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Help with deciding between these hard drives?

10254 Views 65 Replies 16 Participants Last post by  spiralgirl, 
spiralgirl
Hi,

I posted awhile back about getting a hard drive and I'm still wanting one and found two at Future Shop that look interesting.

My iMac is a 17' 2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 1 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM

Here are the links:

the first is a 500 GB
http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pr...angid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10087571&catid=23795

the second one is another Seagate one 500 GB
http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pr...angid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10087564&catid=23795

this is a Seagate 750GB one
http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pr...angid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10087567&catid=23795

this one is a Comstar which says PC/Mac but to the right just says PC, it's 1000GB
http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/proddetail.asp?logon=&langid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10091162&catid=

another cheap Comstar at 500GB but again it lists PC/Mac but looks like it's for PC http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pr...angid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10080571&catid=23795

I know that both are USB and not firewire which means I can't add on another drive right?

S.
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T
I bought the 500GB Comstar earlier this week, works perfectly fine with a 1.83GHz Macbook and an old G3 iBook (USB 1.1).

You can add up to 127 USB devices (such as hard drives) to any USB bus, so adding drives shouldn't be an issue for you. You might be thinking of daisy-chaining hard drives, typical with FireWire drives as they usually have two FW ports on the enclosure.
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spiralgirl
Theseus,

Good to know. Thanks. A friend of mine who was a PC user all his life just got a new Macbook Pro and is using his Comstar external drive with it as well.

S.
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Paddy
The Seagates have 5 year warranties...the Comstar only 1 year warranties. No idea what Comstar have put inside (they're not a drive manufacturer)

These people aren't too happy with them:

Is Comstar hard drive any good? - Virtual Dr Forums-Computer Tech Support
Comstar 250GB 3.5" External Hard Drive $157 after PM - RedFlagDeals.com Forums

I'm somewhat partial to Seagates - and usually assemble external drives myself, because until recently, you couldn't buy an external drive already assembled that had anything more than a 2-year warranty. Good to see that Seagate is now offering that on their externals. :)

Of course, it is possible that Comstar have put a Seagate drive in that enclosure, but you have no way of knowing until you get it home and open it up to have a look. I somehow doubt FutureShop would let you do that in the store! And even if it IS a Seagate drive in there, it probably doesn't have the typical 5-year Seagate warranty.

How about one of these:

Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500GB 7200 16MB ATA-100 EIDE OEM Hard Drive with Ultra Mini Portable USB 2.0 Firewire External Hard Drive Enclosure in Canada at TigerDirect.ca (warranty on drive applies - 5 years)
See less See more
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krs
I see Tiger Direct is still trying to get rid of these crappy plastic Ultra enclosures. They must have bought a ton on of them.
I find these 500 GB drives listed in this thread rather expensive. If you're happy with just USB 2.0, there is a Porsche USB 2.0 500 GB external coming up for $108.00 at Future Shop according to this:
Comp - LaCie 500GB USB 2.0 FA Porsche Design External HD 107.99 @ Weekend FS F&F - RedFlagDeals.com Forums

My current price target is $100 for a 500 GB drive (preferably SATA) and $20 for a USB or $40 for a USB/Firewire aluminum enclosure.
It's just hard to find a Firewire enclosure for a SATA drive at a reasonable cost.
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spiralgirl
Paddy,

The one you suggested looked great and the price was good but then I read krs's reply so now am doubtful.

Why is Firewire the best way to go anyway? I just want something affordable that is reasonable good and is local so I can go and buy it and not pay for shipping and not have to go out and buy and enclosure or some other part. I'm a newbie at external hard drives so want something easy but good.

S.
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meall
spiralgirl said:
Paddy,

The one you suggested looked great and the price was good but then I read krs's reply so now am doubtful.

Why is Firewire the best way to go anyway? I just want something affordable that is reasonable good and is local so I can go and buy it and not pay for shipping and not have to go out and buy and enclosure or some other part. I'm a newbie at external hard drives so want something easy but good.

S.
Click to expand...
If you do video, firewire will be much better. That because (very high level) firewire transfert data in a stream while USB transfert data in burst. For video you need continuous stream. For all other tasks, USB drive can do very well.
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CanadaRAM
In real world use (yes, I benchmarked it myself) Firewire 400 is almost exactly twice as fast as USB 2.0. Also, Firewire puts less of a load on your CPU, so you don't have as much of a slowdown effect while you are doing transfers.
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H
meall said:
If you do video, firewire will be much better. That because (very high level) firewire transfert data in a stream while USB transfert data in burst. For video you need continuous stream. For all other tasks, USB drive can do very well.
Click to expand...
You are right, USB is not consistent in speed, firewire 400 could outperform USB 2.0 at certain points. The consistancy is really important though for videos.

Also I've always noticed that Futureshop tends to be more expensive.
A local shop in ottawa sells Seagate 500GB ones starting at $172 to $225. The local shop has $225 includes USB 2.0, Firewire 400, and eSATA, whereas futureshop doesn't mention firewire and for $300
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B
Costco has/had the Mybook 500GB usb/Firewire external for $179, That's a heluva price. I believe that's a Seagate make.
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CanadaRAM
Bolor said:
Costco has/had the Mybook 500GB usb/Firewire external for $179, That's a heluva price. I believe that's a Seagate make.
Click to expand...
No it is Western Digital
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spiralgirl
krs said:
I see Tiger Direct is still trying to get rid of these crappy plastic Ultra enclosures. They must have bought a ton on of them.
I find these 500 GB drives listed in this thread rather expensive. If you're happy with just USB 2.0, there is a Porsche USB 2.0 500 GB external coming up for $108.00 at Future Shop according to this:
Comp - LaCie 500GB USB 2.0 FA Porsche Design External HD 107.99 @ Weekend FS F&F
Click to expand...


krs,

Glad you posted about the Tiger Direct one and I'm leary of ordering something and having it delivered and then I'm not happy with it. With something local where I can go and pick it up I can always return it.

I can wait for the other one coming up if you think it's a better deal. Although in another post I started LaCie wasn't a good brand to go with. As I read other posts though I'm seeing Firewire is good for videos. Does that mean for downloading videos or for watching them?

S.
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spiralgirl
meall,

Thanks for the advice.

S.
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H
spiralgirl said:
I can wait for the other one coming up if you think it's a better deal. Although in another post I started LaCie wasn't a good brand to go with. As I read other posts though I'm seeing Firewire is good for videos. Does that mean for downloading videos or for watching them?

S.
Click to expand...
That depends on what you mean by downloading, I don't think we have internet that fast yet. Watching, well that depends again on the video, it's raw video files then yes.
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M
Even better, IN STORE, this drive is selling for $159.00.

My son bought one yesterday, and they are selling at this price, in store at Costco, until Sunday 19th. And it is indeed WD.

Bolor said:
Costco has/had the Mybook 500GB usb/Firewire external for $179, That's a heluva price. I believe that's a Seagate make.
Click to expand...
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meall
spiralgirl said:
As I read other posts though I'm seeing Firewire is good for videos. Does that mean for downloading videos or for watching them?

S.
Click to expand...
It mainly depend on what you do, but has nothing to do with the download on video.

For example, if you do iMovies, firewire is a must. If you download video on Internet to watch them only (not editing or anything else like this) normally USB should be OK too. Videos from a digital camera (DV format for instance) are very huge, while Internet (YouTube) video are highly compressed. The limit here is not USB or firewire, but your Internet connection.
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spiralgirl
I can also order from this place:

cstore - Product List (Storage - External)

Thinking the Seagate ones listed might be good or the Mybook one that's $185 or $258

S.
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spiralgirl
meall said:
It mainly depend on what you do, but has nothing to do with the download on video.

For example, if you do iMovies, firewire is a must. If you download video on Internet to watch them only (not editing or anything else like this) normally USB should be OK too. Videos from a digital camera (DV format for instance) are very huge, while Internet (YouTube) video are highly compressed. The limit here is not USB or firewire, but your Internet connection.
Click to expand...

meall,

Thanks, I'm not really into iMovie now but may be down the road. Also at some point I want to buy a video camera. With this in mind Firewire is the way to go.

S.
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spiralgirl
MacBookPro said:
Even better, IN STORE, this drive is selling for $159.00.

My son bought one yesterday, and they are selling at this price, in store at Costco, until Sunday 19th. And it is indeed WD.
Click to expand...
MacBookPro,

Thanks for that. I just need to renew my membership at Costco as I had one a few years ago. I'll take a look at the website. Also see that they have a 1TB one as well for $389, then again I could just get 2 500GB ones for only $318.00

S.
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A
I'm always going to recommend that you buy an external enclosure and get your own HD.

Just make sure to get an enclosure with a fan for maximum cooling efficiency.
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