Hard Drive Question

[epmatsw]

Hey everyone,
I have some questions about macs and hard drives. I'm thinking about buying the low end mac mini, and I know I don't want to spend $150 to upgrade the harddrive with apple, so I'm looking at some external options. I figure I'll get this hard drive since the 320 gb edition is the same price as the 80 gb upgrade I'd be getting from apple for that price.
Now, Here are my questions.

1. I'll probably partition that drive into two: one for Time Machine and one for media storage. How big would I have to make the Time Machine partition if I'm going to use this as my primary school computer for a few years? If we don't know yet, a rought estimate would be good.

2. I have an internal 80 gb hd that I was using in my windows box before the other hardware in that computer crapped out. Do external drives even work with bootcamp? Cause if they do, I'll put that drive in an external enclosure to use as my windows drive. Can I use that installed copy of windows with boot camp? Or do I have to reinstall windows and all those programs again?

Thanks in advance for any help,
epmatsw

 

[iToaster]

Well, for time machine you'd want enough room to back up everything that you have on you computer, so maybe, by my math, that's a 240 Gb partition if you plan to fill everything up to the brim, but maybe 200 would do, or you could just split in half and not bother with the external backup 'cause it would be on the same drive. Your Windows would boot via firewire external drive (burn a drivers disk with bootcamp) and you should be fine, just remember to hold option down during boot up to select the drive.

 

[DoFoT9]

1. i spose time machine should be about the same size as your main harddrive. if your going to have it for a couple of years then things will get quite large on there.

2. hhhmmm using the external drive via usb/fw will work, aslong as its with xp (vista doesnt support external drives). you will have re-activate xp tho, i hope you have your key handy. programs 'should' still work after you have re-activated.

 

[epmatsw]

So, I can boot that windows drive as long as it's through firewire? Do you think USB would be fast enough for time machine and media storage? Cause if it is, I can get a 500gb non-fw edition for the same price. Or do you guys think it would be better to get a fw hub (is that even an option?)?

 

[DoFoT9]

you can boot from it with either usb or fw (intel machines support this).
usb would be plenty fast for time machine. i think the 500gb option would be better, you could always just buy a different case in the future if you dont like the usb.

 

[epmatsw]

Well, with that pretty much decided, I need to find me a good enclosure for my windows hd. Firewire's probably better for an os, right? I don't really have any other fw accessories, so it would make sense to use it for that. Any suggestions on fw enclosures? The drive's an 80 gb ATA/100 Seagate, standard size for a desktop.

 

[DoFoT9]

i would highly recommend the icecube range of external enclosures made by macpower. i have one of these and its perfect, going to buy another soon.. they have a number of different interfaces aswell... usb/fw400/fw800/esata, take your pick..
fw would be best for an OS system tho. thats a good idea.

hope everything works good for ya wen u get it up and running.

woops forgot the macpower webby http://www.macpower.com.tw/

 

[epmatsw]

This may be stupid, but where do I find the prices on those? It looks good, but I do need to know how much they cost, I'm on a pretty small budget.

 

[rdp5008]

The external HDD you linked to is the exact one I have. No problems so far! Easy to use, cool blue light, doesn't take up much desk space.

 

[DoFoT9]

This may be stupid, but where do I find the prices on those? It looks good, but I do need to know how much they cost, I'm on a pretty small budget.

uummm. im only aware of australian stores sorry maybe try google advnaced search.

The external HDD you linked to is the exact one I have. No problems so far! Easy to use, cool blue light, doesn't take up much desk space.

i love the blue light!!! its the brightest led ive ever seen!!! and it flickers wen its being read, i love it!