(REQ) Ext. Hard drive with firewire

Gauge

I've been eyeing this hard drive here because it looks quite nice and has firewire 800 which will come in handy if I upgrade to a Macbook Pro at some stage... also I hear a lot of people rave about WD drives.

I was wondering if any of you know if it's possible to pick up a similar drive or the same drive for less than this? Any sites I should check out? So far, this is the cheapest I can find...

Thanks.

Lego_Man

Sorry to hijack your thread Gauge. Considering a WD Hard Drive also but im not sure what the firewire interface is. Is it necessary or is usb alone sufficient?

thanks,
al

shrapnel222

slightly cheaper here

http://www.pixmania.com/ie/uk/320187/art/western-digital/external-hard-drive-my-bo.html

but then again i didn't check P&P

Mr Mojo

Lego_Man wrote: »

Sorry to hijack your thread Gauge. Considering a WD Hard Drive also but im not sure what the firewire interface is. Is it necessary or is usb alone sufficient?

thanks,
al

Firewire 800 = 800 Mbit/s - * use this if your machine has a port for it *-

USB 2.0 = 480 Mbit/s - * slower - but still grand *

Lego_Man

thanks mojo, thats cleared that up nicely for me.

Gauge

shrapnel222 wrote: »

slightly cheaper here

http://www.pixmania.com/ie/uk/320187/art/western-digital/external-hard-drive-my-bo.html

but then again i didn't check P&P

That version is only €125 on komplett... guess I'll be sticking with them!

whiterebel

Remember too, that wd pro drive has a 3 year warranty. 5 have one and its a lovely quick, neat drive.

craichoe

Mr Mojo wrote: »

Firewire 800 = 800 Mbit/s - * use this if your machine has a port for it *-

USB 2.0 = 480 Mbit/s - * slower - but still grand *

You don't need firewire if your only going to be using it with an external drive. The fastest contiguous transfer you could hope for would be 144 Mbit/s which is well under what firewire or usb can handle.

Automan

craichoe wrote: »

You don't need firewire if your only going to be using it with an external drive. The fastest contiguous transfer you could hope for would be 144 Mbit/s which is well under what firewire or usb can handle.

But Firewire 800 is still 3 times quicker than USB 2.0.

"So just how fast is Firewire 800 then? Well, when tested using HD Tune, the maximum transfer rate using USB 2.0 was 22.6MBps, with the FireWire 400 interface 32.5MBps but with Firewire 800 this jumped to a very impressive 62.5MBps."

Taken from this review:

http://www.itreviews.co.uk/hardware/h1110.htm

Simon201

Yeah got a 1TB version of this from Komplett a few weeks back, I have a 400gb partition all set up for Time Machine, when Leopard arrives.
Very pleased anyhow, and seems to be nice and fast using FW800 with my iMac -

Copying 4.34gb dvd files (15 items) from my hd to the WD - 1 min 58 secs
Copying same back to hd - an even better 1 min 40 secs.

Obviously FW400 would be something like half, as above post. Didn't even try USB cos I'd really like to go to bed in about half an hour!....

Some nice features like drives spin down and it goes to sleep if it doesn't get used for a while, and of course firewire items can be daisy-chained.

Mr Mojo

craichoe wrote: »

You don't need firewire if your only going to be using it with an external drive. The fastest contiguous transfer you could hope for would be 144 Mbit/s which is well under what firewire or usb can handle.

from TechCast website:

USB 2.0 test
1 minute 4 seconds - 1.07GB
3 minutes 37 seconds - 3GB 1020 files

FireWire 400 test
46.2 seconds - 1.07GB
2 minutes 37 seconds - 3GB 1020 files

It’s quite clear that FireWire blasts USB 2.0 out of the water on each and every test I have performed using this option as opposed to the latter. In the 1.07GB file transfer test, it took just over half the time to complete and it managed to knock an entire minute dead-on when transferring the 1020 files.

Lego-man was just asking a quick question in someone else's thread, so I gave him a quick answer.

I didn't feel it was necessary to go into intricate detail about various interface bus speeds and their theoretical hdd transfer rates.


(op: sorry for hijacking your thread, again.)

whiterebel

On a Mac anyway, there is noticeable lag when using USB 2.0 v Firewire. I read somewhere that the USB 2.0 uses the processor, whereas FW doesn't.

patto_chan

I went for the WD USB/FW800 external and bought two from Komplett earlier this year. They were near 200 Euro then - they're only 149 now. Highly recommend them.
I have a MacBookPro so it has USB2, old FireWire and FireWire 800 ports. I usually connect the WD drive through FW800 as it is fastest.

Gauge

I'm going to be using it for video editing which is why I want a firewire drive specifically, for the constant data transfer- I already have a few USB drives.

Automan

Gauge wrote: »

I'm going to be using it for video editing which is why I want a firewire drive specifically, for the constant data transfer- I already have a few USB drives.

Why not get an eSata external drive instead?
Should be even quicker than firewire 800

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.aspx?sku=341415

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.aspx?sku=333094

"SATA transition protocol means it can run at 3Gbps outside of the case, making it as fast as the internal drive in fact. This is something that USB or Firewire can never hope to achieve. "

Taken from this review:

http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/1174/8/page_8_final_thoughts/index.html