I would have to agree with harrismon. I built my own external HD using a Maxtor 120GB IDE HD and a external enclosure that I bought off newegg and I tend to have some problems with it. My next hard drive is going to be either lacie or a g-tech
I got myself a MacMini a couple week ago, and I'm quickly realizing that 80 Gb is simply not enough for disk space.
Can anybody recommend an external harddrive or a harddrive/enclosure combo that plays nice with Mac and firewire?
Dont take this personally, but i am guessing that you want something cheap, as did i when i bought a 200g fantom external hard drive for only $149. Check sites like www.ecost.com and www.macwarehouse.com
I'd recommend building your own using an enclosure with a bridgeboard included. Look for one with an Oxford bridgeboard, maybe go to http://www.barefeats.com as Rob Morgan has done some great work comparing them.
You might want to get an enclosure with 2 bays and use them in a RAID-0 via OS X, since you already have a boot drive.
I use an awesome enclosure that Rosewill makes. It matches the G5/Powerbook/Macwhatever lineup very nicely and is only about 50 bucks for the firewire 400/usb 2 version. It is based on the Oxford 911 chipset and runs very cool. I have a Maxtor 250 gig drive in it and it works great. Here is a link to it:
I have a 160GB lacie d2 extreme (has a firewire 800 interface, along with the usual 400), it looks good and has always performed well IME. If you're on a tight budget its better to look at enclosures and cheap IDE disks - especially as the mac mini doesn't have the 800 port.
I'm not having a great run with external power supplies (pain in the a*se) and need the external to really work hard (photoshop scratch + render disk etc). Everything points to needing a solid power supply which is something you don't always get with cheaper cases. I'm going to recase a 120GB Seagate which can get really hot (surprized me) and that rules out fanless options ? so I want TWO fans in a 3.5' case!!
The granite digital cases seem to answer most problems needed in a workhorse case + you get a high quality cable too! The other option would be a RAID (two disk) but at the moment I just need a solid and reliable performer. My only other selection criteria was how quickly you can switch another drive in for back-up ? again the granite looks good here.
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I just got the ComboGB a few weeks ago. It's got FW 400, 800 and USB2.
A little pricey, but it's fast, tiny and beautiful.
Originally posted by JavaCowboy
I got myself a MacMini a couple week ago, and I'm quickly realizing that 80 Gb is simply not enough for disk space.
Can anybody recommend an external harddrive or a harddrive/enclosure combo that plays nice with Mac and firewire?
Dont take this personally, but i am guessing that you want something cheap, as did i when i bought a 200g fantom external hard drive for only $149. Check sites like www.ecost.com and www.macwarehouse.com
You might want to get an enclosure with 2 bays and use them in a RAID-0 via OS X, since you already have a boot drive.
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...173-003&depa=0
http://www.granitedigital.com/catalo...decasekits.htm
I'm not having a great run with external power supplies (pain in the a*se) and need the external to really work hard (photoshop scratch + render disk etc). Everything points to needing a solid power supply which is something you don't always get with cheaper cases. I'm going to recase a 120GB Seagate which can get really hot (surprized me) and that rules out fanless options ? so I want TWO fans in a 3.5' case!!
The granite digital cases seem to answer most problems needed in a workhorse case + you get a high quality cable too! The other option would be a RAID (two disk) but at the moment I just need a solid and reliable performer. My only other selection criteria was how quickly you can switch another drive in for back-up ? again the granite looks good here.
Originally posted by bicubic
I'm looking at the 3.5" Granite cases with dual fans and built-in power supply as shown here...
Must be noisy...