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Help me build an external HDD

slipper

slipper

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Nov 19, 2003
1,563
44
Please help me (and every other ignorant) build an external HDD.

I dont know the difference between SATA, IDE, ABC. or XYZ. And what would be better USB2 or FW400? I need something that looks decent and and a HDD with a capacity of 500gb.

Thanks in advance.
 
According to a few people here, its "better" to piece it together so you know you're using quality components.

I was planning on buying a pre-made enclosure but that just got me thinking.
 
meh, take it with a grain of salt. Some people are just overly picky.

What Mac will it be being attached to? (what ports? USB2, FW400, FW800?)
What size do you need?
What's it being used for?
Budget?
 
USB2 or FW400

Macbook but sooner than later i will be upgrading to a Macbook Pro 15"

I feel 500gb is fine for me

Not something ridiculous in price, how does $175-200 sound?
 
Personally, I'd go with Firewire. Especially if you have the Firewire port free, it's not as commonly used as the USB so it keeps those ports free.

You'll be able to find them cheaper than Apple, but something like this should suffice.

These days, quality of things such as hard drives is much of a muchness, and you don't get that much difference, really.

Edit: Saying that, this Western Digital is cheaper, and WD are good drives. However, that is USB only.
 
For a 500GB+ drive you're gonna have to go with standard SATA drives. You can usually get older PATA (also known as IDE or ATA) drives cheaper but they're old tech so I wouldn't recommend it. Check out OWC, they have great enclosures and know a lot about Apple. Here's the link:

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/hard-drives/

As for interface type, the best is USB2.0 AND FW400 combos. Maximum compatibility with all computer types. But firewire is the fastest. FW800 is fast but there's not a lot of support out there. The enclosures cost a lot too.
 
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