwrite.
These are run from command prompt or can be added to a text file that is given a .bat file extension in which they then become a batch file. the very first time you do this you will see lots of files copying as well as it can take quite a while due to the limitations of the USB ports speed. I am guessing your on USB 2.0. If your on USB 1.1 or 1.0 it could take a lot longer. These days newer computers have USB 3.0 slots and if the external is a USB 3.0 drive then it goes full speed transfer rate. If its a USB 3.0 drive connected to a slower 2.0 port then it will be at 2.0 speed.
**Also to mention there is a newer replacement to XCOPY called RoboCopy, but XCOPY is compatible with a larger variety of computers so thats why I used XCOPY vs RoboCopy instructions for mirror copying the externals to each other.
