external hard drive

I am a basic computer user with a Dell pc and Windows XP home. I know I need an external hard drive, but which one? I would like to backup documents, OE email and address book. I thought I found a Maxtor which would work only to read in the fine print that it didn't backup OE. Glad I found out that before purchase. Advice sincerely appreciated.

 

The brand shouldn't matter. I would stay away from Maxtor mainly because they are low quality drives IMHO. But the make should have nothing to do with what files can or cannot be backed up. You can back up anything manually. Simply browse to the file in question, and copy-n-paste it to the external drive. OE files can be found here:
>> C:\Windows\Application Data\Outlook Express\{GUID}
- or -
>> C:\Documents and Settings\<User>\Local Settings\Application Data\Identities\{GUID}\Microsoft\Outlook Express
with the second choice being more common.... you'll need to enable viewing of hidden and system files/folders.
There's tons of good backup software that will perform backups automatically on a schedule, incrementally, manually, whatever. Here's a few:
http://www.majorgeeks.com/AKGBackup_d5382.html
http://www.majorgeeks.com/Easy_File_Backup_d4503.html
http://www.majorgeeks.com/File_Backup_Watcher_Free_d1632.html
http://www.majorgeeks.com/Karens_Replicator_d3917.html
and there's a bunch more in the MajorGeeks Back Up downloads section.

 

I've only had one (used) maxtor drive fail on me in 8 years, and that was an OS problem.

Still haven't figured out how to re-format it because of that, but anyway, it's not always the name brand that lasts longer.