Editors' note: This post was originally published on May 10, 2016 and is periodically updated. The cloud is great. But if you need a serious amount of storage, online backup is never quite enough.

It is almost mind-boggling how much data can be stored on a portable drive or USB thumb drive. As convenient as it is it to be able to carry 1TB of data in your pocket, though, portable drives are ...

Fact: the current capacity of hard drives is constantly growing. Fact: data volumes are rising accordingly. Fact: the time it takes to analyse these data volumes, as well as to backup and evaluate ...

Remember when floppy disks were cutting edge? These days, 1.44 megabytes of memory might not even be enough to store one high-resolution compressed image, much less an entire album of digital photos.

(2) A magnetic disk drive that plugs into a USB port on a computer. Used for transport as well as backup and additional storage, portable hard drives rival the capacity of many internal hard drives.

Why your 'backup' drive is corrupting files: The danger of USB hubs and micro-disconnects ...

SSDs Unfortunately, all of that doomsaying last year was correct and SSD prices are surging as a result of the memory crisis SSDs Best external SSDs for gaming in 2026: These are the portable drives I ...

Is your laptop slowing down during everyday tasks? A simple storage upgrade could improve speed, boost performance, and extend its usable life.