ok well first of all i would like to know if it is worth it to spend more on a firewire drive than usb. i would like to spend around $80 for the whole external setup. at first i was thinking about the mybook 160gb version(usb) that i can get for $175 from newegg. but then i kept reading about how people liked firewire better so i looked at them, and they are out of my price range, so i looked to just get an internal drive and a firewire enclosure hoping it would be cheaper. off newegg the cheapest firewire enclosure i can find is about $65 which is to expensive. so i found this that has a pretty good price but it only supports IDE which is older than SATA and i dont want any performance loss. so what should i do? is it really worth it to get firewire over usb? what kind of gain in performance will i get? and am i missing something; is there somewhere i can get a cheaper firewire enclosure? thankyou in advance.
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help me choose external hard drive
- Thread starter stealthsniper96
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I'm not sure where you live, but MyBook Pro's 500GB are about $175 in the U.S., so wherever you're buying, that's expensive...
It's a matter of whether you feel you need the speed of firewire, and whether your wallet can handle it. If it's only for backup/storage, USB will work fine, and it won't matter whether you have IDE or SATA because USB is your bottleneck (same w/ Firewire). If cheap is your route, get an IDE or SATA drive (depending on which you can find for less) + usb enclosure.
o sorry i meant $75 for the mybook. my bad. so your saying that an external IDE drive connected through firewire is ok? i would prefer firewire so i can keep the 2 usb ports on my MB open but i guess i could just get a usb hub.
Yes, that would be fine, but just as fair warning firewire enclosures tend to be more expensive than usb enclosures.
FireWire is MUCH better than USB 2.0.
Depending on the model, FireWire drives don't cost a lot more than USB, if anything at all.
Check out the drives at MacMall. A 250 GB FireWire drive can be purchased for as little as $80 after rebate.
These Fantom drives are ultra quiet when spinning. I myself own one of them. When the unit is not in use the drive spins down, making it completely dead silent.
Depending on the model, FireWire drives don't cost a lot more than USB, if anything at all.
Check out the drives at MacMall. A 250 GB FireWire drive can be purchased for as little as $80 after rebate.
These Fantom drives are ultra quiet when spinning. I myself own one of them. When the unit is not in use the drive spins down, making it completely dead silent.
Buy a decent brand you have heard of.
Buy the biggest you can afford.
Make sure the drive has can breath and it will last forever.
Oh, and networked drives are quite cool if you have more than 1 computer and/or a 360/PS3
Buy the biggest you can afford.
Make sure the drive has can breath and it will last forever.
Oh, and networked drives are quite cool if you have more than 1 computer and/or a 360/PS3
Also if you're trying to save money for the interim, you can buy some components used. Look around our forum sales. Someone's selling a 160GB 3.5" SATA drive for $30 right now. Drives and enclosures come up fairly frequently. I think, given all your caveats regarding what you will not put up with in speed limitations, you will have a very difficult time. Even used, you are not getting a $80 SATA firewire external drive easily. But it will help, at least.
I recently built a Seagate 7200.10 500GB drive into an Icy Dock USB2/FW400 enclosure. Total cost $171 shipped from NewEgg.... If you bought that enclosure and a used 160GB drive, it would probably come out to about $90-95 total....
I recently built a Seagate 7200.10 500GB drive into an Icy Dock USB2/FW400 enclosure. Total cost $171 shipped from NewEgg.... If you bought that enclosure and a used 160GB drive, it would probably come out to about $90-95 total....
I like the concept of the Drobo. Not sure how well it works since i don't own one, but neat nonetheless.
www.drobo.com
edit: sorry that doesn't fit in your budget. My bad, I didn't read through the entire post.
www.drobo.com
edit: sorry that doesn't fit in your budget. My bad, I didn't read through the entire post.
The very least it could do is transform into a fracking jet fighter.
And on a serious note, how do they take them selves seriously, selling an external device that can have more than three terabytes of data in it, and the only interface it has is USB2?
^2.