Now that Windows Vista beta 2 is available for free download, it's time to get another drive for your computer, either to install Vista on, or to backup your old drive in case something goes wrong. Even if you're not quite ready for Vista, there's a good chance you're not backing up yet, and that means all your precious digital photos and videos, your Quicken files, email, and the music files you spent days ripping are all at risk. Fortunately there are a lot of great deals right now on drives. I'm partial to external drives. You don't have to open your case to install them, they also work on notebooks, and you can store them away from your PC for extra security.

newegg.com has some good deals going on right now on drives:

• Fantom Titanium 300GB external USB 2.0 drive: $129.99
• Cavalry 400GB external USB 2.0 drive: $169.99 after $25 rebate
• Western Digital 250GB SATA internal drive: $79.99 after $10 rebate

If you want to build your own external drive, Dealsonic has an excellent selection of hard disk enclosures starting around $20.

And if you want a new laser printer to print this eloquent posting (sorry, couldn't come up with a better segue), newegg still has the 22 page-per-minute Samsung ML-2010 for $49.99 after $50 rebate. Read PC Mag's review.