500GB external HD -- what to buy?

[gnasher729]

But the specs for the WD HDD say that USB is 480Mbps where as Firewire is 400Mbps.

So how come FireWire is faster??

USB transfers data at 480MBit/sec for a very, very, very short time. Then it takes a break and thinks what to do next. And then it runs again at 480MBit/sec for a very, very, very short time. And stops and thinks again. And so on. Firewire runs only at 400MBit/sec, but it is much better at keeping up that speed forever.

 

[brop52]

If you don't care so much about looks, it's cheaper to get an enclosure and an internal drive separately.

Either as just a case or as the whole unit, I'm a big fan of these. I've got six of the 500GB drives.


Exactly. Firewire is much faster at real-world file transfers in most cases.

FW800 is dramatically faster. As mentioned, eSATA is even better, but isn't (yet) supported by most systems.

I have the older v2 model with my mini. I love it. The v3 is even better from all I've heard.

I have to second the OWC recommendation. That eSATA quad wasn't an option when I bought my 800/400/USB enclosure and that's pretty nice for not much more price. Plus, it looks great with my Aluminum iMac.

 

[Nonentity]

I'm also interested in getting a new external hard drive, i only have about £100 to spend. Im stuck between a 500GB and 320GB however the main problem is whether the enclosure should have firewire 800 or not; will it really make that much of a difference to me?

 

[jsw]

seagate freeagent pro. Fast, lots of connections, power button, nearly silent, reasonably priced. I really like mine.

Beware, though, that there are numerous complaints about the Freeagents overheating due to a design flaw. I have two of them, and no issues yet, but complaints about it are all over the net, and apparently, even with the 5 year warranty, Seagate will only replace the whole thing, not let you open it to remove your drive with it's just the enclosure that has failed.

I use mine as secondary backup and tend to keep them offline.

I'm also interested in getting a new external hard drive, i only have about £100 to spend. Im stuck between a 500GB and 320GB however the main problem is whether the enclosure should have firewire 800 or not; will it really make that much of a difference to me?

Depends on what you're doing. Everything will be faster, but you'll only really notice it with larger transfers, like backups and large media files. It's a good thing to have if you can afford it, but, say, 500GB of FW400 is probably more useful to most people than 320GB of FW800.

 

[flieschut]

www.dealmac.com

has been a good place for me to find hard drives. IMO it's all about what's on sale, and redundancy. All hard drives fail some time, and there's no way to really know when that will be. I've had hard drives from all the big names fail me at one time or another; I've had hard drives that I bought from the same maker at the same time last for radically different ammounts of time. There really is no way to tell.....just buy two (or three) and worry less. You can get 500 GB for 100 bucks or less if you wait for a deal; and just a little over that on a regular basis.

 

[QCassidy352]

Beware, though, that there are numerous complaints about the Freeagents overheating due to a design flaw. I have two of them, and no issues yet, but complaints about it are all over the net, and apparently, even with the 5 year warranty, Seagate will only replace the whole thing, not let you open it to remove your drive with it's just the enclosure that has failed.

I use mine as secondary backup and tend to keep them offline.

I don't know; there are a ton of reviews across the net, and only a handful of users report overheating. I've found my drive to run rather coolly. Sounds like an isolated bug to me.

 

[jsw]

I don't know; there are a ton of reviews across the net, and only a handful of users report overheating. I've found my drive to run rather coolly. Sounds like an isolated bug to me.

True, and it might be due to an early flaw that was fixed. I'm just being cautious.

 

[KJdanReuben]

I've heard really great things about the G-Tech drives. I just bought one, but haven't gotten a chance to use it. Everyone at the Apple store in the NYC Soho store says G-Tech. One guy I asked and he answered almost before I was done with the question that G-Tech is the way to go. He said they are Cadillac of externals. Plus they look really cool! If you decide to go with a G-Tech, B&H is the only place I found that has them in stock. www.bhphoto.com

 

[joefinan]

I've just ordered the Western Digital My Book 2 Studio 500GB HDD. It has USB, Firewire 400, 800 and eSATA.

And for £109 it seemed like a good deal...

 

[dcl]

LaCie 2big Triple (2-disk RAID)

Has anyone looked into, purchased, or have experience with:

LaCie 2big Triple (1 - 1 1/2 - 2 TB) size ?

http://www.lacie.com/us/products/product.htm?pid=10967

Protection of data is very important for me - "SAFE 100 (RAID 1)
for maximum security (100% data redundancy on each hot-swappable disk)
with automatic data rebuilding if a spare disk is needed"

 

[dcl]

This is the only review I could find on the
LaCie 2big Triple (2-disk RAID)

http://reviews.digitaltrends.com/review4818_intro24097.html
It received a great score of 9.

Has good 3 yr Warranty and was selling for around $325 for the 1TB before New Years.
I'm hoping there will be some discounts from MacWorld exhibitors who carry this product.

 

[nsbio]

1) NewerTechnology MiniStack V3
2) Firewiredirect: http://www.firewiredirect.com/categories/71/

Both have quadruple interface.

 

[KJdanReuben]

The miniStacks, like everyone is saying, are also very nice. I have one of the v2's and can't complain, except for the lack of FW800, but oh well. I like the way it acts as a hub. They are also very quiet.

 

[joefinan]

Ok, here's a silly question - what is RAID?

And, when I get my new WD drive, should I format it and, if so, what system?

 

[mrfrosty]

I'm also interested in getting a new external hard drive, i only have about £100 to spend. Im stuck between a 500GB and 320GB however the main problem is whether the enclosure should have firewire 800 or not; will it really make that much of a difference to me?

PCWorld are selling 750Gb maxtor one touch drives for £99. I have one...it's ugly as anything ..................but it's 750Gb for £99........no wire fire though.........but a 5 year warranty

 

[Kuska]

Always used Lacie - never had a problem with them (hope I don't regret writing thiose words!!) Currently have 4x500GB Quadra Drives in the Lacie Rackmount.

Only downside, is that I do find them a little noisy and that sort of cancels out the benefits of a beautifully quiet iMac !!

 

[dcl]

Joe Finan

RAID - Is software or hardware that will:
1. Allows you to link two hard drives together to make one large hard drive
2. Allows you to replicate a hard drive drive for security reasons
- If 1 goes down, 2 has all the data / If 2 goes down, then 1 has the data
- Put new drive in, then the other drive will automatically replace the data

RE-Format new drive - Yes

 

[simplyme91]

I've only used two external drives in the past. Therefore, I can only give you those experiences.

The first one was a Seagate FreeAgent 320GB, it started beeping and no longer worked, my brother opened it up and couldn't find anything wrong with the enclosure, so we assumed it was a flaw with the drive. Also, it would get extrememly hot and whenever I was using it on a computer other than my iMac G3, which has a loud buzzing sound coming from it ,so you can barely hear a thing over it, I could hear the drive spinning, which may annoy some people. My brother has the exact same drive and has had zero issues.

After that, I got a LaCie Porsche 500GB, so far it has worked flawlessly, I have read that some people have experienced a hight pitched buzzing sound from this model, but I can't hear anything coming from it.

Also, if you order online, I highly recommend ordering from NewEgg.com.

 

[150hp]

Wow, that enclosure looks fantastic port-wise. Let us know how it works out for you, I'm probably going to be looking into a similar solution a few months from now.

I am quite pleased with the set up. It is exactly what I needed. The drive seems to be very quiet & since it's for back ups mostly, It doesn't spin all that much anyways.