Firewire hard drive. Which one?

P

Pennywise

Registered
Hi,

I am looking for a firewire hard drive.
Criteria: Fast and quiet and, if possible, a nice design!
A small problem is that I live in the Netherlands and not all drives are available here.
I found some drives that are available in the Netherlands:

-LaCie Studiodrive,
-LaCie Studiodrive d2,
-Western Digital firewire hard drive,
-Iomega hdd (coming out soon),
-EZQuest Cobra hard drive.

I heard that the LaCie Studiodrive is noisy so that one is out of the race, I do not know about the others. The LaCie d2 and the EZQuest are very quiet and the EZQuest seems to be fast to.

Which one to choose? Does anyone know which drive is the best?
I use a iMac G4 with Mac OS X (10.1.5)
 
Why don't you just get an iPod? It can double as a MP3 music player AND as your FireWire hard drive.

It is kind of expensive, but if you don't need too much capacity (up to 20 gigs), you might want to consider that option. It definitely is fast, quiet, and has a nice design. :D
 
As much as I love the iPod, it is not much use for me with 20GB. :)
I need a disk with 80GB or 120GB. I will use it for video, mp3, documents.
 
there are two problems I've heard of with using the iPod continuously as an external HD:
I have heard unconfirmed rumors that the Toshiba internal HD isn't designed for continuous access (i.e. reading/writing huge files all day all the time) as opposed to sporadic bursts of copying small files like iTunes does MP3's.
Secondly, (and this IS true if this guys benchmarks are correct), the iPod is quite slow as this type of drive when compared with exclusive external FireWire HDs. I think read this at www.xlr8yourmac.com, but I can't quite remember...
Anyway, sorry I can't help you more, but I don't especially recommend getting an iPod as an external HD... although they are really nice... :)
 
Out of the drives you listed the EZQuest drive is probably the best. I have used one for the past few months as storage for my 200 page catalog and it's never failed me. However, I have read stories of people using firewire drives for video and high-intensity applications such as that and they have had some problems--but these may just be isolated cases. Treat the drive as an addition, not dependable storage space. EZQuest seems to have the most responsive tech support should you run into any problems.
 
Does anyone have experience or and opinion on the GVP External FireWire? I've been strongly considering this one.

Specs:

Hard Drive capacity 80
Hard Drive measurement unit GB
Average Access 30
Spindle Speed (RPM) 7200
Hard Drive interface type FireWire (IEEE-1394)
Form factor external
Linux Compatible No
Money Back Guarantee 30 days
Parts, Duration 1 year
Labor, Duration 1 year
Package Contents GVP Hard Drive, User Manual, Software CD, Interface Cable, External AC Adapter

Picture attached (it matches nicely with the snowy new macs). MacMall link.

Any thoughts?


d8n_two
 

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In short, I would say that the drive with the best customer support wins. Before you buy, call the company first and find out how easy it is to get in touch with a real live human being. I am still waiting to hear back from Que about my two burnt out firewire drives (10GB and 120GB)...
 
Don't forget to look for a drive that uses the Oxford 911 chipset that is, supposedly, much faster than the generic stuff that Maxtor and some others still use.

-Rob
 
Everyone thank you for the advise.
I decided to go with the 80GB EZQuest drive.

The white drive from Macmall was very nice too, but I live in the Netherlands and do not have a credit card so I could not order it.

Now I am waiting for my EZQ hdd to arrive. :)
 
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