Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Recommendation on portable drive please

H

hajime

macrumors G3
Original poster
Jul 23, 2007
8,174
1,414
Hello, I am looking for a portable drive (usb 3, 1TB or more). Any recommendation? I saw very poor rating of WD 1TB and 2TB My Passport for Mac Portable drives in the Apple Store. However, these drives got very high ratings on Amazon. In case I buy a MBP with an internal 1T SSD, is an external portable drive of 1TB sufficient?
 
Last edited:
I would recommend the Seagate Backup Plus 2TB. You can pick it up for around $100-$110 at the big box stores and online. Its got great reviews all over and is very quick over USB 3. As far as internal storage goes 1TB should be sufficient for most people but it depends on what you use your Mac for. If your intentions for the portable drive are for Time Machine backups, then a good rule of thumb is use a drive that is twice the size as the drive to be backed up.
 
A friend of mine just ordered this drive, and I used it long enough to put files on it for him. I was very impressed with its speed and quiet operation, as well as how compact is. I'm seriously considering getting one.
 
satinsilverem2 said:
I would recommend the Seagate Backup Plus 2TB. You can pick it up for around $100-$110 at the big box stores and online. Its got great reviews all over and is very quick over USB 3. As far as internal storage goes 1TB should be sufficient for most people but it depends on what you use your Mac for. If your intentions for the portable drive are for Time Machine backups, then a good rule of thumb is use a drive that is twice the size as the drive to be backed up.
Click to expand...

Thanks. Is the Backup Plus Slim equally good?

Shall I get the For Mac version or Windows version and then format to Mac OS? I suppose the Windows version is less expensive.

I intend to use the drive for backuping. Why twice the size as the drive to be backed up?

Based on experience, it seems that Seagate drives are better than the Western Digital ones. Am I right?
 
Last edited:
hajime said:
Thanks. Is the Backup Plus Slim equally good?

Shall I get the For Mac version or Windows version and then format to Mac OS? I suppose the Windows version is less expensive.

I intend to use the drive for backuping. Why twice the size as the drive to be backed up?

Based on experience, it seems that Seagate drives are better than the Western Digital ones. Am I right?
Click to expand...

yes Seagate's whole line of externals are very good. I would get the version for windows since there is no "mac" specific version its just a marketing strategy for them. I recommend twice the size because you are less likely to run into issues with Time Machine saying that the backup drive is full. Both Western Digital and Seagate drives are very good. Its really down to personal preference.
 
GGJstudios said:
A friend of mine just ordered this drive, and I used it long enough to put files on it for him. I was very impressed with its speed and quiet operation, as well as how compact is. I'm seriously considering getting one.
Click to expand...

I agree with this guy... Have a 500 GB version from last year & love it. Very compact & portable, fast & quiet. Keep meaning to grab another, larger capacity one sometime soon.
 
After accidentally dropping my WD external drive and having it fail, I now only buy drives that have extra protection.

I decided on this one. Had it for two months. Works fine. Of course one of the important factors is reliability over a number of years , so to this I cannot attest.
Use it for cloning and backups.


http://www.cnet.com/products/silicon-power-armor-a80/

You can see them testing the drive here. It is quite amazing what it can go through.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QcFm4YKtVy4
 
Looking for a portable drive myself I've found out that many of them use proprietary hard drives where the USB-3 bridge board is actually part of the drive itself instead of using standard SATA drives. This means if the bridge board breaks you can't just remove the drive and put it into another enclosure. As far as I know, Western Digital are especially into using such drives.

So after a lot of research I went ahead and ordered a 1TB Seagate Backup plus slim (silver) which uses a standard SATA drive as far as I know, and I'm hoping will (more or less) match my Macbook Pro's silver color. There's also a "Mac version" (which, as usual costs more than the "PC version" of the same thing). I'm not sure if there's a slight color difference or if it just comes preformatted for Macs.

Other portable 1TB drives I considered were Lacie's Porsche design 9220 (or the 9223 "Mac version), and the Toshiba Canvio slim II (or their Mac version of the same drive).
They both look great and the LaCie (according to some take-apart videos online) uses a standard SATA drive but read that the enclosure has a bit too sharp corners for carrying around. The Toshiba looks great as well but I suspect (based on its size) it to use proprietary drives just like WD does, so no go for me.

A final option I considered was to get a bare 2.5" SATA drive and a separate USB-3 enclosure. Orico's 2595 or Icy box's IB-234U3 or IB-232STU3, or their other 2.5" metal drive enclosures look good but I read user reviews saying that they all had flaws with very flimsy USB connectors that break or disconnect all too easily.
 
Last edited:
Most of WD drives and seagate drives are pretty much the same. Some swear by one, others won't even touch another. They both aren't the greatest of quality but should be good enough for day to day use. I've had WD drives crap out. The seagate backup plus line seems to heat up a bit under continued use.

That being said, I currently use a Portable WD My Passport 2 TB running strong from 2011 and a 2 TB G Drive Desktop from 2013.

For professionals, I hear Lacie and G Drive are among the best. They're both pricier though.

Either way, backup backup! Generally, the backup drive should ~1.5x the capacity of the source disk. (or your expected usage)
 
Following my comments earlier in the thread I just received my Seagate backup plus slim (1TB silver color) today. Actually the box says "Backup plus portable drive" and the supplied quick guide says it's for the "Backup plus portable drive" as well as for the "Backup slim". I thought the name was "Backup plus slim" so I'm a little confused if there are two models or just one with a couple of names :confused:

First impression is good. Small (how can they fit the drive and a SATA-USB bridge board inside -perhaps a 7mm height drive)?), feels sturdy even though it's not all metal (bottom is black plastic, top is thin brushed aluminum), light, but not too light (feels quality) and looks stylish and modern (brushed silver aluminum top, thin and classy white activity LED).
Heat doesn't seem to be as much as my 5 year old 160GB Glyph Portagig 800 (all metal Firewire 800/USB2 enclosure) with a Seagate drive inside. Perhaps technology has improved since then or the Glyph drive actually takes up more heat in order to better cool the drive inside. I don't know.

Appearancewise it looks great but doesn't completely match my Macbook Pro as the computer doesn't have a brushed metal surface, but it's close enough (for me) and still looks good IMHO. I'm not willing to pay $$$ extra just because it's labelled "a Mac drive". It came with some PC/Mac software on the drive which I've backed up but not cared to try out as I already have backup software which works fine for me (Time Machine and Chronosync). The drive came pre-formatted NTFS (PC format), so I opened up Disk Utility and reformatted it again (MacOS extended (Journaled)) then set Time Machine to use it.
 
Last edited:
I can't find Seagate drives in local stores. They like to sell WD drives. I found Lacie drives (the silver ones). I guess they are probably the Design Mobile Drive. Any experience on this drive? Few years ago, Lacie products were quite good. Don't know recent years.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back