How to connect a USB external hard drive to your iPad – iPad external hard drive – iPad flash drive

You don’t have to pay for premium space on the iPad.  Just buy an iPad with the lowest space and connect an external hard drive or thumb drive for additional storage.  Sounds simple enough, right?  Well, it is.

Here’s how you connect an external hard drive, flash drive, or USB stick to your iPad:

1. Buy the $29 Camera Connection Kit (CCK).
2. The CCK comes with a USB adapter that you can use to connect a USB external drive.
3. You can use any flash or thumb drive if it is formatted in FAT32 and contains your photos in a folder titled DCIM.  If you have these prerequisites, then connect away!
4. Regular external hard drives will be rejected by the iPad.
5. The only advertised external device that is compatible with all Apple support devices (iPad, iPad, iPod) is HyperDrive.  This will allow you to sync, back up, and transfer your files.  Plus, you don’t need to buy the CCK.

I recommend the HyperDrive iFlashDrive since it’s portable and you can easily transfer and back up files from your iPad, iPhone PC, and Mac.  You can choose between the 8GB ($100), 16GB ($150), and 32GB ($200) models.  If you need more space, you can go with the HyperDrive Hard Drive.  This product has up to 1TB storage, but is bulkier looking like a beefy portable external hard drive.

The HyperDrive iFlashDrive is ideal for backing all your computers and devices to it.  You no longer need a separate external hard drive for your PC, another for your Mac, and then one for your iPad and iPhone.  This flash drive takes care of everything.  If you’re not using a cloud IT service for backing up your iPad or iPhone, or just haven’t bought into the cloud craze, this flash drive backup is a great IT solution.