Portable Storage

Portable storage devices use the same major internal technologies as desktop storage devices, but differ in matters such as bus connections, cost per MB, and form factor. Systems that have no internal provision for the type of drive desired can attach an external drive to any of the following:

  • PC Card slot interface

  • Parallel port interface

  • USB interface or IEEE-1394a interface (if present)

  • SCSI interface (if present)

Drives that support USB 2.0 (Hi-Speed USB), IEEE-1394a, or SCSI interfaces usually require the portable user to install the correct port by means of a CardBus PC Card to use devices of these types. SCSI devices also can be connected by means of a parallel-to-SCSI adapter, although performance is slower than with a normal ...

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