Quiet + Reliable 2.5" HD

[Onizuka]

Hi all!
I'm thinking of turning my old clamshell iBook 366 in a file/webserver, so I need to change it's old 5.5 Gb HD into a bigger one... it would be on 24x7 so I'd go for a silent and reliable disk and don't need great performance.

What kind/brand of HD would you advice to choose?
Would it be better an external boxed 3.5"?

Thank you in advance!
Onizuka

[Zammy-Sam]

I would surely pick an external 3.5 disk if you have a firewire plug on your ibook. There are some reasons:
- 3.5 drives are cheaper
- 3.5 drives can go up to 400gb (2.5 just 100gb)
- no need to open your ibook
- If there are some troubles with your ibook or your network, you could very easily access your files on your external disk

[Onizuka]

Unfortunately I only got Usb 1.0, the older clamshells had no firewire... anyway a 3.5 drive with usb 2.0 could still do a good job.

Thank you!
Onizuka

[Viro]

I second what Zammy has said. I don't know how reliable laptop drives are, but I imagine they aren't going to be much better than desktops. Which is probably not too good, if you're running a server 24/7 .

Go for an external drive so it's easier to swap if the drive goes bad.

[Zammy-Sam]

USB 1.0 is a very tight bottleneck for a fileserver. Max 1mb/s will make you avoid any kind of storage. But how does your network look like? If you are using your fileserver on a wifi network, it might be ok.
Remember this: a 100gb 2.5'' drive will cost around 150€. A 3.5'' 120gb drive only 60€. That's 90€ difference! For that money you could get yourself a network fileserver box for 3.5'' drives (I guess) and use your ibook as a regular computer and not a fileserver.

[Onizuka]

Originally Posted by Zammy-Sam

USB 1.0 is a very tight bottleneck for a fileserver. Max 1mb/s will make you avoid any kind of storage. But how does your network look like? If you are using your fileserver on a wifi network, it might be ok.
Remember this: a 100gb 2.5'' drive will cost around 150€. A 3.5'' 120gb drive only 60€. That's 90€ difference! For that money you could get yourself a network fileserver box for 3.5'' drives (I guess) and use your ibook as a regular computer and not a fileserver.

The biggest bottleneck is my adsl upstream band 352Kb/s as the fileserver is ment to host my website and a couple of photo/videos I share with friends.
The fileserver box could be a good work around to avoid the usb 1.0.
I choose the ibook due to low power, silence (fanless) and too slow for real use.

Thank you
Onizuka

[Onizuka]

Originally Posted by Viro

I second what Zammy has said. I don't know how reliable laptop drives are, but I imagine they aren't going to be much better than desktops. Which is probably not too good, if you're running a server 24/7 .

Go for an external drive so it's easier to swap if the drive goes bad.

Ok for the external, maybe through a fileserver box...

Thanks
Onizuka