hedwards: Those kinds of things tend to work quite well, but they're terribly slow over USB2, make sure it's USB3. I assume you don't have e.SATA.
Sachys: its not there for fast transfer - just backup, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups, of backups and so on!
...also maybe helping out the odd friend or two if another component in their laptop etc blows but the drive is fine (seen so many binned laptops with otherwise fine main components because the fan or the power unit went)
TBH, even e.SATA is painfully slow if you've got a ton of data to transfer. But yes, if you don't mind having to have the computer on for a long time and don't mind a huge wait, then it doesn't much matter. But, USB2 is painfully slow.