Likewise, you can view and transfer files from your external hard drive and put them back on your internal hard drive. You can transfer files off of your internal hard drive and put it on your external one. SOME PEOPLE RELY ON THE CLOUD-AND THAT’S FINE-BUT AN EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE IS A GREAT OPTION FOR THOSE WHO WANT TO KEEP THEIR FILES CLOSER TO HOME WITHOUT RELYING ON A CLOUD SERVICE.Įxternal hard drives work on your computer by connecting to it. While new internal hard drives have a ton of space compared to older ones (now measured in terabytes instead of gigabytes as in years past), it’s a good idea to have a backup of your work. An internal hard drive is the hard drive that comes inside your Mac or store-bought Windows system. What is the difference between an internal and external hard drive? No matter what reason propels you to buy an external hard drive, we’ve compiled some of the best external hard drives for Mac the market has to offer to help you make an informed choice. Or if you work with gigantic files that need more space than what your Mac’s internal hard drive has to offer. Maybe you want to have all of your data available for when you get a new Mac. But there are other reasons to buy an external hard drive for your Mac. Anyone who’s ever lost all of their data after a computer crash can understand how important that is. External hard drives are used to back up large amounts of information outside of your Mac’s internal hard drive.