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I can't decide which external hard drive to buy, out of these choices?

A

AdventurousJosh

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Aug 11, 2008
300
19
Okay, so I know they are similar but for one reason or another I can't decide. if you were buying an external hard drive for your 2007 Blackbook (late) what would you buy?
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001F9LY14/ref=noref?ie=UTF8&s=electronics

http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digit...=dp_ob_title_ce?ie=UTF8&qid=1254686897&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digit...5000AN/dp/B001NANNNM/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top

They're all different, but none of them are different enough for me to decide. Is mac formatted worth buying over not? for a few extra bucks?

Thanks.
 
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Kusuri said:
Okay, so I know they are similar but for one reason or another I can't decide. if you were buying an external hard drive for your 2007 Blackbook (late) what would you buy?
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001F9LY14/ref=noref?ie=UTF8&s=electronics

http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digit...=dp_ob_title_ce?ie=UTF8&qid=1254686897&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digit...5000AN/dp/B001NANNNM/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top

They're all different, but none of them are different enough for me to decide. Is mac formatted worth buying over not? for a few extra bucks?

Thanks.
Click to expand...

I like the first one http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001F9LY14/ref=noref?ie=UTF8&s=electronics
 
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umm ok, they are all 500GB, and the cheapest one was $96.. So yea Id have to say the one thats $96!?
None of these hard drives have any special features that the other doesn't.
It's not like buying a car where one is automatic, one is manual, one has cruise control, one has power locks.......

It's a hard drive man! Get whatever one you want. :rolleyes:
 
It doesn't matter which one you buy. They're all made using the same parts out of the same chinese sweatshop.
 
ha wouldn't buy any of them.
you can get 1tb for 100 bucks if you look.

my mom was going to get one of those, they have them at costco for under 80. after looking a little phantom drives had a deal for 80 bucks 1tb, it was to late for the rebate but ill find another.
i have 2 phantom drives. nice case, wd drives, and have been doing great.
 
benlangdon said:
ha wouldn't buy any of them.
you can get 1tb for 100 bucks if you look.

my mom was going to get one of those, they have them at costco for under 80. after looking a little phantom drives had a deal for 80 bucks 1tb, it was to late for the rebate but ill find another.
i have 2 phantom drives. nice case, wd drives, and have been doing great.
Click to expand...
I'm looking for something portable though, that I can take with me backpacking overseas traveling.
 
benlangdon said:
ha wouldn't buy any of them.
you can get 1tb for 100 bucks if you look.

my mom was going to get one of those, they have them at costco for under 80. after looking a little phantom drives had a deal for 80 bucks 1tb, it was to late for the rebate but ill find another.
i have 2 phantom drives. nice case, wd drives, and have been doing great.
Click to expand...

Those drives are portables - small, light and no extra charger.
Your 1TB for $80 is a 3.5inch+charger HDD.

I wouldn't want to carry around a 3.5inch plus charger everyday.
 
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As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
Kusuri said:
Wow that's actually nice, but, I have a 2007 blackbook, how much faster is firewire 400 then USB? not much I'd assume, so it's probably not worth it.
Click to expand...
what kind of computer you have doesn't matter.
correct me if im wrong because im just remembering this
usb 40mb/s
fw 400, 400 mb/s
fw 800, 800 mb/s
esata I, 1.5 gb/s
esata II, 3 gb/s
 
benlangdon said:
what kind of computer you have doesn't matter.
correct me if im wrong because im just remembering this
usb 40mb/s
fw 400, 400 mb/s
fw 800, 800 mb/s
esata I, 1.5 gb/s
esata II, 3 gb/s
Click to expand...

USB 2 is 480mbps and FW 400 is 400.

However USB uses data packet transfer as opposed to Firewire which lumps files over in one go. Firewire is usually faster and more reliable for data transfer to a portable hard drive.
 
KielderWolf said:
USB 2 is 480mbps and FW 400 is 400.

However USB uses data packet transfer as opposed to Firewire which lumps files over in one go. Firewire is usually faster and more reliable for data transfer to a portable hard drive.
Click to expand...

ya i think 480 mb/s averages out to 40 mb/s on big file transfers.
ya i moved over 300 gb and it took forever on usb.
 
so, it sounds like firewire 400 is, kinda faster, but not very noticeably then USB, and yes it does matter what computer I have because if my mac had firewire 800 then that's the clear winner, but my late 07 blackbook only has firewire 400, and from the look of things, isn't all that worth it compared to just standard USB.

Thoughts?
 
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