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Good physically small external hd

A

adamtj11

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Feb 26, 2011
418
41
Belfast
Hi all ordered the base macbook air, just wanting some good advice on what would be a good external hd that isn't overly expensive and small to carry with me. thanks
 
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I have been using a Seagate GoFlex 500GB, USB 2 version with my MBA. It's been working very well, and it's pretty small. You can get larger capacity GoFlex models, but they get a little larger in size.
 
I love the LaCie Rugged drives, they're small, quiet, fairly fast, and durable. And they are bus-powered off your FireWire or USB port, so no need for a power adapter.

I would stay far away from Western Digital no matter how tempting the price is. I have a WD 1.5 TB drive I was using as a backup drive and it's horrible. Dog slow and flakey. When it's plugged in and the Mac goes to sleep, the Mac must be rebooted, actually the Mac's power cord must be removed before it'll reboot, I'm not joking. And when I had it attached to an Airport basestation, it would periodically unmount itself and foul everything up. Worst piece of technology I ever bought. And I remember the days when WD made some of he best hard drives, but those days are long gone.

I also know some people who like the "G" drives, but I haven't owned one.
 
Cynicalone said:
I have a little Seagate GoFlex Drive 500GB that was on sale at Best Buy for $55.00 a few weeks ago.

And yes it's silver to match the mac and can be either USB 2.0 or FW800 or even USB 3.0 with just a change of the connector.

Here is a link.

http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-FreeA...FK/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1311528135&sr=8-13
Click to expand...

I will vouch for this drive. I have 2 of them, and as stated above, cables can be upgraded and swapped out. USB2/3, eSata, FW800... Also, there are 7200 RPM ones available as well. Those paired with a FW800 connector make a nice external HDD. Also, they are powered over the connector as well, like the LaCies.
 
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Well, I have three WD drives sitting around my MBA while I do the installs, backups, imaging, etc. Have had them for years, and they have never let me down.
 
I second the Lacie Rugged

I second the Lacie Rugged, it's great. A little extra durable, and it has multiple bus powered connections. Works very fast (at least on firewire). Gets a little hot sometimes (when I'm using it hard), but all drives do. The ruggedness is great if you're going to be bringing it with you to various places...
 
I use WD variants. Here's hoping for a thunderbolt external hdd case to be released at a suitable price.
 
This little Western Digital beauty is tiny, cheap, and capacious:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Western-Digital-Elements-Portable-Drive/dp/B003CFAZZ0/ref=pd_cp_computers_3

The main thing to look out for, which I only realised when buying this, is to get a USB-powered drive, so you don't need to carry an adaptor around to use.

I might be stating the obvious here, but I didn't realise USB-powered external HDDS existed and weren't much more expensive till I bought this drive a couple of months ago.
 
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Just buy a laptop drive and buy a mini enclosure and make it yourself, that way you can change the drive anytime you want.
 
Once affordable 1tb thunderbolt drives become available, the MBA will be a speed demon. USB drive access for aperture isnt bad but not great.
 
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