Need new external hard drive for video

[prs986]

Ok, so I'm in the market for a new external HDD for HDV editing and storing. This is what I'm looking for:

500GB - 1TB
FW 800
FW 400
USB 2.0

$300 - $500(U.S)

This is what I found. Got good reviews. Does anyone else have any good suggestions?
Also is getting a drive set up with RAID 0 a better bet for faster performance since this will be my capture scratch drive?
Thanks!

 

[roland.g]

http://www.wdc.com/en/products/Products.asp?DriveID=270

probably can get it a bit cheaper.

EDIT: Or you can do what I did. Get a great RAID case even if you plan to use it as a JBOD system. I got this one http://www.cooldrives.com/dusahadrfi80.html for $140 though OWC has one for $120. I like the cool drives better. New egg has Seagate 500GB drives for $119 or so, Western Digitals a little cheaper. I bought the newer Seagate 7200.11 750 for $195 - thats $333 total with my case, but you can get the 7200.10 750 for $185. The 7200.11 has a 32MB cache instead of 16MB which you won't find on any of the LaCie or MyStudio drives right now. I only put 1 drive in my case, plan to add another later when I need it. I will use the 750 for Time Machine and the second drive either 500 or 750 for video. That's why I set the jumper not to connect drives. You can jumper them in a raid, but if one drive dies, you lose the data from the other, if you keep them independant, then you don't, which is something else to remember about the LaCie and MyBook, both those are 2 500s in a RAID. One disk fails, both do.

 

[Flynnstone]

I just bought a Maxtor 750G OneTouch drive. USB2 and Firewire 400. Not Firewire 800. For $190.
Works well.

http://shop4.outpost.com/product/53...YWIOZlvgA**.node2?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG

 

[prs986]

http://www.wdc.com/en/products/Products.asp?DriveID=270

probably can get it a bit cheaper.

EDIT: Or you can do what I did. Get a great RAID case even if you plan to use it as a JBOD system. I got this one http://www.cooldrives.com/dusahadrfi80.html for $140 though OWC has one for $120. I like the cool drives better. New egg has Seagate 500GB drives for $119 or so, Western Digitals a little cheaper. I bought the newer Seagate 7200.11 750 for $195 - thats $333 total with my case, but you can get the 7200.10 750 for $185. The 7200.11 has a 32MB cache instead of 16MB which you won't find on any of the LaCie or MyStudio drives right now. I only put 1 drive in my case, plan to add another later when I need it. I will use the 750 for Time Machine and the second drive either 500 or 750 for video. That's why I set the jumper not to connect drives. You can jumper them in a raid, but if one drive dies, you lose the data from the other, if you keep them independant, then you don't, which is something else to remember about the LaCie and MyBook, both those are 2 500s in a RAID. One disk fails, both do.

I was just thinking the same thing. I like the idea of adding another drive later. Also I didn't really think about the RAID 0 that if one drive fails, the other does too...... I think I might go with your set up. Get the RAID case, get a 750GB for now and update later. Thanks for the info!

 

[roland.g]

I was just thinking the same thing. I like the idea of adding another drive later. Also I didn't really think about the RAID 0 that if one drive fails, the other does too...... I think I might go with your set up. Get the RAID case, get a 750GB for now and update later. Thanks for the info!

I really like my cooldrives case. It was a bit pricier than the OWC macsales.com Mercury Elite AL RAID case, but I think it might be a slightly more attractive. It has that sparkly aluminum finish that mathes my alu iMac perfectly. The OWC case has a weird dark strip across it. The other difference is that the Cool Drives case can be set up vertically or flat, whereas the OWC case has a foot on the bottom and is meant to stand on its side. But all that said, OWC sells great stuff and I'm sure their cases are good. The Cool Drives case is normally $160 but is currently $20 off so that only made it a $20 difference. They both have the G5/Mac Pro style grille.

OWC Case. There are some pics at the bottom and a click to download PDF with more pics.
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other World Computing/MEFW924AL2K/