Need help buying external hd

[Jedi5]

looking to buy an external hd, 2-3TB if possible.
never bought one before, wouldn't know what to look for.
for us Mac users, is there a brand that is better than the other?
a brand maybe for Mac I should stay away from?
from the little search I did this morning, there were a few hd's saying formatted for PC but I could reformat for Mac.
how easy/difficult is that to do?

thanks everyone.

 

[MrCheeto]

It's as easy as clicking "Erase".

Any drive will work with your Mac. The only advice I have is to avoid any drives with pesky applications like auto-backup software included. Just keep it simple.

 

[treestar]

Any drive will do. G-Technology drives have aluminum finishes identical to Apple products. They are great drives. A lot of people choose OWC for a better price. Even the cheap Western Digital options will work. In my opinion, pick something with at least a 3-year warranty and backup your data. It was good advice to keep it simple, and formatting for Mac is very simple. My personal choice is G-Tech; I have two.

 

[Jedi5]

Thanks for the help!

Wow, those G-Drives are pretty expensive. Well more than I thought they would be after spending a while looking at the WD and Seagate models.
Is connection important? I see some with firewire and other with USB.

I'll keep looking.

Thanks again

 

[Shrink]

Any drive will do. G-Technology drives have aluminum finishes identical to Apple products. They are great drives. A lot of people choose OWC for a better price. Even the cheap Western Digital options will work. In my opinion, pick something with at least a 3-year warranty and backup your data. It was good advice to keep it simple, and formatting for Mac is very simple. My personal choice is G-Tech; I have two.

Another vote for G-Tech.

I have one, and it's simple and easy to use. (Even a n00b like me had no problems. )

I was told that it is specifically geared to work with Time Machine.

 

[kirsch92]

I have a Sans Digital 2 bay FW800 drive, which is fast and reliable, but the fan never shuts off, so I just use it for backups and video editing.

I also have a Segate Goflex 1Tb drive USB 3.0, than bought the firewire base. (I only bought the 3.0 Usb because it was on sale).
I have always been a Western Digital guy, because I have yet had one to fail, but the Seagate works great so far. It is my media drive for itunes. It goes to sleep when not in use, and it always wakes up when needed. Very happy with it, quiet too.

You can always find people complaining about this drive or that drive, and those that love each as well.

The more expensive (usually) route is to buy a good enclosure, and add your own drives (my Sans digital setup).

My advice on ANY prefab external (Mybook Studio, Goflex, etc) is DO NOT install any of the manufacturer software. Re-format to what you need, and just use it.

You do not need a Mac specific drive either. The Goflex PC version, purchased with a FW800 base costs much less than the MAC version, but is black instead of silver. The Mac one comes with some hocus pocus software to allow both mac and pc to read/write from the drive, which is just a read/write failure waiting to happen.

My 20 cents...