Suggestions on FW drives

jassdjassd
Posted:
in Current Mac Hardware edited January 2014
I intend to buy an external firewire drive . It will be used mainly as a backup device for my G5 160 GB.



1. Have the problems with firewire drives and Panther been resolved?



2. Looking for suggestions as to manufacture?s - LaCie ? Western Digital etc.



3. Any glaring differences in warrantees amongst mfg?s ?



4. Any known reliability problems with FW800 as opposed to FW400 ?



5. Will backup compression/decompression result in any deterioration to photo or music files or should I just stick to carbon copy ?





Assuming it will take a while for me to fill this backup device, I would consider using part of the drive for ?scratch space? while editing and rendering Final Cut Express projects. This leads to more questions.



6. Will an external FW device speed up or slow down the rendering process. II have read that a 2nd drive speeds the process through less ?head contention? but will the FW connection obviate this advantage.



7. If so, will FW 800 also obviate?

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 9
    bungebunge Posts: 7,329member
    A second internal might be cheaper and better, but an external FW will be fine for your needs.



    The one warning I'll give on any second harddrive is that if it's not used very often you should let it go to sleep so it's not in constant motion. But if you let it sleep it takes a few seconds to wake up. That means if you need to access it there's a pause before it's accessible.



    Other than that you should be good with anything. If you're worried about the problems Panther had, just get an external with the Oxford 911 chipset, I believe it's the 912 that had/has the problem. Actually, I just don't know if it's been fixed yet.



    Just an aside. If you don't like a mess of wires but still don't want an internal drive, there are some full size/full speed FW drives that are powered off of the firewire cable. That's kind of cool.
  • Reply 2 of 9
    ipodandimacipodandimac Posts: 3,273member
    i have a 320GB external FW400 Lacie. its perfect.
  • Reply 3 of 9
    mattjohndrowmattjohndrow Posts: 1,618member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by ipodandimac

    i have a 320GB external FW400 Lacie. its perfect.



    I have a 250 GB Lacie, it works fine
  • Reply 4 of 9
    composercomposer Posts: 212member
    Only had one (now solved) problem with my LaCie 80GB.



    LaCie makes really good and quiet drives. Favorites of mac users everywhere.



    Maxtor also makes good, reliable drives.



    Western Digital makes FW drives, but I've had bad experiences with them. Although they may work just fine now.



    There's tons of others, but for my money, I like LaCie the best.
  • Reply 5 of 9
    mattjohndrowmattjohndrow Posts: 1,618member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Composer

    Only had one (now solved) problem with my LaCie 80GB.



    LaCie makes really good and quiet drives. Favorites of mac users everywhere.



    Maxtor also makes good, reliable drives.



    Western Digital makes FW drives, but I've had bad experiences with them. Although they may work just fine now.



    There's tons of others, but for my money, I like LaCie the best.



    i would have to agree, i have also had problems with WD, had a FW Drive that just died, and they wouldn't give me any support.

    LaCies are the best, in my opinion
  • Reply 6 of 9
    dawgfatherdawgfather Posts: 40member
    I have an AcomData and have had no issues with it ever. I know a lot of people love LaCie, but like Macs they tend to cost a few dollars more. I'm assuming you pay for what you get though, but my AcomData has worked flawless for 3 years now. It's an older 80gb



    I'd have to agree many people tend to complain about WD drives internal and external.
  • Reply 7 of 9
    altivec_2.0altivec_2.0 Posts: 995member
    I really like the HD's from www.macsales.com
  • Reply 8 of 9
    leonisleonis Posts: 3,427member
    Lots of people in the Apple forum have problems with the 2nd internal hard drive dying in one month (due to heat issue maybe).



    Same thing happened to me two days ago. The 2nd hard drive I put in myself died in tragic death. The drive whined so loud like a jet plane engine and everyone in the house came to me and ask what was going on. Then the machine hard froze.....and the machine couldn't boot at all. I had no choice but to take it out. When I took the drive out it was so hot, so fu(king hot like a cookie tray straight from the oven



    The replacement unit is coming but I am not going to put it into the tower. I will just sell the replacement unit and get an external drive.



    I love building my own external drives using the DIY case and the drive I like. It usually is cheaper than buying a brand name one.
  • Reply 9 of 9
    digitalandresdigitalandres Posts: 115member
    I really need a backup for my 40G iMac, so I'm about to order a 160G Firewire External LaCie from Macmall for $219. It's comparable to other prices/HD's I've seen, so I suppose it's a good deal?
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