Well Im looking for a new external hard drive for my notebook. What I am planning on doing is having a 100-120gb hard drive for backing up my 100gb notebook. Then having another 200-300gb hard drive for random stuff. Should be firewire or usb, or both. I looked at the lacie drives (nice design) but heard that they are not that reliable. What brands are more reliable? Thanks!

 

I used to think Seagate was the way to go, but ever since I learned how they were made, not anymore. They use a layer of foam right underneath the disk to help quieten the disk. Well, what do you think that would do as far as heat is concerned? Sure, they're great drives, but just my second choice now.

This is gonna sound weird because of the other recent external hard drive thread, but I'd go Maxtor. Actually, you can probably find the best deal on eBay, because most businesses there will use a 3rd party enclosure with a name brand drive. Works just like any other external drive, and probably 3 times cheaper.

 

Yea I have a maxtor drive now, Its worked fine. Any more suggestions as far as Lacie and seagate, or any other companies?

 

Dibble,
After receiving the support I did over the last few days, I would vote Maxtor. The problems I experienced were CPU-specific, not the drive. I spoke with three different techs - each of whom were very willing to help. The last tech, a lady, spent close to two hours on the phone with me on two different calls to figure my computer out. The drive now functions as it should.

The most refreshing part was that the people I spoke with were based in Longmont, Colorado - not India, etc. Oddly enough, I passed through Longmont on three or four occasions this past weekend since I was in Boulder for my sister's wedding!

Andreas

 

I have an IOGear 320GB that has been great. It has 3 one touch buttons for various backup schemes using the Retrospect software (good backup software) It has USB and firewire connections.



I bought a linksys device for putting this drive on my network, but I haven't been able to get that piece to work. In light of this, I'm probably going to pick up another one of these for my wifes PC.

 

Thanks for the suggestions, I think i will go the Maxtor route, I like the design and reliabililty of their drives, and nothing beats easy to understand tech support! I went on newegg.com and found some great prices on hard drives.

 

I really dig my Seagate 200 GB USB/Firewire one.
http://www.seagate.com/products/reta...al/usbfirewire





Have not had one problemo with it.
I use it to back up the whole C drive automatically once a week, and also to PRV my TV shows to it for later playback.

 

I saw that one, looks good, but isn't it large (size wise, dimensions, lol, you know what I mean) The Maxtor is a lot smaller. Maybe the Seagate has more cushioning? I took apart my Maxtor hard drive case once and there is hardly any cushioning, its metal of the hard drive bracket against metal of the actual case. Cool that the Seagate has multiple connection options though.

 

corey, i have the exact same seagate, it was on sale at best buy so i got it for $150, once again, no probs with it.

 

dibble,
Some of the Maxtor OneTouch II drives have both USB & Firewire, while others, like mine, are simply USB. Works great, looks great, and is assembled in the US!

Andreas

 

anyone here use lacie drives? they really look great and are small. another question: My notebook has a 5400 rpm hard drive, will there be any performance difference between a 5400 rpm and a 7200 rpm external drive since the internal is slow? the portable drives (take up less desk space) use slower notebook drives.

 

I work for a home builder. I draw the house plans on my system, and take care of the other computers. We have 4 computers in the offce. We were running a RAID on my system with Maxtor drives and they failed after 2 years. I am not impressed.

I now have an external drive to back up all the systems, it is a Western Digital.
No complaints.

 

Hitachi makes 7200 rpm internal notebook drives now. It would be a smart upgrade.

 

I second that. Slow drives can be a pretty big bottleneck in a laptop's performance.

 

i have the seagate as well. its not as big as you think, 6 inches long and 2 inches thick

 

This IOGear one (320Gb) is on sale at Buy.com for $199 after rebate.

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.as...70&dcaid=17070

 

I was just cleaning out my subscribed threads and saw this one that I started. I found another external hard drive that I thought some of you would be interested in. Soon I will be purchasing a G-Tech drive, they match the apple look really well, and they have multiple connection options. Right now its either the G-Tech mini, or the desktop size. Even though the desktop one is faster, I will probably get the mini since it does not need a power supply. It really doesnt have to be that fast, just for backup reasons.

I will report back after I have been using it for a while.

http://www.g-technology.com/Products/G-DRIVE.cfm