[Will2]

Hi,

I have a 2006 iMac with a 230GB internal hard drive that is now too small to house my music library as well so I'm running iTunes with my 1GB Time Capsule as the preferred folder location (I hope that isn't unwise).  I really should have a backup for my music and I'm thinking an external drive would be best for that.  Is that a mistake?  If not, can someone point me to an external drive that would serve this purpose well?

Cheers
Will

[Niteshade]

I have had very good luck with my 250gb WD MyBook and a 250gb Maxtor. Actually, I have a very old Maxtor that's STILL works 100%!

When the drives are not used, they are unplugged from the computer. This really adds allot  to their life. Mine are used for archiving only.

[Pez]

I have never met a hard drive that was truly more reliable than another one.  I have a seagate currently and it seems to be pretty good, but there's always the chance for failure. My take is just get one that isn't obviously a piece of junk cheapy.  I have used everything from western digital to fujitsu to Lacie and they are all prone to failure.

[K Shep]

I have a Mac Mini and iOmega makes an external that has the same footprint (sits beneath my Mac Mini).  I have had great results with the setup.  Amazon is a great source for external harddrives:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_0_6?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=iomega+external+hard+drive&sprefix=iomega

My suggestion is to utilize a Firewire connection from you computer to the external.  I am not a "computer guy", but we do have many here on AC that should be able to expand on my answer.

Kirk

[K Shep]

Pez brings up a good point.  I am about to purchase another external to backup my music files. 

Kirk

[Pez]

Firewire 800 is the way to go, unless you're like me and are running programs off the external drive you may benifit from using eSata which is 3.0 gbps.  The equivelant of having a second internal drive as far as speed is concerned. 

I should have elaborated a bit on what I do for drives. I have my time machine backup going to the Seagate (the eSata setup one) that is constantly plugged into my computer. Then I have what I call a "doomsday drive" one that I use to back up mine and my wifes that I ONLY plug in to back up. I do this (or try to do this if I remember) once a month.  Time machine runs constantly.

[Crimson]

I use a few of the On-The-Go and Mercury firewire solutions from OWC (Macsales). Pretty robust and haven't had a failure yet.

[Will2]

Thanks guys.  Just ordered a Mercury Elite AL-pro from OWC.  My wife is going to be in NY for the weekend so she can bring it back to Bermuda for me Monday and I can get it set up - hopefully before my Time capsule packs up  .

Cheers
Will 

[Toka]

Thanks guys.  Just ordered a Mercury Elite AL-pro from OWC.  My wife is going to be in NY for the weekend so she can bring it back to Bermuda for me Monday and I can get it set up - hopefully before my Time capsule packs up

Good pickup, I was going to recommend the same thing. All the connection options you could need and its worked without a hiccup since I've purchased one (just under one year so far). Great company/service too.

[ecramer]

Is there an advantage to an external hardrive rather then just plopping a esata drive in this big ol case i got siting here. I also am starting to look because my HD is very nearly full

Ed

[adydula]

Hello,

Well for once I will say I know something and its hard drives!! I do this for a living..and most hard drives of ok fine...I use many, and I mean many...I would go for the esata connection first if your pc or system has an esata port.

If not then firewire 800.

Drives can last a long time but there are always exceptions. I just had a reputeable 1.5 TB USB external die in 28 days of working and in the middle of a 100gb file copy...the heads crashed and made wonderful noise!!

Drives are relativly cheap.

I backup up gb's of data to several drives, internal and external. My insurance is one of these drives will survive. Having drives internal makes things easy to use but they give off a lot of heat.

You can get a really neat External adapter that you can plug in a sata drive connect to your system via usb or eSata. This way you can backup up to one or more physical drives and store them away and once a month plug them in to get the disk spinning etc....

Link: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817153071

I have 4 drives with the same data on all 4 and have them stored away. I plug them in once a month just to spin them up.

I also have my pc running RAID 5 (three drives) with the same data stripped across them.

Running an external drive is better than one main drive but a third is that much better.

Also before you buy, you may want to check the vendors website to see if they have any firmware updates, Seagate and others have had issues with the newer large sized drives with loosing data, drives that cant be accessed etc....

Food for thought...

All the best
Alex

[bunnyma357]

I've had good luck with OWC drives, I'm also using one of their On-The-Go drives (FW800).

The only drives I've had consistent problems with are LaCie, the drives themselves are fine, but the power supplies fail at an extremely high rate.

No matter what you get, just always remember that all drives will fail eventually, so prepare as best you can.

Jim C