any techie DCUMs out there?

[Anonymous]

I'd like to back up my laptop hard drive (it's a Dell). any advice on how I should go about finding a good external hard drive? I don't want to get ripped off.

also -- if anyone happens to know -- can you back up your iTunes library?

[Anonymous]

They're pretty straightforward to use. Maxtor and Seagate are a couple of good manufacturers, but I'm sure there are many others that are fine.
Newegg.com is a good source for purchasing online, my husband buys computer parts from them. Or just watch the sales/rebates available locally, check out the sunday ads in the newspaper. When we needed one a couple of years ago in an emergency we just went to Best Buy and they had some good deals after the rebates. Just pay attention to the price for the size.
You probably want something at least as big as the hard drive on your computer, bigger if you're going to be archiving photos, etc.

[Anonymous]

Yes you can back up your Itunes library but be aware that the DRM limits you to a number of copies. If the limit is seven, the 8th time should lock you out. You may want to simply copy the songs in your library to separate media and add new songs on a regular basis.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:Yes you can back up your Itunes library but be aware that the DRM limits you to a number of copies. If the limit is seven, the 8th time should lock you out. You may want to simply copy the songs in your library to separate media and add new songs on a regular basis.

The iTunes DRM doesn't limit the number of copies, but rather the number of computers authorized to play the music. It also has limits on burning to CDs, but that shouldn't apply to backing up to disk. There shouldn't be any issues backing up to a hard drive.

[Anonymous]

Perhaps one of you can answer this question. A dear friend's hard drive crashed, and now her I-tunes music library is ONLY exists on her I-Pod -- is there a way to copy from an I-Pod onto an external hard drive?

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps one of you can answer this question. A dear friend's hard drive crashed, and now her I-tunes music library is ONLY exists on her I-Pod -- is there a way to copy from an I-Pod onto an external hard drive?

Short answer is yes. How it can be done depends on:

1) What OS is on her computer;
2) Whether the music has been purchased from the iTunes Store or ripped from CDs (or acquired through other means which we won't discuss).

This page contains a bunch of helpful information on the topic:

http://forums.ilounge.com/showthread.php?t=71349