Question for 256GB rMBP owners (bootcamp gaming)

[kimovski]

What models/brands do you guys recomend for a good usb 3 external hard drive?

 

[Moriarty]

What models/brands do you guys recomend for a good usb 3 external hard drive?

I got a Hitachi Touro Mobile Pro - 750GB drive at 7200rpm. It's a 2.5-inch USB 3.0 bus-powered drive so great to carry around. There are very few 7200rpm external drives out there... you could always buy a bare drive and put it in an enclosure yourself but that's rarely any cheaper.

I have formatted mine with a large HFS+ partition for my iTunes library and some other documents that I won't waste SSD space on, and a smaller exFAT partition (readable by both OS X and Windows) for games and general file sharing between computers.

Time Machine will only back up HFS+ formatted partitions as a note of caution.

 

[Hrim]

You just made my day. That is just awesome, especially considering I'll only be playing things like WoW and GW2. Much more convenient than being tethered to a USB3 drive, although its a fair bit more expensive for the convenience as well.

The cheapest Sandisk 128GB SDHC cards get around 42MB/s read, which is perfectly fine for gaming, although not quite as fast as the 90MB/s or so you'd get from USB3.

I bought a very cheap lexar 128gb from B&H (less than 90$). Not super-fast but it is far more enough for testing the concept of a SDXC "drive" on the retina. While it may not be as fast as a USB 3 drive, it's much less massive and can also be swapped between computers more easily.

I am planning on doing this as well. Hopefully Windows 8 will support loading from a SDXC card, but otherwise I will just use it to install the games. Looking into this one: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220666 .

If Windows 8 can be somehow installed on a SDXC card, I think I'll invest more and take a faster one. The only issue with this, is that you'll have your card locked in the slot as it stores your OS, so no hot-swap.

As for an USB 3 drive, I like the look of the lacie P9920, which offers 1TB without additional power needed. I don't have much more to say, as I found only one review for that drive. Looks "good enough".

Yet, I would love to invest in a thunderbolt solution, but as Windows is not supporting them yet via bootcamp, it's more annoying to use than a more standard device (even if slower).