Hard drives are what provide the permanent storage on your computer. Most of your data is stored on your hard drive, and it can also be used to play games and run software. Some prefer to use an external hard drive to contain their data, to expand their capabilities or because they need the drive to be portable. External hard drive manufacturers include Quantum, Maxtor and Seagate. You can install a second hard drive if you run out of space on your main drive. For people who need to do a lot of data backup, this may be a viable storage choice. However, factory-installed hard drives are getting bigger and bigger all the time, so you may simply need to clean out your drive if you are pressed for space. It seems that we are being constantly bombarded with new games, new software, and new applications that pertain to work and entertainment. Some of these "apps" require a great deal of storage space that you don't want taken out of your hard drive allotment. You can buy extra hard drives with storage allowances of 80GB and even 200GB. 100MB per second is a standard data transfer rate for internal hard drives that you can buy right now. Of course, there are super-speedy hard drives that work 50 percent faster, but will be pricier as well. Serious gamers who keep up with the latest and most demanding games will want to go with the fastest hard drives, but everyone else can get good use out of what's in the middle of the drives, controllers & storage market right now. | 
