Is there a brand you recommend for the hard drive that I will mine, for example I can directly connect the internet cable. Finally, does it need to stay connected to the computer after installation?
storagenodes can run on a NAS or such things.
one shouldn’t used USB external hdd’s if one can avoid it, and if you don’t have a NAS or similar “host/server/computer” then yes the hdd will need to be connected to whatever hardware runs the storagenodes, and it also needs 24/7/365 connection to the internet.
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definitely go for an enterprise HDD with PMR, they should be good for about 3 years with storj work loads. I tried consumer level HDD and SMR (shingled magnetic recording), they work for some time but you will run into problems sooner or later.
Also, I would not recommend NAS or RAID systems. If you are running on a PC just get a direct SATA connected disk, that is most reliable. If on a pi you will have to go USB.
Personally I always use wd exclusively. The few hdds from other vendors are not to my liking but are small 2TB drives anyways 
But be sure it’s a cmr drive, not smr.