Suggestions for an external harddrive...

Hello
I would like to purchase an external hard drive to back up my computer (emac OS 10.4.11) What is a reasonabley priced 1TB HD that comes formatted for the Mac? The ones i see on the Staples website seem to need to be reformatted. Thanks!

WD drives themselves generally get good reviews, though I've heard mixed reports about their prepackaged MyBook units. There are only a handful of companies that actually manufacture the drives, so what most vendors are providing is the case. I've been quite happy with the drives from Other World Computing:
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire/
but there are probably a number of brands that would work quite well for you.
Regards.
Disclaimer: any product suggestion and link given is strictly for reference and represents my opinion only. No warranties express or implied. I get no personal benefit from the sale of any product I may recommend in any of my posts in the Discussions. Your mileage may vary. Void where prohibited. You must be this tall to ride. Objects in mirror may be closer than they appear. Preservatives added to improve freshness. No animals were harmed in the making of this post.

Similar Messages

What format for my external harddrive?

Hello,
I have a 1,5 TB Seagate external harddrive.
What format and partitiontype shall it be to be used on both Mac and Windows?
Because right now it only works on my mac and the rest of my family uses Windows so i would like to share my ext. hdd with them aswell..
Right now it's Mac os Extended Journaled and Apple-partitiontype..
Help Please :-)

Not quite sure I understand but here is what Disk Utility Help says about partitioning a disk:
Partition a Disk
1. If you’re partitioning an external disk, make sure it’s connected to your computer.
2. Open Disk Utility.
3. Select the disk that you want to partition and click Partition.
4. Choose the number of partitions from the Volume Scheme pop-up menu.
If you can’t choose the number of partitions, follow the steps for partitioning a startup disk.
5. Click each partition and type a name for it, choose a format, and type a size.
You can also drag the divider between the partitions to change their sizes. If a partition’s name has an asterisk beside it, it’s shown larger than its actual size in order to display its name clearly.
6. Click Options and choose one of the following:
If you’ll be using the disk on a Windows computer, choose the Master Boot Record partition scheme (also known as “fdisk”).
If you’ll be using the disk only with Mac computers, choose GUID Partition Table.
7. Click Apply.

Suggestions for new external HD

I have a G4 powerbook with 80 GB of HD which is pretty much maxed out. Looking for an external HD to transfer pics on to, and to do some backup with. (Currently i use my iDisk for backup of my Documents folder, so haven't really needed Backup). Any suggestions for a good ext HD though? LaCie? Toshiba?
Also, I'm thinking I should upgrade my 512 of memory to full gig of memory. All this doesn't need me to lead me down the path of a new MacBook instead, does it?!

GoBraves:
Since you have a PowerPC Mac you should be sure to get a Firewire external HDD. This will enable you to make a bootable clone which will do double duty as a full backup and as an emergency boot drive.
Be sure that the HDD that you get is larger enough. Since they drives are now quite affordable I would not suggest anything less than 250 GB. You can partition this clone your HDD to a partition approximately the size of your internal HDD.
The element in a Firewire Drive that fails most often is the firewire bridge. You need to get a drive with the more reliable Oxford 911+ chipset like one of these external firewire HDDs at OWC.
Good luck.
cornelius

Suggestions for an external HD to use with my AirPort Extreme?

I have a fairly new APE (6 months old or so), and I want to purchase an external HD for use as a backup/sharing device on my network. I have a MBP running ML, a PC desktop (win XP), and a PC laptop (win 7).
It will be a stand alone unit at part of the network, and plugged into the APE, but when configured, I'd like to be able to access the files stored there with any of the computers I have.
I do not anticipate having to plug the ext HD directly into any of the computers, except in an extreme emergency.
Would a HD like a WD MyBook do, formatted either for the PC or the Mac? Does the HD need to be formatted one way or the other for maximun compatibility?
I dont intend to buy a "portable" HD to do the job. It will be connected full time to the network.
I've never used Time Machine before as a backup tool, nor any other backup software. Primarily, the backup will be of my photos, and a few documents.
If I have a system crash, I can and will reinstall the OS, whatever computer dies.
I've not got much experience with network HD backup, but I figure it's about time.
Sorry if my questions are a bit lame, or if this has been covered in some kind of tutorial somewhere else. Please direct me to that link if it has.
Any advice or help would be greatly appreciated!!
DJ

Thank you for your reply.
I have been looking at the WD MyBook Studio as an option in my system. Not so much because it is Mac compatible out of the box, but more because I like the idea of the metal enclosure, for durability and heat dissapation.
I have heard and seen reviews where many external drives can be noisy as well. I'm not so concerned with noise during a backup or a file transfer, but I dont think I could tolerate constant noise.
I have a APE, 802.11n, Model MD031LL/A that I intend to plug my external drive into. I may or may not just do basic "copy and pastes" of files and such, at least until I find a backup plan that is somewhat automated and hands-free.
For now, anyway, I have nothing of importance stored on my MBP, so using Time Machine might not be a factor as a backup solution for my MBP.
An overwhelming majority of my files will be JPEG, RAW, along with Word and Excel files (from both my MBP and PC). I do not have any Mac-exclusive formatted files on my MBP.
I try to be careful when saving and storing files to allow for max compatibility on both platforms. As an aside, if there is a good tutorial about this topic (file-saving and compatibility), I'd love a link if you can share.
I would be willing to reformat the external drive if it meant better, cross platform compatibility and performance. In the back of my head, I have this idea about getting the MyBook Studio, and reformatting as necessary.
I know this idea sounds a bit fussy, but I just want to get a quiet, solid desktop external drive, that I can just sort of buy, configure and forget (in a manner of speaking)
Plus, I dont want to waste $100-$150 bucks making a poor HD choice.
Further suggestions?
Thanks,
DJ

Suggestion For An External Scratch Disc needed

I have recently learned that I had my scratch disc set up incorrectly to the same internal SSD in the Mac Book Pro. I assume that to keep the maximum transfer speed I need and external HDD or SSD with FireWire 800 instead of USB. I have found a few of those but they are much larger than what I need in GB and physical size.
I need something portable and reliable since I do most of the work on the road.
Thanks for your suggestions.

Have you considered a G-Drive mobile or G-Drive mini SSD? Both are bus-powered.
If you're ok using AC power, look at the G-Drive mini.
These are very nice units - small, reliable, good reputation.
FireWire (or eSATA if you have a MBP with an ExpressCard slot) is the way to go. USB generally cannot keep up with the sustained throughput required for video.

Suggestions for formatting external drive with bad block?

I have a OWC Mercury 300 GB external drive. I wanted to erase it and use it as a backup for one of my laptops. The drive had been working fine as a Time Machine back up for an old (intel) iMac. I told Disk Utility to erase and reformat. It erased, but refused to reformat saying there was a bad block on the drive. Now Disk Utility recognizes the external drive but won't do anything with it. No Verify. No Repair. All grayed out. Any suggestions?

I wasn't a hard error, that's why. Repartitioning and reformatting will often fix soft errors in the directory structure. Had there been a real, new, bad block on the drive it would not be repairable. A soft bad block error can be fixed by reformatting. The hard block error may be fixable by using Zero Data one pass that may spare out the bad block. But if none of that works then you need to replace the drive.
You were fortunate that the error probably was spurious and resolved by repartitioning (may have been in the disk's RDB.)

Suggestions for an external hard drive?

I'm in the process of shopping for a good external hard drive to work with FCPHD 4.5. I have a g5 dual 2.0 and I was checking out the "LaCie d2 Extreme Triple Interface, 160GB, 7200 RPM, External USB 2.0 / Firewire 400 / Firewire 800 Hard Drive" hard drive. I've been scouting the discussion board and saw alot of kernel issues. Has anyone had problems with this one, or know of any problems with Lacie? Or can you suggest a good hard drive that is compatable with FCP4.5.

I have never heard anything bad about OWC or Weibtech. They all have great stuff. I own a Weibtech enclosure I put my own drive into. Right now I also work with (3) 500GB Lacie BigDisk drives. I work them very hard. One is a back up and constantly has stuff moving on it. One holds all my project files and footage, which I work on for at least 7 hours a day. So far everything is seemless.
It is true that Lacie tends to change their hard drives they use quite often, however, I've never had a problem with their stuff.... except for that one time I bought a referbished model. In other words, if it's really important to you, don't get a referb. But they do have great prices on them.

Is there is common format for an external harddrive for Mac and a PC?

I'm planning to have some 8mm film digitized, and would like the result to go on an external drive that could be used on both a PC and a Mac.
I think that FAT 32 would work, but that it has a file size limitation that might be a problem with video files.
My questions are:
First, is there a way of formatting an external hard drive which that it would work both both a Mac and a PC for transferring/working with video files?
And two, what codex should the film to video be saved in, to work with iMovie?
And three, does it matter now is the hard drive is USB, or must it be FW?
Thanks,
Hal

First, is there a way of formatting an external hard drive which that it would work both both a Mac and a PC for transferring/working with video files?
FAT32, unless the drive needs to contain files which are 4GB or larger, in which case, no.
And two, what codex should the film to video be saved in, to work with iMovie?
DV.
And three, does it matter now is the hard drive is USB, or must it be FW?
It doesn't matter.
(55447)

Can anyone recommend a good external harddrive for iTunes backup?

I would like to backup my files externally. I really dont know too much about this stuff. Can anyone make a suggestion for an external harddrive? Thanks!

I have an AcomData 120GB, a Western Digital 200GB and a Fantom 250GB external HD. All are working well. LaCie is another fine brand. I usually buy the major brands by price. Expect to pay $0.50 or less per GB (my last ExHD was $90 for 250GB).
If you are very concerned about longevity, then look at the Seagates as they carry a 5-year warranty (at least on the internal laptop drive that I have purchased).
See This Link

Having macbook search my external harddrive for itunes/music

short story/question:
my itunes library with all my music (1000+ songs, and iphotos) is on one of those external harddrive firelite things. how do i set up my macbook to search for the itunes library on my external harddrive, rather defaulting to an itunes library mistakenly loaded on my computer?
long story: (bare with me, because i'm in a panic stress mode without my music)-
my kids both have macbooks. my daugther made a video that was on a flashdrive. she couldn't get the flashdrive to open the video on her macbook. unbeknownst (?word) to me, she inserted her flashdrive into my macbook. my external harddrive, with all my music on it was NOT hooked into my macbook at the time.
when she inserted the the flashdrive, the macbook said something like "can't find itunes, would you like to choose an itunes folder?" i still didn't realize she was using my macbook, so i clicked on "choose a folder". now i get a little confused, but two folders came up, the first was labled "itunes", i believe that was an old folder we (apple geniuses) had labled as the orginial music in my library for my external harddrive. there was also a second folder i remember creating labled, itunes1 (or something), which i believe was an updated copy of the most recent music on my external harddrive. i had to give the folder a different name otherwise it wouldn't accept the music again. i thought i deleted the original folder though, after i made a copy of the most recent music. i'm digressing though, sorry.
anyway, i chose the first itunes folder, and her flashdrive video didn't open, so i clicked on the second folder. her video opened up. she was happy. she removed the flashdrive (the wrong way, by just pulling it out. then inserted it again, and removed it correctly.
as she went to shut down the computer, i realized she was using MINE rather than hers or her brother's. i flipped, because know i realized i somehow download some form of origin itunes setup directly onto my macbook.
i inserted my external harddrive with my music, and needless to say, it couldn't find my music. i double clicked on the external harddrive to try to find or open the music... nothing. i find it hard to believe that i lost my music off my external harddrive, considering it was never connected in the first place.
other issue- i recently downloaded some music (from a grateful dead website) not off itunes (which i rarely if ever do). when i clicked on "a button" in itunes, it seemed to download just that music into, i believe the itunes on my macbook. (that music was also in my external harddrive).
bottom line:
how do i get my macbook to search for my intues folder/music that was on my external harddrive, rather than on the macbook itself? i think the macbook needs to know to search the external hardrive, rather than the macbook itself.
i have an appointment with the apple genius bar on saturday, but if someone thinks there's a simple solution that i can do (that will ALWAYS work to have my computer search my external harddrive, rather than the itunes folder on the macbook itselft). i'm willing to try.
my biggest fear... losing, or having lost ALL of my music and photos from the external harddrive.
btw: i hopefully have most of that music backed up to a SECOND external harddrive. which i bought just in case the first one crashed.
help. please. and thanks for listening.
not sure which macosx i have. i think it's 10.6.8, but it may be 10.6.7. i'm typing from work now.
thanks,
anthony

My guess is that you have set up your iTunes library up on the external drive using some sort of alias (been a long time since I've done that and cant recall the exact procedure). At some point you've probably launched iTunes without the external drive connected, and iTunes created a second library on your computer, and is now defaulting to that library. I think you should search for the directions on how to set up a library on an external drive, and re-apply that hack.

Need Mic suggestions for solo guitar video...

I have a Sony TRV-38 mini DV and need suggestions for an external mic. I want to video a solo guitar player sitting in a chair. Would I need to mic the guitar from a mic stand in front of him or would some sort of shotgun mic do the trick? Would buying a Beachtek unit be the best way to go, or is there a simpler/cheaper mic alternative that gives very good results. This is primarily just for good sounding archival footage.
Thanks for any help.
Mac OS X (10.4.3)

there are a couple of approaches... you can close mic, but if you are experimenting with your equipment and techniques, it is quite possible that you could get a very colored tone and not accurately depict the performace from a sonic standpoint.
something that is quick, easy, and relatively high performance at a budget is to use an M-S stereo shotgun mic. the left channel will be mono hypercardoid aimed right at the performer... with the mic mid range, not close mic'd. the right channel will be the "-S" component of the stereo signal, which is optional and can be decoded with an M-S stereo process in the edit process, or if for example, there was too much ambient noise, simply discard the track and just use the left / mono signal. (personally, i would probably just mount my audio technica M-S stereo mic on my rycote hotshoe adapter, and mic camera mounted... no stands or cables to deal with)
yes, the beachtek or similiar direct interface is the way to go, bypassing the Sony's poor gain stages (disable auto gain control, if possible).
IF sound quality is of the utmost importance, then the real correct way to do this would be to record with 2 mics in an X-Y stero mid field setup. expense, complexity, and possibility of getting something wrong are probably too high to do for something as critical as a 1 take live event if you don't have experience under your belt.

My external harddrive is not showing any files after a mac partition

I transfered my files from my pc to the external harddrive. The instructions for the external harddrive said I needed to partition the drive to make it mac-compatible. After partitioning, I couldn't find any of the files that I transferred.
Can anyone help me find the files on the external hard drive?

abbey road wrote:
I transfered my files from my pc to the external harddrive. The instructions for the external harddrive said I needed to partition the drive to make it mac-compatible. After partitioning, I couldn't find any of the files that I transferred.
Can anyone help me find the files on the external hard drive?
Hi and welcome to Discussions,
did you do the partitioning after you have copied the files to the external harddisk ?
If so, then they are gone.
A repartitioning of a harddisk deletes everything that is on that harddisk at that moment.
If the files are still on your PC, then just reconnect the external HD to your PC and copy the files again.
Regards
Stefan

Need recommendation for bootable External HD for CCC

Hi ! I recently came to the forums to get info on how to effectively back up my mid-2010 MBP 500 Gb because according to Disk Utility I need to reformat my HD
I am currently only using Time Capsule to back up with Time Machine. I had initially decided to drag my iPhoto library, itunes, and movies (along with some other user files) to a new Seagate 500 gb GoFlex portable External HD that I had. But since I've done that, I've also done more browsing on the boards here and learned that I probably should be making a bootable clone of my HD (using Carbon Copy Cloner). That sounds like a logical idea, and Im embarassed I didn't know about it sooner. So I plan to purchase the CCC immediately and do this before it's too late. On their website they specifically say NOT to use Western Digital drives because some of them are not bootable. I also saw some comments that the Seagates "go to sleep" and probably should be avoided. I'm not sure how up-to-date those forums are so I am coming here for some recommendations/suggestions.
Before seeing those comments I had seen a few in the local stores here I was considering (WD passport, SeaGate backup plus, Toshibo Canvio Connect)...but now I'm confused.
Any suggestions for an External HD that I can use? (also, I was thinking 1 TB was a decent size to get)?
Thanks so much for your help !
Christine

chrstene96
probably should be making a bootable clone of my HD
Bootable clone is very important to have, and MUCH more useful than time machine in general.
Forget about CCC, Superduper does the same thing for FREE. Download the APP SuperDuper (most use it).
Some advantages of a cloned HD:
In case of an internal HD crash and failure, there is absolutely nothing quicker to getting back to 100% operation than having a HD clone handy to either boot from, or within 20 mins. installing and removing the bad HD. Nothing to install software-wise, and a speedy immediate return to your computer use and productivity.
If you do an option key startup at boot you can directly boot to your cloned drive externally and operate from same like normal.
Sandboxing: With the help of the Cloned Drive, you can perform sandboxing, or the testing of new software, their updates and applications before they are installed on your Mac system. Moreover, if there are issues with the system, you can troubleshoot them by booting off the Clone. Many people test new APPS or experiment with a secondary clone and never worry about a failure or serious issue since the internal HD is untouched and the secondary clone can be wiped afterwards if any major issue occurs in testing. This is an invaluable tool in many instances.
If you sell you computer for purchase of a new one, you can take the clone you have on hand and install same or clone it to the new internal drive of your new Mac.
As it turns out one of the huge positive benefits of a clone is that people were seeing faster HD speeds; with APPS booting up from the clone than they had seen with the internal HD. The cloning applications in cloning the drive defragments the data to the clone and remove the “holes” in the cloning process.
With a small portable HD clone you can take your ‘computer’ anywhere to most any other current Mac and boot from your HD clone and have your entire system and its data immediately there for use. In case one is across the world and their macbook gets stolen, or damaged, with another Mac you can be up and 100% in the time it takes to boot to the new or borrowed Mac!
You can clone from your external clone to the internal HD/SSD in case of corruption.
The best thing that can be said, ideally, when your HD crashes with all its data is “so what, I’ve got a clone right here” and you can return to normal operation within seconds (by booting from the clone) or minutes (by swapping drives).
In separating out your system hub (OS) and your data hub, and storing them separately, is if you make only periodic clones (every month or so), and have a HD crash, the worst case outcome is that what is lost on your clone are some bookmarks and preferences since your data hub containing your vital files is constantly archived separately as it should be.
Disadvantages of a cloned HD:
A HD clone takes a rather long time to update since it checks all files for changes.
Ideally you would erase and create a new clone of your updated system every 2 weeks or month, which would therefore leave a gap in data integrity and OS files and system changes.
Autonomous constant data hub archiving fills this downside “gap” of HD clones, wherein which the worst that would be lost is a 2 week or one month window of application updates, or system changes irrelevant to your vital data.
best options for the price, and high quality HD:
Quality 1TB drives are $50 per TB on 3.5" or $65 per TB on 2.5"
Perfect 1TB for $68
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Canvio-Portable-Hard-Drive/dp/B005J7YA3W/ref=sr_1_ 1?ie=UTF8&qid=1379452568&sr=8-1&keywords=1tb+toshiba
Nice 500gig for $50. ultraslim and perfect
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Canvio-Portable-External-Drive/dp/B009F1CXI2/ref=s r_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1377642728&sr=1-1&keywords=toshiba+slim+500gb
2.5" USB portable High quality BEST FOR THE COST, Toshiba "tiny giant" 2TB drive (have several of them, LOT of storage in a SMALL package)    $117
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Canvio-Connect-Portable-HDTC720XK3C1/dp/B00CGUMS48 /ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1379182740&sr=1-4&keywords=2tb+toshiba
*This one is the BEST portable external HD available that money can buy:
HGST Touro Mobile 1TB USB 3.0 External Hard Drive
$88
http://www.amazon.com/HGST-Mobile-Portable-External-0S03559/dp/B009GE6JI8/ref=sr _1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1383238934&sr=8-1&keywords=HGST+Touro+Mobile+Pro+1TB+USB+3.0+72 00+RPM
Most storage experts agree on the Hitachi 2.5"
macjack My Swamp
It's usually not the WD drive
If you're handy you can "roll your own" with a bare drive and an enclosure
Its never the WD mechanical HD itself.      None of those posts on "data corrupted .....Mavericks...HD RAID arrays" has any issue with the mechanical HD from WD
(that being said WD quality is the worst and I refuse to buy them).
Ill let you know when I find a HD enclosure that is worth more than 50 cents and/or is reliable.
(actually this one IS reliable: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Anker-2-5-Inch-USB-3-0-eSATA-to-SATA-Hard-Drive-Disk-HDD -External-Enclosure-/321085534744?pt=US_Drive_Enclosures_Docks&hash=item4ac23072 18 )

How to choose an external harddrive for booting an iMac G5 (Intel Core 2 Duo, late 2006 model MA589xx/A)

The internal harddrive of my 20" iMac G5 has failed and I would like to run the computer from an external drive until I can purchase a new one. I don't currently have an external drive available to do this so I would like some recommendations regarding which type would be preferable for this use. My neighbor suggested buying an external firewire enclosure and a 500 GB drive to go inside it. Is that adequate? If so, which brand is good to buy. In the future I will be using this new drive to backup files from whatever computer I end up purchasing. I am also considering replacing the internal drive of the iMac since the rest of the computer works well and, if possible, would like to use this new drive for that purpose.

I agree with your neighbor. A good source is OWC. You want a 3.5" SATA I or SATA II (1.5 or 3.0 Gb/s) hard drive. The enclosure should have a power supply and support at least Firewire 400/800 and USB 2.0. OWC even has tools. Good drives to choose from include Seagate, HGST, and Western Digital (stay away from their Blue drives.) Avoid so-called Green drives.

Which external harddrive best for huge FCP video project?

Hi,
i'm editing a massive film, pulling media off 3 1TG external harddrives. The drives I've been using are a Chinese brand that works smoothly with premiere but is way too slow for FCP (can't play through the timeline without getting dropped frame notices, even though I'm not daisy chaining them). I'm thinking I have to replace all the drives with better, faster ones. Sooo, wanted to ask you pros, what brand of harddrive is the best and most reliable for this workflow (and reasonable affordable- i have to buy a few!)? Any suggestions? Thanks a bunch! O

dropped frames, fyi, are on playback only. It doesn't mean you are losing frames in your files or in your sequences. It's not necessarily the drive speed causing the dropped frames. Sometimes it's just the inability for FCP to process the frames fast enough, which is processor based, not drive based, and has a lot to do with filters, transitions, and the like. You can turn off the dropped frames warning in the User Prefs.
That being said, if it IS drive speed, make sure that, not only are you using at least Firewire 800 drives, but also that the drives are 7200 RPM and not 5400 RPM. The reason you may think it works better with Premier is because Premier may not have a dropped frames warning.

Suggestions for an external harddrive...

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