External hard drive suggestions...

[Shpigford]

I'm looking for suggestions on external hard drives. Ultimately I need something extremely reliable and am willing to pay more for that. I need something atleast 250GB.

What external drives have you found to be extremely reliable over a longer period of time?

[houltmac]

The argument continues... Everyone will have a different opinion on the matter and many people are very strong willed on the issue. Perhaps I will start with a few things I look for in a good external hard drive:

Reliability
Speed
Sleep/Wake timing
Size (although I use a mix of sizes as well as desktop and portable devices)
Volume (how loud the drive is)
Well made hard disk drives inside
Good service (warranty repairs)
Interface (I ALWAYS use FireWire)
Material/Construction

This is an off the top of my head list, but I believe that LaCie checks all these boxes. It's well worth paying for a well made drive and that's where LaCie has never let me down. The number of LaCie drives I have dropped that continue to work flawlessly is amazing (although I admit that it's as much the drive inside as the solid metal casings they generally use). I use many LaCie drives at home, it's all we use at work and all we supply to our clients. I won't bang on any longer but siffice to say I would never use anything else.

Check out LaCie.com for more info; personal recommendations are the d2, Porsche, Mobile Porsche and Mini stack.

[baseballboy828]

Lacie, Segate, and Maxtor's are my favorite. Seagate owns Maxtor, so they are basically the same things.

[asadeddin]

I own a 320 GB LaCie external HD and I love it. It's a great piece of hardware manufacturing and has never failed me. I've got the F.A.Porche: LaCie - Hard Drive, Design by F.A. Porsche - USB 2.0 . I would personally recommend this...

[lonnie]

I've got about a dozen of the F.A.Porche LaCie Hard Drives - from the smaller portable one to the mega 500GB one. All have worked for me.

[Raven]

Although I don't use them personally, I have to put in a good word for the LaCie Porsche ones, based on what I've seen at work. Even the most talented users generally have to work hard to break them.
Myself, though, I use a WD myBook with the triple interface.

[houltmac]

I don't know much about your needs, Josh, but I have some interesting news on a new drive.

I have been using LaCie Porsche Mobile drives for around 8 months now. I had my doubts about a bus powered, 2.5" drive... but damn these things are awesome. I bought my first one (80GB) for £120 which I thought was a bargain. I have since bought nearly every upgraded model for around the same price but a new height has been reached. You can now purchase the same drive with FireWire (viz. a useful bus) at a 250GB capacity (5400rpm) for £170!!! Bargain of the century.

I really love these little drives. They are durable, easy to use (viz. bus powered means a single cable) and light/small enough to carry in your pocket. I mainly use them as archive drives, storing *.dmg's, music, movies and the like on them. I also use one at work as a boot drive which has worked for days on end in all manner of Macs without issue (and it was pushed hard). Finally I also use one as a backup drive, so that works it out. Not a single problem as yet.

I can't say enough good things about drives I was so skeptical about. If the drive is ever going to move and 250GB really is enough then check them out. Really.

[djejrejk]

I have a 500gb WD My Book Pro and I love it. The big plus is the fw800 interface- I can transfer 100gb in under 20 minutes. It has also been very reliable, no problems after 6 months. The first on I got in i dropped, however, western digital replaced it no questions asked so customer service was great as well.

On top of all of that, the aluminum enclosure matches the MacBook Pro nicely. For the price, you cant beat it.

[Artec]

Do any of these HDs mentioned above
have both USB 2.0 and firewire?
(Need firewire for audio processing apps, heard it is better)

[houltmac]

@Artec: LaCie generally offer one of the following solutions:

• FireWire only
• USB2.0 only
• Both FireWire and USB2.0
• Multi-interface (previously Triple Interface Extreme, quad now available also)

I use TIE, Both or FireWire only as it is so much more reliable, faster (for long/large transfers), can pass through more power and is more far stable in it's transfer rates. Realistically, even if a drive has another port, I only use the FireWire.