thanks for all the help, i think firewire is the way I want to go, does anyone have any good suggestions for a reasonably priced firewire around 40-80 gigs?
My sugestion is make your own.. Pick up any FW enclosure and an ATA HDD and your set.. A word of advice when picking enclosures though, shoot for something with the Oxford chipset in it. They usualy have higher performance than everything else.