Question about External Hard Drives

[Paydirt]

I recently purchased an external hard drive to back up my music files before I put a new operating system on my computer. I wanted to know if I connect the external drive thru a USB port and leave it connected, thus excessible, if I were to contact a virus could the virus be spread to the external drive. Or if there I leave it connected and the system crashes for whatever reason and destroys all my files will the files on the external drive be destroyed too, simply because of the connection through the USb port. Lastly, if the answers to the previous are yes how can I have access to the external drive without risking the files on it. Any help in understanding this would be appreciated. Thanks

 

[ceciol]

Sorry I can't help you, but I'm in the market for an external hard drive, too. I want to get one for backup purposes, and for an eventual move to a brand new XP machine (I've got an old Win98 right now). Are these things obvious to use, and idiot proof? I can just see the nightmares in tryin to get everything back and forth from the old computer to the backup and from the backup to the new machine.

 

[Palmetto Pimp]

I think a virus can still spread to your external hardrive..not too much of a worry there though

When a computer crashes ONLY the drive with your operating system on it should be afftected

I have my main hardrive partioned in two
C Drive with WinXP on it
D Drive with all my files

computer has crashed twice....zero files lost on D Drive

 

[TheCooler]

no the virus wont spread to the external drive unless you place a file on it that is infected. if your hard drive on the cpu crashes no it will not affect the external drive. yes you can leave it attached accessible all the time. just make sure you virus scan all files on your hard drive that you want to move to the external drive before actually moving them.

 

[Paydirt]

Thanks for the responses fellas.

 

[Stuman]

It depends on what the virus targets, but yes, it is possible if the virus is one that scans all drives in search of something. You can't worry about that, though. If you get a good antivirus product, you will be 99% safe. I recommend Symantec Norton Antivirus. It has never let me down, not even once. You could run a daily scan if you are worried, but the real-time protection is deadly effective.

 

[KMA]

A virus, depending on which one, could erase any drive on the system. Ergo, keep up your antivirus software and firewall. If your system crashes and corrupts your main hard drive it is indeterminate what would happen to your external, windows blowing up tends to take out it's own drive/partition and *may* take out a drive that it is writing to at the time, an external drive should be safer than the main system drive, however most times it is not likely to get zapped. Seldom do "all your files get destroyed" usually its the drive electronics getting zapped and you can no longer access them. So the likelihood of both getting hit at once is low
There is no safety this side of the grave, but keep up your antivirus, practice "safe computing", and the odds get better for you.

(Currently running 3 systems with close to 500 gb of externals)