Maxtor One Touch 4 External Hard Drive (750gb)

i have been looking at the 750gb version of the the maxtor one touch4 and have a couple questions... if anyone knows the answers

-since there are many computers in my house (hdd sizes 250, 160, 160 and 60) can i back them all up to the hard with the software? or will the drive become confused?
-would i be able to partition the drive so i could use say half for backups and half for just extra storage?

this will be my first external hard drive so im trying to learn as much as i can

also, any opinions about the drive itself?

For both your questions I would say, Yes. ;)
And if you require any back up tool then there are many which are able for free or for a cost, just search on google. BTW I use Partition Magic & it is the best tool that I have come accross.

You can use external hard drives for backups as well as for extra storage. But external hard drives are not always advised for backups. If you intend to use this hard drive for backup for long times that can be harmful, as usually the backups are the most important and precious data for us.

Check out this article - Security paramount for external hard drives