External HDD will do?

D

DarkSorrow

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Based on this http://macosx.com/forums/hardware-peripherals/295892-hdd-i-o-error.html

im off hunting buying a new HDD, so i would like to have your opinion. i planning on buying a internal HDD and HDD enclosure, but realized it will be more expensive if i buy them both and then decided to buy a external HDD which more cheaper. so been surfing around Newegg.com, hoping i can find some 200GB HDD but it rare to find it, only most avaiable and my budget is 160GB external HDD.

All i want is just use for daily use. i boot up to XP and use my external HDD for gaming, my 20GB Boot Camp partition wont handle space like Hellgate: London, Rise of Legends, Supreme Commander, The Orange Box. Which the reason why i need to use external HDD to handle those, it handle just fine on my previous HDD enclosure. I want to have it stay on FAT32 (i could use MacFuse for NTFS but after reading how it work, too much work) and have it OSX and XP support as well, i dont need those bells and whistle one-touch backup feature. just treat it like a internal HDD. So been looking and found a few and want your opinion about it. i want it to keep it long lasting as it can. and have the USB 2.0 or Firewire 400, and preferable to have it own power supply because if it run through USB-powered, it will affect its speed (i read a few article about it, it said best to have it own power supply if you want a top speed)

And less than 100 bucks as well (i dont care about the taxes, just the product itself)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822101007

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822101026

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822161032

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822218001



Your help will be great. if there is other product that you want to suggest, im open to it
 
I would recommend this drive:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3206376&CatId=2423

It'd be at the high-end of your price range, but it is made by Western Digital which means it is reliable, and has good support. I have used many of their drives, without incident. I have replaced one external HDD from them (probably broken by plugging in the wrong power adapter), and it was a breeze. It also has a Firewire interface, which I find to be faster than USB 2.0, but you can decide that for yourself, as it has both interfaces. Firewire will defiantly be faster for large amounts of data transfer - like video editing, file transfer, etc.

It's also 320 GB.

It's refurbished, so you may have to hurry. WD has reliable refurbished drives (if not, see customer support for replacement). Full warranty is included.
 
BootCamp, currently, does not support external harddrives AFAIK. Haven't tried BootCamp 2.0 in Leopard, though.
 
fryke said:
BootCamp, currently, does not support external harddrives AFAIK. Haven't tried BootCamp 2.0 in Leopard, though.
Click to expand...


you sure? i have no problem with my HDD enclosure through USB or Firewire without a problem.

i am using 1.4 beta Boot Camp. just plug it in and it will see as a partition and mount it automatically. Maybe it because im using HDD enclosure, not HDD external?

honestly, there is no difference between HDD enclosure and HDD external. Boot Camp will not notice the different, they just see if there a partition and will load that partition automatically. Sure in human eye, there a difference, but in CPU?
 
eric2006 said:
Seems that some have had success:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=2292040&postcount=14

However, it looks like they are using a FW drive, and I don't know if a USB drive will work (I believe that OS X will only boot from FW external drives).
Click to expand...

that thread is entirely based on installing/booting XP through external drive. And that not what i am using a new external drive for

Im not sure if my first post is confusing. i already have 20GB Xp partition on my Macbook Pro in internal drive (80GB). i will be using External Drive for storing things and program files.



after a long read a interesting thread about that. they said you cannot boot a external Firewire Disk, but can boot through USB. If you look at post #74, that poster said just format the partition as FAT32 through Disk Utility, then reboot it by have the XP installation CD in the drive, then during the installation process begin, it will ask you which want you want, keep the FAT32 partition or convert it to NTFS, then it will work because there is no limitation for NTFS while FAT32 have 4GB file transfer limitation which will affect the installation. but if you boot using external drive, you face limitation playing game or using intensive software, the limitation is there is no paging file in external drive. the XP will see it as external drive but forbid put paging file on it, which you need equal or more than 2GB RAM to act like a paging file.

one thing confused me, some said OEM XP wont work in BootCamp, but i am using OEM XP (from Frys store) and it run just fine on Boot Camp. Even Apple clearly said in their website and their Agreement said OEM cannot work in Boot Camp, but there is no word saying "you not allow". but i dont understand why Apple said it wont work. i reinstalled XP two times. first time using 1.2 Boot Camp, the second time using 1.4 Boot Camp, and it work flawlessly, the reason why i reinstall the second time because the first time, some .sys file went missing during booting and i cant repair it which cause me to reinstall it the second time. this happen few months later after the first installation. Maybe it depends on which OEM, if it Dell, HP or any computer branding OEM, it wont work. but Store brand, it will work since mine is from Frys Store
 
I don't see why bootcamp will have trouble seeing the external drive - it has drivers for Firewire/USB, you just need to install the Windows drivers for the external HDD.

If you are concerned about the FAT/NTFS issue, you could make a NTFS partition for Windows, and a FAT partition for sharing. MacFUSE will also work. OS X can read NTFS without help, also.
 
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