Customer Reviews

500GB USB 2.0 Port Ext HD

5 star:		(38)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

Good item and appears to be good quality. Very simple to use and no setup. Actual useable hard drive space is 465gb. Very small, lightweight and super quiet. Included USB cord is only about 6 inches long. Has glossy finish.

This is the way to go. I have tons of pics and music on my pc and it is all safe and secure now on my external hard drive. It worked like a champ. I had to restore my computer to factory settings because of some glitches and once I did I transferred everything back with ease. I would definately recommend this product.

This product is small and highly portable. I have owned mine for 4 months and I love it. I have had no problems unlike other drives I have owned. It works well with both of my PCs and also in my PS3. I am back here to buy another one! Oh and by the way it does not require external power which is awesome!

for some strange reason, i was very suspicious. the 500Gb was cheaper than 400Gb. The warranty information on the site was very vague and unclear. It was not even clear if the part# was right as there were mismatches between this and those on the toshiba website.

But decided to buy it anyway as 100$ seemed a steal with free shipping. Just checked it out today. It works fine. The cable is really long..... NOT. It is the most stupidly designed cable i have seen. it is a whopping 8 in long tip to tip which makes it very inconvenient. I need to look for a longer cable. Otherwise its too early to tell about performance but it seems to be fine.

Oh and it does have a 3 yr warranty.

I bought this product and it never worked. I contacted Toshiba for support twice via email and I got NO reply. I was not able to return to Amazon for warrant exchange and end up with this USD100 paperweight.

I actually bought this for my Toshiba Satellite A215 notebook, plugged it, and started using it. So far, I haven't had any problems. There's even a little icon in the taskbar which you click to quickly (and safely) remove this hardware if you want to disconnect it without damaging any files. Click it, wait 2 seconds and it's done. And the hard drive is so tiny, it's about the size of a 3 x 5 index card and 5/8" inch thick. I just tape it sometimes on the back of my laptop when my rambunctious 5-yr old is using the computer to make sure he doesn't accidentally kick the hard drive accross the room. It is so small, it stays put even when he moves the laptop around.

At first, this hard drive worked pretty well. But lately it seems incapable of remaining connected. The slightest movement is enough to have it disconnect prematurely.

I thought it may have been the usb cable but I've tried other cables and it gives the same problem. Like another reviewer suggested, it seems like the hard drive's mini usb port was designed poorly. The usb cable does not connect properly to the port so at any moment during use, the hard drive could decide to just disconnect at will.

Luckily though, this seems to be the hard drive's enclosure's fault, so you could just replace it with another case for under $10. Or you can just avoid this purchase all together and buy a naked hard drive and an enclosure separately.

Edit: After yet another abrupt disconnection (even though the drive was perfectly still) I am compelled to reduce my score from 3 stars to 2. Avoid this drive.

EDIT FINAL: My files got corrupted and I couldn't access the drive. I got Disk Warrior which worked, but the hard drive is putting up a fight. There's also a rather loud, ominous, crackling sound coming from the drive. I'm treating that with the same level of caution as I would with fleeing animals. This drive can no longer be trusted.

Looks good, easy to set up and use on multiple computers. Does exactly what I wanted it to do.

What a piece of junk! I got sucked in by the large capacity, good price and (what I thought was) a good brand. It worked great for the first 6 weeks. Then, BAM! Windows can't see it, none of my computers can see it, and I can't find any drivers or support from Toshiba for the pretty little box. Sorry I bought it. I will stay away from Toshiba in the future.

I ordered the 320G version based on the great reviews, but I am having a problem. The USB cord is a loose fit. I have tried other USB cords with it, so, it's not that the USB cord is flawed, it's the socket on the drive that is slightly too large for a secure fit.

If I just barely move the drive when it is attached to the computer, the USB connection breaks and the drive powers down. It starts right back up when I push the USB cable back in, but if this happened when I was accessing the drive or if I were doing a backup, I would certainly lose data.

I would buy another except for that defect, which is a big enough defect for me to buy the slightly bulkier La Cie instead.

Anyone else have this problem? If so, how did you resolve it?