The laptop’s internal hard drive can only store limited files.
This is why it is important to have an external storage device.
The best external hard drives for HP laptops will have a large capacity and breakneck speeds.
In this blog post, I will share my personal experience about the five best of them, each with pros and cons.
So this article will help you decide which storage drive is best for your needs; keep reading!
Also read: Best Dell Laptops
Best external hard drive for HP laptop
1 LaCie Rugged Mini 4TB External Hard
Lightweight
Top Features:
The LaCie Rugged Mini 4TB Portable Hard Drive is perfect for your on-the-go lifestyle.
This rugged, durable drive has a compact design and fits in the palm of your hand because its measurement is only 2.5 inches, so you can take it anywhere by putting it in your pocket.
I need to say; its metal casing can bear any hit or sock resistance.
However, keep this drive safe from dust and water; otherwise, it will damage LaCie Rugged Mini, which has no pre-built protection against such damages.
Primarily, please keep it safe from dust; otherwise, it will reduce drive lifespan.
Further to say, LaCie Rugged has plenty of storage options, including 1TB, 2TB, 4TB and 5TB; easier to choose storage size according to your budget.
Even 4TB and 5TB sizes options are great for backup needs and basic storage requirements, especially when it comes with a backup-utility feature.
Likewise, it supports taking automatic backup, and also it allows to set up backup on schedule.
Moreover, LaCie Rugged Mini comes with integrated USB 3.0 ports, which allow you to transfer data at speeds of up to 5 Gbps—10 times faster than USB 2.0!.
Also read: Best Laptops for Construction Business
2 WD 5TB My Passport Ultra Portable Drive
Extreme Portable Drive
Top Features:
The WD My Passport Ultra external hard drive is an excellent storage drive for most HP laptop owners.
With its sizable 5 TB of memory, this single tiny drive can hold about 300,000 digital photos or more than 170 hours of 4K video.
It’s also fast enough to accommodate multiple devices simultaneously.
Furthermore, my passport Ultra comes with password protection to secure your storage device from unbothered access.
Additionally, this drive also features 256-bit AES hardware encryption, so you can store all your digital data in one place and rest assured it’s secure.
And design and casing is beautiful also ideal storage solution for users who would like to showcase their drive.
Plenty of storage space, beautiful design and security are good things in WD My Passport; speed is also excellent.
In my experience, this hard drive provided blazing-fast data transfer rates of up to 1Gbps when connected to a USB 3.0 port on my HP laptop.
Also read: Best Laptops for Video Editing
3 Seagate Backup Plus HDD Drive
Drive with Higher Storage Cacpity
Top Features:
If you have an HP laptop and need a drive with a larger storage capacity, you need to consider a Seagate Backup Plus drive.
This storage drive comes with a max 10TB storage capacity, and you can avail yourself of this hard drive for your laptop in a much more affordable pricing range.
But this is not a single reason why I recommend buying this drive for an HP laptop.
There are lots of other benefits to this storage drive.
For example, it has two USB 3.0 ports for faster data transfer.
Besides this, these ports can also be used to charge your smartphone and other digital gadgets.
Its appearance is good but could be difficult to carry when it comes to design as the drive is a little heavy.
In addition, there are only black variants available.
Users looking for a purpose with different colour options can safely skip this one.
Seagate drive already has an official backup software with convenient features that add a more convenient feature to the program.
It’s pretty awesome because, with this drive, users will be able to take or restore backups with only one click.
The best part is setting automatic backups according to your preference.
That is an energy-saving feature so that your backed-up files are stored in sleep mode and not constantly running.
However, Seagate’s official warranty with this drive is minimal (only one year).
Also read: Is 8GB Ram Enough
4 Toshiba Canvio Basics 4TB Portable Drive
Editor’s Pick
Top Features:
Toshiba Canvio Basic drive is incredibly lightweight and easy to carry in your pocket or hand where you go.
These features are necessary when discussing the benefits of external drives and Toshiba Canvio Basics specifically.
Its weight is just 7.68 ounces, and its dimensions are 4.3 x 3.1 x 0.77 inches, making it a perfect portable storage drive.
Need to mention, the design is sleek and premium looking. But does it protect from physical damages? Most definitely! Its design and casing not only protect from smudges; water and other substances cannot damage its exterior.
Another best part about Canvio Basics is its usability along with portability.
In other words, Canvio Basics is much easy to use; the installation process is a couple of minutes game.
You don’t need to install any 3rd party software for its use on an HP laptop.
Furthermore, this drive is compatible with USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 ports; plug and play on any USB port without installing an AC power cord.
Additionally, there is no need to format a drive for Windows operating system.
Further to add, speed and performance are excellent; in our testing, reading speed was 140MBs and writing 134MBs, respectively.
But during testing, it got a little hot.
Another issue with this drive is it has no password protection.
However, that’s not a problem because you can use third-party software to protect your computer with a password.
That’ll make it handy to add files and folders without worrying about the materials inside getting into the wrong hands.
This is particularly useful if you’re travelling through a public space and want to ensure no one’s going through your things.
Furthermore, this tinny storage device comes with three different storage configurations, including 1TB, 2TB and 4TB.
However, this is not a storage drive that offers an ample storage capacity but is still good to easily upgrade your computer that is running out of space.
So without any further thinking, Canvio Basics is great for storing pictures, videos, business data and gaming.
Go ahead and purchase this highly affordable external drive for your HP laptop.
Also read: 512GB vs 1TB Storage Drive
5 ADATA HD710Pro
Best Selling Drive
Top Features:
If you frequently use an external hard drive outdoors, consider investing in the new ADATA HD710 Pro because this storage drive is built to withstand a lot of wear and tear.
We’re talking about dropping, dusting, water protection from a one-meter distance and more.
Additionally, the waterproofing protection will let you rest easy when bringing your storage drive with you outdoors on rainy days.
Even it can stand up to one hour in water.
Moreover, you should keep your mind at peace when it has 3 Year Warranty.
However, the design is very dull; I wouldn’t say I like it.
Its performance and speed are also outstanding, making ADATA HD710 Pro the best external hard drive for an HP laptop.
For example, in our testing, its writing speed was 132MB/s, and reading was 161MS/s.
Moreover, it has a USB 3.1 interface that provides 5x times data faster speed than USB 3.0.
But capability for connection is very short.
Also read: How to Increase Laptop Speed
FAQs on Best External Hard Drive for HP Laptop
How do I connect an external hard drive to my HP laptop?
There are two ways to do this.
Firstly, if you have USB 2.0, the easiest way to transfer data is by plugging your external hard drive into an available USB port on your HP laptop.
After the files are moved, remove the external hard drive from your computer and reinstall it in its original slot for storage purposes.
Secondly, if you have a USB 3.0 connection, plug it in using one of these ports since this is also compatible with older file transfers (approximately 6x faster than USB 2).
If you don’t see any blue lights in front of the ports where you inserted your device/port-cable combo on both ends of the screen, then it means that they’re not compatible.
Which brand of external hard drive is most reliable?
There are many reliable brands of external hard drives.
Seagate is a great company that produces high-quality hard drives.
Western Digital and Toshiba are other companies that have quality and reliable internal and external drives.
At the same time, Samsung is another excellent brand for producing high-quality and fast storage drives.
So, we could not precisely tell which brand drives are more reliable.
But according to the Backblaze study, Seagate drives are highly reliable drives with zero% failures rates in 2021.
Which is best, WD or Seagate?
The question of which is best WD or Seagate will depend on the user’s needs.
For example, are you looking for fast read and writing speeds? Or are you looking drive with a large storage capacity? Do you require ruggedness or portability? These factors will shape the best storage device for your needs.
Of course, many other factors are involved in determining which device offers the best value for any given individual.
Ultimately it depends on how each person defines.
What drives them? What do they hope will become of their memories and belongings if they pass away one day far too soon? This very personal question might yield the solution to finding which storage device is suitable for that particular storage need.
Can you put an SD card in an HP laptop?
Yes, you can put.
There are a few types of laptops available today, and some designs work better with micro SD cards than others.
For example, SD card slots-on-laptops have been known to crack from frequent use or be too close to other components for easy access.
It’s also essential that there is not anything obstructing your view of the slot as it may easily fall out if the computer vibrates during operation.
One example is when they’re positioned above a fan vent hole located on the bottom left side, which vents cool air over the laptop’s processor and memory chips.
My recommendation is to look for notebooks with front panels covered by acrylic.