The passage of time is tough on pc elements. Typically it’s about how a lot they put on down over time; different instances, it’s the truth that older elements get put aside and forgotten, solely to be left behind by time.
As an illustration, it might seem to be PCIe 4.0 simply arrived to supercharge NVMe SSD speeds, however that was in 2018! We’ve already moved on to PCIe 5.0, with PCIe 6.0 units nonetheless on their manner and PCIe 7.0 slated for 2025.
So, it’s not unusual to improve PC elements—and if you do, you need to determine what to do with these elements you’ve retired.
When you have an older SSD or HDD taking over area in storage and also you don’t know what to do with it, listed here are just a few methods you will get extra mileage out of it with out throwing it away.
1. Make it transportable
Perhaps you will have an outdated inside drive that you just upgraded some time in the past, and now that drive is sitting in a drawer someplace. Properly, simply because it’s not in a system doesn’t imply it could possibly’t nonetheless be helpful—give it a second life by turning it into a conveyable drive.
A fast search on Newegg turns up a great deal of enclosure choices for several types of drives. You’ll be able to stick an NVMe SSD right into a small enclosure to get pleasure from quick, transportable storage at a fraction of the value of many devoted transportable SSDs.
You could find SATA enclosures for SSDs and HDDs as effectively, providing you with loads of choices for what you possibly can stick your drive into. As soon as it’s made transportable, it turns into helpful for system and file backups.
Associated: Tips on how to clone an SSD to a different SSD with no information loss
2. Flip it right into a NAS
TerraMaster
TerraMaster
TerraMaster
Why keep native? As a substitute of only a transportable drive, you can also make your outdated drive right into a wirelessly accessible drive by turning it right into a NAS (Community Connected Storage). You’ll be able to even mix a number of drives right into a single NAS for much more cupboard space.
A NAS is a devoted storage machine that hooks right into a community through Ethernet or Wi-Fi and offers 24/7 entry to the drives inside it. You’ll be able to even entry it remotely if you’re away from dwelling.
It’s an effective way to share information between units on the identical community, and it’s additionally helpful as backup storage instead of a cloud storage supplier (so that you keep away from these month-to-month charges).
If that is your first rodeo, go for an entry-level NAS just like the TerraMaster F2-212 (our evaluate), which might match two SATA drives and hyperlink as much as your house community. You’ll be able to seize one on Amazon at an affordable worth.
3. Join it to your router
If you happen to don’t need to undergo the difficulty (or expense) of organising a NAS, you possibly can take the less complicated method of connecting your outdated drive on to your router as a substitute.
Many fashionable routers have USB ports that you should utilize for connecting exterior storage drives, offering community entry to the information on mentioned drives. You would possibly want an adapter to attach the drive to USD, however that’s simple sufficient to seek out on Amazon or elsewhere.
Be aware that this technique isn’t nice performance-wise and needs to be reserved for easy, rare file transfers. If you happen to intend to switch plenty of information or stream high-res video, think about choosing a NAS.
4. Convert it right into a bootable drive
One other helpful choice for an outdated transportable drive is to show it right into a bootable drive, which principally hosts an working system and allows you to boot any pc into that OS by plugging within the drive. You need to use a device like Ventoy to load up all the mandatory information.
A bootable drive is nice to maintain available in case your pc ever runs into bother. You need to use the bootable drive to troubleshoot, set up, or reinstall your working system. Or you should utilize it as a brief, transportable working system. Or you possibly can set it to run particular antivirus and information restoration instruments.
I as soon as had a system malfunction and used a bootable model of Ubuntu to entry and again up information from the system’s inside drive. It’s the sort of device you need to have ready lengthy earlier than you really want it.
5. Stick it in one other machine
Simply because one of your programs not wants that outdated drive doesn’t imply one other can’t profit from it. If you happen to’ve acquired a family stuffed with electronics, there’s a good likelihood you may need one other machine that may turn out to be the brand new dwelling to your outdated storage drive.
For instance, the Xbox One is ready to swap arduous drives, letting you improve capability or improve to a sooner SATA SSD. In the meantime, the PlayStation 5 has area for a spare M.2 SSD. And for those who’ve acquired a laptop computer sitting round, you would possibly take a look inside to see if it has an area slot for storage (although that is changing into more and more unusual).
6. Improve it
Perhaps you will have an outdated inside drive in addition to an outdated exterior drive, and perhaps the interior drive is higher than the exterior one. In that case, you will have an alternative choice obtainable to you!
If you happen to pop open the case to your exterior drive, there’s likelihood you’ll discover the identical 2.5- or 3.5-inch drive type issue that usually goes inside your pc—and you’ll swap it along with your different inside drive, thus upgrading your exterior drive.
7. Donate it to a pal or member of the family
If you happen to aren’t utilizing an outdated drive and you continue to can’t discover a use for it, why not be a pal and provides it to somebody who can? And earlier than you do, you would possibly even flip it into a present by loading it up with video games and/or media.
Some recreation launchers, like Steam, allow you to manually level totally different video games to particular areas on drive. When donating to a pal, they will level their launcher to the information you’ve pre-downloaded for them. (They should have purchased the video games for this to work, in fact, so it’s primarily helpful for mates who’ve actually gradual web.)
Nonetheless, even with out pre-loading the drive, it’s nonetheless an excellent reward to provide. And the most effective half is realizing that your drive will probably be actively used as a substitute of rotting away behind a drawer someplace.
