[DM-MUG] External Firewire Drive

[Matthew W.]

On Jun 17, 2006, at 6:22 PM, James Corbett wrote:

> Good Evening,
>
>       I have a 500 GB Lacie external hard-drive on my firewire 800  
> that is heading south. I had this less than a year and I am  
> disappointed that it is failing, but what can you do. I want to see  
> what others are using so I can get a idea what I need to look for  
> when I get this replace which will be soon.

LaCie has spotty hard drive reliability lately (but not CD/DVD). I  
don't know if they got a bad run of drives, or parts to make the  
cases, but I still respect them highly. Have you called to complain?  
IMO, their support has been very good.

Just put a new drive in the old case and you'll probably be okay.  
Don't get less than a 3 yr. warranty on a drive. Most of the OEMs  
(LaCie, MacAlly, Fantom, etc.) include 1-year consumer-grade drives  
inside.

>
>      I mainly use this device to download audio and video pod-casts  
> and to save multimedia files/documents that I find on the net. I  
> would use my internal drive, but that will fill up very quickly,  
> since allot of pod-casts are in the 50 megabyte range. What luck  
> does others have on these drives and what is the manufacture. Thank  
> you so much for your input!

I've used OWC Mercury Elite cases from <http://www.owcomputing.com/>  
and found them to be very solid. I even used the incorrect DC adapter  
on one, and forever after that, the red LED lit. Otherwise, it  
performed perfectly. I've seen and recommended at least 30 of these.  
Never had a problem. I frequently buy my own drive with a 3-5 yr.  
warranty and put it in myself.

> James Corbett

Matthew