external HD have a size limit - ?

[mjp29]

I want to buy an external HD that is both firewire and USB 2. I know that when one puts an IDE HD in a desktop or laptop, one sometimes has limits by the hardware (say 500 gigs) as to how large of a HD a laptop/desktop will take.

I would like to know if there is any limit on how large of an external HD in storage size to connect to any Ubuntu computer.

If anyone knows of a good external firewire&usb HD to recommend, please do.

[lensman3]

None that I know. Files can be up into the terabyte range. The Wikipedia limit for a volume is 16 Terabytes.


HOWEVER, the bios can limit the HD size. Usually not a problem in the motherboard is less than 5 years old. Any MB manufactured in the '90s probably has a limit. I think there is a limit on max file size for DVDs and CDs.

Go to Wikipedia and search for ext3. The max file size is 2 terabytes.

[mjp29]

Thanks for your answer.

Another question, if I get an external HD that is firewire and USB 2, could I also use the external drive to backup files on my mother's old iMac (which is running os x but has USB 1.1).

I guess what I'm asking is, will a UBS 2 external HD work with an older iMac computer that is USB 1.1 (or usb 1) ? I suspect it will but would just move the files more slowly on the usb 1.1 iMac.

Your thoughts on that one please.

[viper250]

usb 2 may cause you problems I havent tried one on an imac but usually you get an error message telling you that it may not work properly in windows but usually still works I cannot guarantee that there won't be file loss though.
in the older systems running dos and windows creating multiple partitions allowed you to fool the os into believing you had multiple drives ( dos had an upper limit of 500 megabyte) an old 6 gig dive could written with 12 - 500 meg partitions and each one would show up as a different dos drive

[mjp29]

usb 2 may cause you problems I havent tried one on an imac but usually you get an error message telling you that it may not work properly in windows but usually still works I cannot guarantee that there won't be file loss though.
in the older systems running dos and windows creating multiple partitions allowed you to fool the os into believing you had multiple drives ( dos had an upper limit of 500 megabyte) an old 6 gig dive could written with 12 - 500 meg partitions and each one would show up as a different dos drive

I also think USB 2 may cause problems; however, I also suspect it most likely won't. I recall reading that USB 2 and USB 1.1 are backwards compatible. For example, the iPod can be connected to either (if it's a usb ipod) and the only difference is that the songs transfer slower while connected to usb 1.1 As far as a HD, I dunno.

I think I read somewhere that usb 1.1 is compatible with usb 2 and 2 is backward compatible with 1.1.; however I may have read that usb 1.0 is not so compatible with 2.0 [the 1.1 making a big difference].

Anyone else's thoughts on this please.