I am moving to Canada shortly and one of the items I need to take with me is all my work. It is currently on my computer on an external hard drive. I know the voltage is different and I was wondering would I still be able to get my hard drive to work and get my work transferred onto a new computer when I get there?

Thanks

It depends on the hardrive...If you view the manual which you will be able to find online (or ask the manufactuere directly through there customer support).

In reality even if they say it is okay to do this i would 'back up' the hard drive...
To do this buy a number of large DVD's or other storage device and ensure all works before you set out to your new life.

Yes I think you can (please someone correct me if I'm wrong) you can buy a thing called a transformer and it converts the voltage but certain electrical items that the U.K. have e.g. my digital camera' plug has a voltage between 100-240 volts so I would just need a plug convertor and it'll be fine.

Emma

This is true for plugged appliances...A transformer can cost alot of money.

Also any technology like computers or games consoles or Televisions this will not help you as the frequency of the electricity is different and i can not garentee that a transformer will convert this...before you do anything it is best to ask.

There really should be no reason why it wouldn't work.

The voltage input to the power supply may be different but the power supply should provide the correct voltage internally to the motherboard and drives.

Cheers
Steve

Cheers for all the advice. I think to be safe I'll bring the hard drive but also make copies of everything onto DVD's aswell. I presume I won't have issues with DVD's? Or are copied DVD's you copy to region coded the same as films?

Hangman is right in the sense that most electricals will operate at any voltage especially internal circuitry. but please be aware that unless provided with greater knowledge of the equipment it is not always best practise to assume this.

I bought a DVD recorder today and if you look on the first page of the manual after the index it says:

"Please do not use on any other supply"

If i plugged it into a Canadian supply i know that it wouldn't do any damage to either the DVD player or the house electronics it simply would not work.

Once again though this is a safety warning these companies put these warnings in their manuals so that if you manage to injure yourself or burn your house down you may get insurance problems or may not be able to get compensation.

Always read the label if it says it can not be used on a Canadian supply you can then buy things that will make it operational (post a question or ask the manufacturer for this information).

Hope this helps

Blank DVDs have no 'regional' settings. As far as I am aware computer DVD roms also have no 'regional' settings.

What I meant was that the internal voltages in computers will most likely be the same so a hard drive from the UK should work in a Canadian machine without any modifications.

I don't think a Dell computer is any different internally here in Canada or the U.S. than one in the UK or Europe except for perhaps the power supply and even that may be the same. My power supply manual states it's 110-240 volt switchable automatically.

Cheers
Steve

If you are referring to computer DVD ROM drives, I just checked mine and it does have regional settings as does my DVD RW drive.

Cheers
Steve

Hangman

So if your computer in Canada does have regional DVD ROM drives which I presume will be region 1 and I put my work on a DVD here in the UK which is Region 2 do you think I would be able to get it to read on a computer in Canada?

Either way the answer should be yes.

If the drive over here won't read your DVD you can change the region on DVD drives but only for a limited number of times. I believe that limit is 5 times, so you should be able to change to Region 2 (UK) and back to region 1 (North America).

I thought the region thing only affected movies though so I'm not sure it would apply to a work disk. Not 100% sure on that point.

Cheers
Steve

Cheers for all the advice. I think with the hard drive and the DVD's I should get the work copied over one way or another. Thanks again.

My experiance is that only video is region encoded.

Data is universal

the hard drive should work on any machine provided that the interface type matches (IDE/SCSI)

the power supply plugs and voltages are to a global standard.

Thanks Mike for the confirmation, that's what I thought but it's always nice to have someone confirm.