Removeable Hard Drives

[My3Cents]

This question is sort of aimed at IGOTOUT because I know he uses removeable hard drives, but answers from anyone who has experience would be appreciated.

I work in two home offices and I also travel a bit. I want to have the same computing situation wherever I go - at least as far as software. So I take a laptop with me. In my main office I hook it up to an external monitor and keyboard.

In my next iteration, I'm thinking it would be nice to build a desktop as my main machine, but keeping all the same programs and data would mean laborious synching (which is a pain) and not only installing the same software multiple places but making sure to tweak preferences and settings in the same way.

The thought occurs if I could use a single removeable hard drive on all machines - that might do it. And since travel really does require a laptop, the laptop drive would have to be the one that moves. Does anyone know if there's a way to make a desktop so it uses a laptop drive as the main, bootable, C: drive. (not as a slave)?

Thanks.

[Steve!]

That's a tricky one.

You might try going online to places like http://www.microcenter.com and CompUSA's website and look at peripherals and hard drives and accessories.

If anyone makes an adapter for a PC to accommodate a laptop hard drive, you would see it on one of those sites.

I can't imagine that you could do it without an adapter.

[pawtucket]

you could get an external hard drive and have that be the "data" drive for both computers. And have each computer have the standard array of programs. Having the external drive as the place where all your docs go would eliminate the need for syncing.

[ChasUFarley]

Why not just get a flash drive? They're very portable, and very easy to use - I've got one for work and even got one for the boss for Christmas (read: brownie points!)

[pawtucket]

Chas,

3 cents has multiple offices, travels and all that. He is known to have a big brain. The flash drive may not be enough.

[My3Cents]

Thanks for the help guys. If I can't find a way to use the same bootable disk on many machines, (which I probably can't) I'll just stick with my laptop. I find it the lesser of two hassles.

[Steve!]

Yeah, that probably would be. Get yourself a docking station for home or for your office and you can hook up a regular monitor and a regular keyboard and mouse to that, so that your laptop will "feel" like a regular desktop machine. Heck, you can even hook up a printer to a docking station.