Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
63,283
30,344



At CES last month, LaCie announced its "Fuel" wireless hard drive for iOS and Mac devices, allowing users to easily expand storage for their devices. With the Fuel now available for purchase, LaCie has given MacRumors some hands-on time with the Fuel, showing that the device does indeed live up to its billing for those willing to carry around an extra device as needed.

Similar to the Wireless Plus from parent company Seagate, LaCie's Fuel offers a 1 TB drive to provide ample storage for media, with iOS device users able to access content through the Seagate Media app.

lacie_fuel.jpg
With Fuel connecting wirelessly to iOS devices, the device also supports Wi-Fi hotspot functionality, allowing it to connect to an existing Wi-Fi network and passing that connectivity through to devices connected wirelessly to Fuel. Macs can connect to Fuel either wirelessly or via USB 3.0, as Fuel features a micro USB 3.0 port and an adapter cable to connect to standard USB ports on other devices. The cable can also be used to charge Fuel through an included AC adapter. Users looking for fast file transfer from their Mac should obviously opt for a wired USB 3.0 connection over the Wi-Fi option.

Fuel's ability to create its own Wi-Fi network allows up to five devices to connect to it simultaneously, with HD video streams being served to up to three devices at the same time. That feature is what creates an almost seamless experience for users while connected to the device, giving them the ability to wirelessly stream content straight from Fuel while still accessing the Internet from their devices.

seagate_media_1.jpg
Seagate Media app's main screen (left) and file view (right)
LaCie Fuel also includes Dropbox support, allowing it to automatically sync a user's Dropbox folder when turned on within range of a Wi-Fi network, ensuring that media and other files can be easily pushed to Fuel.

The Seagate Media app automatically categorizes media into five groups: Videos, Photos, Music, Documents, and Recent. Videos, photos, and music can be played right from the app, although not all file formats are supported. Documents generally require third-party apps to open, but tapping on them brings up the standard iOS sharing screen with quick access to compatible apps.

Aside from the "Media View" organized by file type, Seagate Media also offers a "Folder View" to allow users to browse the complete folder hierarchy without relying on the automatic groupings used in Media View. Files and folders can be sorted by name, size, date, or type, or filtered by type, and the interface also allows users to rename, delete, copy, and move files.

seagate_media_2.jpg
Seagate Media app's audio player interface (left) and power preferences (right)
Battery life on Fuel is rated at ten hours, although streaming high-quality video will drastically reduce that time. To help users maximize battery life, the Seagate Media app displays the charge remaining while offering several options such as an "ECO mode" to help turn off certain functions and conserve battery life.

Fuel is available now from Lacie's store and other vendors at a suggested retail price of $199.99.

Article Link: LaCie Fuel Offers 1 TB Wireless Storage with Hotspot Sharing for iOS Devices and Macs
 

KdParker

macrumors 601
Oct 1, 2010
4,793
998
Everywhere
They haven't messed up the external drives that I have been using.

This could be a nice addition if it really works.
 

xPad

macrumors regular
Dec 15, 2013
228
184
Lacie is owned and made by Seagate, which means unreliable. No thanks.

[citation needed]

Otherwise, we can just assume you are extrapolating from "derp, I had a Seagate drive that failed once, and I remember a batch of bad drives from 2007".
 

nrose101

macrumors 6502
Sep 9, 2011
355
466
Seagate is known for making bad drives for a long as I can remember (I have been in the industry for over 20 years), and have experienced a few myself.

However I have never had a problem (thankfully) with Seagate LaCie drives.
 

Razeus

macrumors 603
Jul 11, 2008
5,348
2,030
[citation needed]

Otherwise, we can just assume you are extrapolating from "derp, I had a Seagate drive that failed once, and I remember a batch of bad drives from 2007".

Actually from 2009. Two of them to be exact.

Then as recently as 2011 within the first 6 months of use. That's 4 drives and more than enough for me.

I've written them off and will only buy Hitachi or Western Digital (who are both the same company these days). I stand by my claims.

Citation? Sure, here's one that only reinforces my thoughts of their sub-par quality. This is the 2nd or 3rd report from them that shows Seagate still hasn't fixed many of their quality control issues. At least they're consistent.
 
Last edited:

SBlue1

macrumors 68000
Oct 17, 2008
1,936
2,366
So this thing can serve as a home server since my iPad has not enough space for all my music and movies? Cause I don't want to go and get my MacBook out and wait for it to boot and iTunes to start up to access my library. Or is it not how it works?
 

shiseido

macrumors newbie
Aug 13, 2010
26
0
It sounds like this thing is not a router. I thought it could possibly be an alternative to Time Capsule.

However, when they said it's same as Seagate, then it all becomes moot.

I was filming an independent movie and editing and storing important video files on a 2tb seagate thunderbolt drive. It failed. I had ordered a 2nd replacement and it also failed. I ended up rush delivery a western digital drive to get the data before losing it completely. If I would have completely lost the data due to seagate, I would have lost files that could never be replaced. Filming a movie and keeping files is important. Writing a book you could at least rewrite it, but refilming a lost scene, that's not really an option. Putting in laymans terms. Imagine if you recorded your wedding video on a seagate and the seagate failed. It's not like you can record the wedding again.

Final summary. I will never buy Seagate...even though it's always on sale. Never again.
 

JackieInCo

Suspended
Jul 18, 2013
5,178
1,601
Colorado
Lacie is owned and made by Seagate, which means unreliable. No thanks.

Back in 2008 I bought a LaCie 2 big triple and had the two drives inside fail after just one year. The drives inside were Seagate. The LaCie enclosure failed a few years later.
 

djplaxe2109

macrumors 6502
Feb 4, 2013
437
0
Perhaps I'm just lucky.... but 3 Seagates and 2 LaCie drives and none of them have shown signs of slowing down after 3 years...
 

CodexMonkey

macrumors member
Feb 22, 2012
73
18
Lacie is owned and made by Seagate, which means unreliable. No thanks.

I have three Seagate drives - two pocket and one desktop and I’ve had them for years. Each is written to daily, esp. the desktop as I back up to it. I’ve had them all for over two years each and never had even a slight problem. Years ago I had a "Lacey" and that too performed flawlessly. Where are you getting your information?
 

SgtPepper12

macrumors 6502a
Feb 1, 2011
697
673
Germany
[citation needed]

Otherwise, we can just assume you are extrapolating from "derp, I had a Seagate drive that failed once, and I remember a batch of bad drives from 2007".
No no no. I know this happens a lot, but there are actually quite telling and significant statistics out there that without doubt show that Seagate is by far the worst hard drive manufacturer out there – in fact so much worse than the rest, that it is a conundrum to me how they still exist.

If you look at the numbers: Tested were Hitachi, Western Digital and Seagate hard drives (a few thousand). The annual failure rate (the amount of hard drives that failed after one year) were:

Hitachi: ~1 %
Western Digital: ~3 %
Seagate: ~9 %​

So don't buy Seagate, you're throwing money away.

Source: "Who makes the most reliable hard drives" by extremetech.com (21.01.14)
 

CodexMonkey

macrumors member
Feb 22, 2012
73
18
No no no. I know this happens a lot, but there are actually quite telling and significant statistics out there that without doubt show that Seagate is by far the worst hard drive manufacturer out there – in fact so much worse than the rest, that it is a conundrum to me how they still exist.

If you look at the numbers: Tested were Hitachi, Western Digital and Seagate hard drives (a few thousand). The annual failure rate (the amount of hard drives that failed after one year) were:

Hitachi: ~1 %
Western Digital: ~3 %
Seagate: ~9 %​

So don't buy Seagate, you're throwing money away.

Source: "Who makes the most reliable hard drives" by extremetech.com (21.01.14)

Numbers where? My numbers are: Three drives work flawlessly and always have. Should I ditch them now and put my faith in, say Hitachi, based on your "numbers" and your say so? How confident are you? Confident enough to wager the cost of the work that is currently quite secure where it is?

And yes, I do back up to two locations. They’re both Seagate. Neither has ever failed.
 

xPad

macrumors regular
Dec 15, 2013
228
184
No no no. I know this happens a lot, but there are actually quite telling and significant statistics out there that without doubt show that Seagate is by far the worst hard drive manufacturer out there – in fact so much worse than the rest, that it is a conundrum to me how they still exist.

If you look at the numbers: Tested were Hitachi, Western Digital and Seagate hard drives (a few thousand). The annual failure rate (the amount of hard drives that failed after one year) were:

Hitachi: ~1 %
Western Digital: ~3 %
Seagate: ~9 %​

So don't buy Seagate, you're throwing money away.

Source: "Who makes the most reliable hard drives" by extremetech.com (21.01.14)

That's one data point. And if you look into it further, you'll see that the 4TB Seagate drives have the same failure rate as WD. What does that say? Did Backblaze get a bad batch? Did Seagate change something in their newer drives?

This data is meaningless without a p value.

Thanks, though, for the citation.

----------

Actually from 2009. Two of them to be exact.

Then as recently as 2011 within the first 6 months of use. That's 4 drives and more than enough for me.

I've written them off and will only buy Hitachi or Western Digital (who are both the same company these days). I stand by my claims.

Citation? Sure, here's one that only reinforces my thoughts of their sub-par quality. This is the 2nd or 3rd report from them that shows Seagate still hasn't fixed many of their quality control issues. At least they're consistent.

Thanks for the citation. Your anecdote is meaningless. Statistics state that some people will get failure after failure. I've had plenty of WD drives fail, and no Seagates (I even had one of the bad batch where the heads fell off, and didn't have it fail).

My anecdote is also meaningless. Which is my point.

I'd be interested to hear more than just the one Backblaze report. It's more comprehensive (which is fantastic), but still mostly meaningless.
 

SgtPepper12

macrumors 6502a
Feb 1, 2011
697
673
Germany
Numbers where? My numbers are: Three drives work flawlessly and always have. Should I ditch them now and put my faith in, say Hitachi, based on your "numbers" and your say so? How confident are you? Confident enough to wager the cost of the work that is currently quite secure where it is?

And yes, I do back up to two locations. They’re both Seagate. Neither has ever failed.
If you have three drives, say for 5 years, then the probability that every one is still working after this time is approximately

((1-0.09)^5)^3 ≈ 24 %.​
That's still not impossible. So it's not like I said "it's impossible to have 3 Seagate drives working after five years", I just said it's improbable, especially more improbable than in the case of a Hitachi drive. If you think your loyalty will pay out, go ahead and try your luck, because that's all it is.
 

scaredpoet

macrumors 604
Apr 6, 2007
6,627
342
[citation needed]

Otherwise, we can just assume you are extrapolating from "derp, I had a Seagate drive that failed once, and I remember a batch of bad drives from 2007".

Here's your citation:

http://blog.backblaze.com/2014/01/21/what-hard-drive-should-i-buy/

This is about as close as you can get to a study on drive reliability rates by vendor. BackBlaze has some 27,134 hard drives in their inventory from differing vendors, and they've kept records on failure rates, because getting the most out of the drives they buy, and making sure they are reliable, is a key part of their business.

The results, put graphically:

blog-fail-drives-manufacture.jpg


"The Seagate Barracuda Green 1.5TB drive, though, has not been doing well. We got them from Seagate as warranty replacements for the older drives, and these new drives are dropping like flies."

"The [Seagate] non-LP 7200 RPM drives have been consistently unreliable. Their failure rate is high, especially as they’re getting older."

"The bigger Seagate drives have continued the tradition of the 1.5Tb drives: they’re solid workhorses, but there is a constant attrition as they wear out."

This jives with my personal experience as well. I didn't record down specific numbers, but I could tell from my usage of dozens of drives where I work, that Seagate is pretty bad in terms of reliability compared to other brands. the 4TB drive comes closer tot he baseline in matching the other vendors, but still edges them out in terms of failure rates. Not something to be proud of.

The Backblaze informal study is pretty darned clear. A lot of people have anecdotal experience, and this confirms it.

----------

I'd be interested to hear more than just the one Backblaze report. It's more comprehensive (which is fantastic), but still mostly meaningless.

How is it "mostly meaningless?" You asked for numbers, and the Backblaze report offers them, pretty conclusively.

Something tells me that anything that differs with your personal brand preference will be considered "mostly meaningless." On the other hand, Backblaze is not in the business of preferring one brand over another because the names look pretty. They need to buy drives that will give them the best reliability for the price, and that is what drove them to compile the data.

Likewise, I don't avoid certain drives just because I want to, and I suspect that others who have been similarly burned by Seagate in the past aren't grinding an axe just because it makes them feel good. We want drives that will work well, and will last a decent number of years. For many, it would appear that Seagate has so far not been able to deliver on that.


By the way, here's another study, which I'm sure you'll find equally "meaningless:"

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/hdd-reliability-storelab,2681-2.html

Again, graphically represented:

HDD-Reliability,2-C-254100-13.png


"The largest percentage difference can be seen with the market leader, Seagate, where its failure rate of over 56% is almost twice as high as its 31% market share."
 
Last edited:

Jetfire

macrumors 6502
Jul 10, 2008
386
347
Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
No no no. I know this happens a lot, but there are actually quite telling and significant statistics out there that without doubt show that Seagate is by far the worst hard drive manufacturer out there – in fact so much worse than the rest, that it is a conundrum to me how they still exist.

If you look at the numbers: Tested were Hitachi, Western Digital and Seagate hard drives (a few thousand). The annual failure rate (the amount of hard drives that failed after one year) were:

Hitachi: ~1 %
Western Digital: ~3 %
Seagate: ~9 %​

So don't buy Seagate, you're throwing money away.

Source: "Who makes the most reliable hard drives" by extremetech.com (21.01.14)

Almost all I buy is Seagate for HDD drives. I very rarely have a failure. WD and Maxtor used to fail all the time on me. I can't say much about Hitachi since I have been using Seagate for the past 15+ years. If a machines Oem HDD fails I replace it with an Seagate. Although in the last few years I have been switching to Samsung SSD. But for large storage and my servers it's been Seagate. The other thing I make sure of is that an drive enclosure has a fan in it.
 

SgtPepper12

macrumors 6502a
Feb 1, 2011
697
673
Germany
Almost all I buy is Seagate for HDD drives. I very rarely have a failure. WD and Maxtor used to fail all the time on me. I can't say much about Hitachi since I have been using Seagate for the past 15+ years. If a machines Oem HDD fails I replace it with an Seagate. Although in the last few years I have been switching to Samsung SSD. But for large storage and my servers it's been Seagate. The other thing I make sure of is that an drive enclosure has a fan in it.
That is good for you, really, but I don't see how this is even out for discussion.

It's not like a complicated study of any sort – you buy a bunch of hard drives, put them somewhere and let them run for a few years. When you're finished you look how many of them still work. There are no hidden factors, no correlation that can be mixed up with causation. If you don't believe in statistics (why ever the hell you don't want to), then go ahead, maybe your luck will continue.
 

Jetfire

macrumors 6502
Jul 10, 2008
386
347
Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
So don't buy Seagate, you're throwing money away.

I have a problem with that.

I'm just seeing everyone here taking a dump on Seagate when I have had nothing but good dealings with them.

I am trying out some HGST (WD company now) 1TB 2.5" 7200 RPM drive in my newer (used) server since Seagate didn't make any 1tb 7200 RBM that's not in the Constellation class.
 
Last edited:

69650

Suspended
Mar 23, 2006
3,367
1,876
England
Purchased a 1TB Seagate portable hard drive in 2013 which only lasted about 6 months. Turns out it didn't like being portable. Fortunately I had just migrated my iTunes library to a 2TB WD portable hard drive which thankfully has proven to be more reliable.

I don't see the point of this device. It's basically the same as the Seagate version which has been floating around for over 6 months.

I'd like to be able to take my iTunes library with me but I'd rather use my existing 2TB WD device and simply add a Kingston Wireless MobileLite for around £30 to effectively give me the same result but much cheaper and with a bigger hard drive.

I'd be interested to know if anyone has done this already and what the result was.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.