External or Internal?

[hondaf17]

I've only got a 160GB SATA HDD in my PC and it's getting filled up. Plus, whenever I reformat I'm extremely sick of burning DVDs to backup my data. I need more storage. So, should I:

1) Buy a 1TB Internal HDD to use as my primary, and keep my separate 160GB as backup? Is this "safe" enough to use as a backup?
2) Buy a 1TB external HDD? I don't know anything about external HDD, have read there is USB and eSata. How would an eSata connect to my internal mobo sata connections?
3) Buy a 1TB Internal HDD, and an external HDD enclosure to put my 160GB in...would this be "safer" than #1, and do the enclosures make it easy to somehow hook up to my computer's internal sata connections?
4) You guys have any other ideas?

Primary use of whatever storage solution is periodic backup of files to make for 1) safe data (I'd be super pissed if I lost all my pictures) and 2) ease of future reformats.

Oh, I'm cash conscious...under $200 if possible!

Thanks in advance guys...

 

[taltamir]

an eSATA does not connect to your internal mobo connectors, it connects to an external plug called eSATA plug (external SATA), it offers the same SATA speed but on a different shaped plug, you can get a bracket that basically converts your mobo connector to eSATA ( since it is just a differently shaped plug.), or a full pci controller card that will make one of its own.

The reasons for an enclosure is if you want to physically unplug it to protect from viruses / power surges (unplug it from power AND pc to protect from lightening strike). And also to give you mobility, the enclosure's controller will ALWAYS decrease your speed and performance compared to having it as an internal drive (I find it to be 1/3 or less of the speed of internal usually).
Worse, if you buy a quality enclosure, it will come bundled with the drive, but opening the enclosure will break it and void the warranty, but if the drive fails you would typically want to open it to try and recover the data (by plugging in the drive internally, in case the enclosure failed and the drive works).

I wrote a guide explaining how to protect your data properly, it is found here:
http://forums.anandtech.com/me...=2228539&enterthread=y

I would make some formatting changes to it to make it easier to read later. But it has all the info right now.