Help choosing external hard drive

7 replies [Last post]
Junette
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Joined: Nov 17 2000

Hi,

I am currently hard drive shopping and my head is starting to spin a little from all the information that I am trying to absord. I can't decide what to buy so any advice or suggestions would be very much appreciated as I don't know much about hard drives...

I am using an Acer Aspire 1705SMi P4 3GHz with 120BG internal drive, with 2 firewire (400) ports and at least 1 USB2 (I'm not sure if all of them are USB2 or not).

I am looking to buy an exernal hard drive, at least 250GB for storage and for DV capture & editing. From what I've been reading I understand that it is possible to capture to an external drive using firewire and to work directly from it when editing.

My problem is that from reading posts on this site & elsewhere it seems that many drives are unreliable & people are reporting various problems and failures with different drives. It looks to me like the best options for digital video are Lacie, Maxtor & Western Digital drives but I don't know which direction to turn. I am concerned about drive failure, instability, overheating & inadequate performance when capturing & editing.

As I said, and help/advice/pointers would be very much apreciated.

Regards,
Junette

harlequin
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Joined: Aug 16 2000

All of the answers are personal .... they work for me

1. firewire over usb for capturing dv footage to
2. connect firewire drive to one firewire connector , connect camera to a different connector where possible.

Gary MacKenzie

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robo
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Joined: Aug 15 2000

Just bought a Lacie D2 160gb firewire/usb drive and so far am impressed. It came with software and every conceivable lead required(including a continental power plug). Easy to set up, athough I did need to buy an extra lead to daisy chain to Sony 300 deck. The only thing to watch for is the fact that it's 'future proofed' ie the firewire ports are 800 not 400 ( not to worry as they are backward compatible with 400 units) Leads are avaiable for 800 to 4 pin firewire.
I captured a 50 minute section of tape daisy chained from the Sony to the drive using my Acer 1362 Sempron laptop with Edius 2.5 with no apparent droped frames (I'm still working on the section but so far it all seems ok) Access to the data on the drive seems fast enough so far as editing is concerned. I've yet to export to mpeg for DVD.
The only thing I have to say is that the number of power leads would seem to make the words 'mobile laptop' a little far fetched!!

robo

robo
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Joined: Aug 15 2000

Sorry, just to clarify. There is a 6 pin 400 firewire conection as well as the USB but the other two conections are both 9 pin 800 firewire.

robo

Alan Roberts
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Joined: May 3 1999

Where did you get the 800-400 cable from? I could do with one as well. I use a 250G LaCie via USB2, camera on firewire, not dropped a frame so far, but I'd rather use the firewire ports.

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blah45
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Joined: Apr 23 2006

look into gettin accom data hardrives
they are nice looking
and circuit city or one of those stores always has sales on them
i bought a 40gig from them for like 60 bucks
and a 160 from them for 120 maybe

they have 2 firewire ports and a usb
they make no noise also
and i have kept them on and in use for a week straght

robo
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Joined: Aug 15 2000

Alan,9 pin to 4pin firewire cable from directusbstore.co.uk £7.99 including postage.

robo

Mark M
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Joined: Nov 17 1999

In my experience the two important things about external hard drives are:

1. The chipset that does the translation from the external input to the hard-drive
2. The manufacturer of the Hard Drive.

I favour the Oxford and Initio chipsest over all others, and have lost too much data to Prolific chipsets.
My friend whose business is data recovery from failed hard drives rates Seagate (esp the 120gb and 300gb models) head and shoulders above the rest in terms of reliability, and Maxtor somewhere down the bottom. He gets a lot of failed Maxtors from external HDDs and reckons that Maxtor have not got the cooling sorted out in their external cases.

You can get whatever combination suits your needs from span.com who are also head and shoulders above the rest. Give them a ring and chat through your requirements. They are very nice people indeed. I am no relation, merely an often satisfied customer!

Mark

Who has just bought his own 300GB External HDD from Span.

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