need a good external hard drive for my new MBP

[prada]

I just purchased a 13" macbook pro. I previously owned a 15" MBP that I bought four years ago and never upgraded the OS on it, so I was still using Tiger. Now that I have the new computer and time machine to go along with it, I'd like to start being more proactive about backing up my files.

I don't want to purchase Apple's Time Capsule for two reasons: the price, and I've read that it is not possible to partition the drive for other storage capacity besides backing up. Ideally I'd like a drive that I can store movies/tv seasons on in addition to the time machine backups.

Does anyone have any recommendations on reasonably priced external hard drive that will suit my storage needs and work easily with time machine? The hard drive on my laptop is 320GB , so I'm also wondering how large of an external I need to purchase... was thinking 500GB but I really have no clue. Thanks!

 

[JohnRN]

I got one of the little g-drive mini's from the apple store. It was a 500gb drive in a sweet aluminum enclosure, had firewire 800 too. I use it as my time machine back up it works out great, no problems, quiet and doesn't require an external power source to work. Here's a link to it, also comes with a neat little carrying case and a bunch of different cables.

http://g-technology.com/products/g-drive-mini.cfm

 

[MonkeyET]

I hear what you are saying! Just picked up a 13" MBP myself and was toying with Time Capsule vs. Airport extreme with an external. Decided to go Extreme and am looking at a good external. Just setup the extreme which took less than 10 minutes (including unpacking, running power cord up the back of my wall unit, software installation and complete setup. It is awesome. As we speak I am getting full signal in my bedroom (didn't happen with several other routers). I am looking at a LaCie drive to connect to it.

I would suggest getting a 1 TB drive. They aren't that much more than a 640 GB ( I read you should double your current hard drive at a minimum). Let us know what you get as I could use the HD suggestions since I am still unsure.