Some Iomega Hard Drive Questions

[thegoldenmackid]

Hello.

Looking to purchase another external hard drive. I was wondering what the difference between these two are:

Iomega 34451 2TB FireWire 800/FireWire 400/USB 2.0 UltraMax Pro Hard Drive

Iomega 34440 eSATA/FireWire 800/FireWire 400/USB 2.0 2TB UltraMax Plus Hard Drive

Just to clarify, I won't be using eSATA; so that sort of obvious difference is irrelevant.
Thanks.

 

[SchneiderMan]

they are almost the same.. you should get the first one without the esata then, it looks better too.
its a month newer then the other one, but the one with the esata is smaller in size..

 

[brop52]

Not a fan of the OWC Mercury Elite AL-Pro RAIDs? Unless it isn't exactly what you are looking for.

Those Iomega HDDs only have 8MB of cache according to their spec sheet.

OWCs give you the option of 32MB or 64MB cache along with building your own for a bit less with 32MB and a bit more for 64MB. You also have an option for enterprise-grade HDDs.

Plus, if you do build your own drives the enclosure itself is $109.99 without the extra software and $119.99 with the extra software. It can take 10,000 RPM HDDs if you really wanted them or 64MB cache HDDs. Though it is still cheaper to have them give you the ready built enclosure unless you can find 1TB HDDs at 32MB for less than $95 each to break even.

 

[thegoldenmackid]

How relevant is this going to be if it solely for back up? (Using iBackUp at night)

I understand there is a huge difference between the cache's, I would likely opt for the 64 version of the OWC since the price isn't any different, would there be any other 64 mb cache drives that would seem like a better option?

 

[brop52]

How relevant is this going to be if it solely for back up? (Using iBackUp at night)

I understand there is a huge difference between the cache's, I would likely opt for the 64 version of the OWC since the price isn't any different, would there be any other 64 mb cache drives that would seem like a better option?

I haven't seen that many around.

I'd worry mainly about price as the main concern just for backups. I was just suggesting the drives because they were the same price as what you were going to buy and probably more reliable. On the plus side, you can easily switch out drives down the road vs. the major brands where often times you are stuck with their drives and even have to order directly from them.

 

[thegoldenmackid]

I haven't seen that many around.

I'd worry mainly about price as the main concern just for backups. I was just suggesting the drives because they were the same price as what you were going to buy and probably more reliable. On the plus side, you can easily switch out drives down the road vs. the major brands where often times you are stuck with their drives and even have to order directly from them.

Yes. I had an OWC drive before it failed after 13 months, which was disappointing. I never got to try the support because that was two years ago and I needed more storage, but I definitely would consider buying from them again as they have extremely good reviews. Thank you for all of your help; I'll post a "laymens" review of the Iomega drive after playing around with it for a while.