Hitachi SimpleDrivell 2TB Turbo USB 2.0 External Hard Drive

by SimpleTech

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 8.6 x 4.2 inches ; 12 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 3.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B002IVVCZQ
• Item model number: HSD2000
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (40 customer reviews)
• Date first available at Amazon.com: January 1, 2009

Product Description

Capacity: 2 TB

Hitachi HSD2000 SimpleDrive External Hard Drive - 2TB, USB 2.0

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Cust Serv Ever Encountered!, November 23, 2009

By 

Midwest Tech User (Midwest) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hitachi SimpleDrivell 1TB Turbo USB 2.0 External Hard Drive (Personal Computers)

I own 2 Simple Drives. One is a very old 160GB usb drive and the other is a new 1TB usb drive. They both work great! I had 2 problems for which I needed tech support. I called the 800 number and got right through both times without any wait time.

The first problem was caused by me when I did a sector by sector backup of my hard drive, and the dell emergency backup partition became visible on my 1 TB usb drive. That partition is difficult to delete, but the support person was very helpful in getting it deleted. Unlike most, it was a very pleasant and pretty quick tech support call!

The second problem was a little more difficult. When attaching both usb drives at the same time, the 1TB drive showed up in "My Computer", but I could not transfer files to it. The support person had me try several different usb connections, checking of drive letters, and a few other things, but nothing worked. We both agreed that the problem was not the usb drive, but most likely an issue with my computer. He suggested I try attaching both to a different computer to confirm this, and call back if it still didn't work. I hung up, and attached both to a newer computer and they both worked perfectly. Issue resolved as far as I was concerned.

An hour later I get a call from tech support. HE has discussed my issue with an engineer, and they believe the problem is being caused because both drives have external power supplies and it could be overloading the usb controller. He suggested I unplug the power supply on one drive and see if that works. Then he asked if he could send me an email so I could respond to tell him if that worked.

I have been through many tech support nightmares. I have never before had such a pleasant tech support experience as this, and I wanted to share it with those that are considering this product.

33 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Four Stars (provisional on it lasting for a couple of years), August 11, 2009

By 

iloveads47 (Minneapolis, MN USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hitachi SimpleDrivell 1TB Turbo USB 2.0 External Hard Drive (Personal Computers)

I purchased this drive so I could back up all my data, repartition my hard-drives anew and put Linux on there instead of Vista. I am jumping ship and recommend you do to :)

I like the price a lot. The design is sorta 2006 and I am not thrilled by it. The indicator LED is white and feels like its flimsily attached. The Hitachi website and logo borders on Engrish and does not inspire my confidence as a westerner.

This drive is QUIET! I can't hear the head moving. When it is in use there are very strong tortion / gyroscoping effects compared to my old 5400 RPM external drive. You really feel some resistance if you try to move it, probably because its 7200 RPM. In other words I wouldn't move it around too much :)

The wire it ships with is a micro-usb and very short. Luckily I have a longer one lying around.

Performed surface scan, and found no errors as shipped. I will tell you that scan took a while. Its a big drive. Which actually makes me a little nervous, since if it fails you will loose a whole lot of information all at once. Hmmm I wonder if RAID 5 comes in USB versions... Probably not at this price anyway.

I encountered a problem. The drive is supposed to shut itself off when the USB connection is interrupted (such as when your computer powers off). I like that, it saved power and increases drive longevity. However, when Windows goes to sleep and then wakes up the drive is not automatically detected and has to be unplugged and plugged back in.

This drive is compatible with something they are calling Turbo USB 2.0 and is supposed to be 25% faster with the use of a custom driver - probably some sort of compression algorithm, judging from higher processor loads, but they are tolerable - the driver sits in your system tray. You have to install it, and it seems to work. I have not tested the claims of speed, but it seems that this driver is available for Windows only, which is not great for me.

So really I feel like giving it 3.5 stars, but since I hope It will last for a few years and I will grow fond of it (with my new penguin-friendly OS) I will give it 4. Also the price is good!

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars So far so good, January 2, 2010

By 

Yang Luo (San Diego, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hitachi SimpleDrivell 2TB Turbo USB 2.0 External Hard Drive (Personal Computers)

My first external hard drive WD 250GB purchased 5 years died right before the Christmas day. It's a disaster when you backed up all your important data and it's gone. So I purchased this one with my finger crossed hoping it won't die on me.

It looks rigid, it's easy to use. I hooked it up to my Mackbook first, so I could format it and partition it to the formats both Mac OS and Windows would recognize. It was easy to let the Mac partition it to two partitions, one is Mac Bootable (1TB), another is FAT. So my Mac would read both partitions.

I use the Time Machine to backup my Macbook, and manually backup photos, videos and other stuff to the Windows partition.

I've used almost 300GB out of 2TB so far without any issues yet. The Turbo USB 2.0 does seem to be faster than my regular USB2.0.

At the moment I am writing this, my computer is still copying hundreds of thousands of files.

I will update this when I see something unusual. But so far so good.

Update on Jan 5, 2010:

Two problems found so far:

1. When you transfer a huge amount of files (let's say 20,000 files), the drive gets significately slower. Now if you unplug it (when it's safe) and plug it back, it will be back to normal speed. I guess it's a memory management issue.

2. Sometimes, your computer will not recognize your drive. You try different USB ports, still doesn't work. Even a different computer, still the same. Now you need to unpluge the power cord (when it's safe) whith the USB cable pluged, and plug the power cord back on, it will work.

Just my experience.

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