external hard drive suggestions

[jfoley89]

Ok so i'm looking at setting up a home sharing network, Mac Mini + 2 external hard drives to hold the iTunes library and a backup of my iTunes library.

I'm looking for suggestions for external hard drives, I would like something that matches the aesthetics of a Mac Mini (I'm one of those people who likes things to match) so brushed aluminium and not too pricey as I need 2 of them and will be getting more of them when I setup my file.

I've been looking at the WD My Book Studio 3TB as its a reasonable price. Any complains about this product or the brand WD?

thanks in advance

 

[danny_w]

I just recently went through this same exercise and ended up buying an OWC Mercury Elite Pro Dual Thunderbolt with 4TB (2x2TB) that I will run in RAID 0 because I wanted fast direct storage, and will use an existing disk for backup; I have my iTunes library on external as well. However this option is quite pricey (actually not bad for what you get but overkill probably for what you want). If I had not gone for a RAID array I probably would have gotten the OWC Mercury Elite Pro 3TB or 4TB stand-alone drive (2 if you need a backup); as a matter of fact I had one in my basket but changed my mind at the last minute. I looked at the LaCie 2big and d2 but they are plain ugly (to me at least).

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire/1394/USB/EliteAL/eSATA_FW800_FW400_USB

I have had WD externals in the past and while they are serviceable drives they are minimalist; you get what you pay for with these drives. I would spend the extra and get one of OWC's offerings (or LaCie if you like them) but stay away from the big box store offerings like WD and Seagate externals. I think most (if not all) of the current WD lineup uses hardware encryption, so if your case/electronics goes out you can't recover your data by putting the drive into another case; I think somebody else on this forum just ran into this issue.

 

[ColdCase]

Some outfit, I think OWC, sells so called stackers... they look just like the mini only they house hard drives.

Foe example:

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/ministack

I think you can still get the Seagate Backup Plus in silver. ~$150 for 4TB USB3, $110 for 3TB. I have a few of them and they seem to work well.

 

[danny_w]

Some outfit, I think OWC, sells so called stackers... they look just like the mini only they house hard drives.

Foe example:

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/ministack

I think you can still get the Seagate Backup Plus in silver. ~$150 for 4TB USB3, $110 for 3TB. I have a few of them and they seem to work well.

I thought about getting a couple of miniStacks and raining them together until I read how loud they are. No thanks.

 

[ElectronGuru]

Duplicate

 

[jfoley89]

Sweet thanks people. Will look into these for sure, love the fact they match so well and will save a bunch of space, never even heard of them until now.