Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

space or speed, speed or space

what should squeeky do?

  • Total voters
    32
squeeks

squeeks

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Jun 19, 2007
3,393
15
Florida
that is the question...

see after my harddrive started dieing yesterday i quickly ordered a replacement 200gb 7200 RPM drive, however now that this 250gb drive seems to be ok (i made a complete image of it last night with no errors) im trying to decide if i should just keep the larger slower drive, or put in the slightly smaller faster drive

i like my speed almost as much as i like my space, with everything i have on there now i have about 70gb free, meaning with the smaller drive ill have about 20gb free i just dont know if the speed diffrence is worth losing the 50gb of space, usually for video work i use my externals, but i like to keep most of my other stuff on the internal since i carry the notebook around with me all the time and i cant drage my mybooks with me...*sigh* i dont know, what would yall do?
 
In today's world, 20 gig free will last you for another couple of months at most. So you'd have an increase in speed for a very short time, after which you'd have to bounce everything to the bigger slower drive yet again. It ain't worth it, IMO.

I think you should connect both drives and keep the stuff you care about running quickly on your small fast drive, and put the stuff you don't mind running slower on the big slow drive. That way you get tons more space total and also have the extra speed most of the time you'll care about it.
 
OS X needs 10 percent of the drive to be free. So the smaller drive would already be full.
 
im already running two 500gb mybooks

new poll (reply with A or B)
External Enclosure

A. Firewire 400
B. USB 2.0

Must be self powered and support 2.5" HD
 
squeeks said:
that is the question...

see after my harddrive started dieing yesterday i quickly ordered a replacement 200gb 7200 RPM drive, however now that this 250gb drive seems to be ok (i made a complete image of it last night with no errors) im trying to decide if i should just keep the larger slower drive, or put in the slightly smaller faster drive

i like my speed almost as much as i like my space, with everything i have on there now i have about 70gb free, meaning with the smaller drive ill have about 20gb free i just dont know if the speed diffrence is worth losing the 50gb of space, usually for video work i use my externals, but i like to keep most of my other stuff on the internal since i carry the notebook around with me all the time and i cant drage my mybooks with me...*sigh* i dont know, what would yall do?
Click to expand...

i think you better buy the 7200 RPM HDD ..nice name ''Squeeky'' XD
 
Isn't a 7200rpm HD louder than slower spinning HDs? I think I'd rather pick space and less noise.

byakuya
 
squeeks said:
im already running two 500gb mybooks

new poll (reply with A or B)
External Enclosure

A. Firewire 400
B. USB 2.0

Must be self powered and support 2.5" HD
Click to expand...

For a 2.5" SATA drive, you're going to have an easier time finding a USB drive. It will also (usually) be cheaper. If you're not going to be doing audio or video editing or running HD video off of the drive, you don't necessarily need the constant throughput of the FW drive either.

So my answer is:

B

EDIT: most 2.5" laptop drives can be bus-powered by a USB port as long as the port itself is powered, ie: a USB hub probably won't work as the majority of them are un-powered.
 
I'd have to disagree.
I think A is the better choice.
If your planning on backupping your Mac HD on the external drive I think a firewire enclosure will be more comfortable because of its speed. However, they are a bit more expensive than only USB 2.0 enclosures.

byakuya
 
byakuya said:
If your planning on backupping your Mac HD on the external drive I think a firewire enclosure will be more comfortable because of its speed. However, they are a bit more expensive than only USB 2.0 enclosures.
Click to expand...

True, but he already has 2 500GB external drives, presumably for backups and possibly firewire (squeeks ?). Personally, taking the cost per GB and actual drive speed into account, I wouldn't use a 2.5" drive as a primary backup solution, I'd use a (3.5") desktop drive and the 2.5" drive for on the go storage (movies, projects, whatever) and file transfer.
 
byakuya said:
I'd have to disagree.
I think A is the better choice.
If your planning on backupping your Mac HD on the external drive I think a firewire enclosure will be more comfortable because of its speed. However, they are a bit more expensive than only USB 2.0 enclosures.

byakuya
Click to expand...

not going to, i bought a new 250gb mybookpro for that

this will be a carry around drive for current video projects im working on that i want to work on away from my desk

jdechko said:
True, but he already has 2 500GB external drives, presumably for backups and possibly firewire (squeeks ?).
Click to expand...

thats correct, two mybook pros 500gb Firewire 800

1. formatted as Fat32 (for transfering files between mac and pc)
2. HFS+ for those large DV files, since FCS dosent split the DV files into start/stop chunks like vegas does

main usage of both is video storage though

mostly they are current being used for editing my parents trip to europe (2 and a half hours), and our cruise (hour and 20 minutes) of HDV :eek:

plus various random projects im working on
 
Wait, so are you going to store the video on the 2.5" drive or edit the video from the drive? If it's only the former, then the USB enclosure could work. If it's the latter, then a FW enclosure all the way.

However...

My friend bought a USB2.0/eSATA enclosure for about $20-30. Assuming you have a MBP (you said FW 800 which isn't on the MB) then you also have the expresscard slot which, if it's not being used, could host an eSATA card like these. You could connect via eSATA when editing video, but have the flexibility to connect to USB if needed.

I think it was this enclosure. It comes with a USB cable, eSATA cable and an insert for adding an eSATA port to a desktop.
 
jdechko said:
Then I'll change my answer to A. You're going to need the FW connection if you're going to use the drive for video editing - especially HDV.
Click to expand...

so basically ill have to have a drive thats plugged (to power) all the time to do video editing, thats ok...cute kid btw
 
squeeks said:
so basically ill have to have a drive thats plugged (to power) all the time to do video editing, thats ok...cute kid btw
Click to expand...

I know I edited my answer, but you wouldn't necessarily have to keep it plugged in (to the wall I assume you meant). For most laptop drives the power draw will be around 5 volts. According to wikipedia, 6-pin Firewire is capable of providing 30 volts of power, more than enough to power the drive. On the larger desktop drives, you still don't draw much more than ~12V, enough to power the drive itself, but not enough to run the fans to cool the drive. That's why most full-sized (3.5") enclosures require a separate power supply.

Thanks about the kid, too.

In reality, it all depends on what you want to do with the drive. If it's just storage, USB will work fine (albeit slower for very large file transfers, ie: backup/copying DVD images/DV files). If you want to edit the movies from the drive directly, then a FW or eSATA connection is recommended/required. This is also why I'd recommend looking at the enclosure I linked to above. It's got eSATA for if you decide to edit, and USB if you just want a storage disk.
 
jdechko said:
Wait, so are you going to store the video on the 2.5" drive or edit the video from the drive?
Click to expand...

edit, well, just when i was away from my desk, usually i do everything at home...

Assuming you have a MBP (you said FW 800 which isn't on the MB)
Click to expand...
See my Sig :p

then you also have the expresscard slot which, if it's not being used, could host an eSATA card like You could connect via eSATA when editing video, but have the flexibility to connect to USB if needed.
Click to expand...
true, but that still requires external power right?

It comes with a USB cable, eSATA cable and an insert for adding an eSATA port to a desktop.
Click to expand...

i actually have that exact enclosure, it has the original drive that came with the notebook in it..

and yes its quite hard to find a 2.5" firewire enclosure im finding.
 
So your setup is MBP (with no HD currently installed?), 2 FW800 MyBook Hard Drives, the original 250GB 5400RPM drive in the USB/eSATA enclosure, and a 200GB 7200 RPM drive on the way? Wow.

If I were in your shoes, I'd have the larger drive installed in the MBP for the simple fact that you're running low on space as it is. As long as you have your MBP with you, you've got the most important data already on the machine. If some of the data weren't as necessary being accessed only occasionally, you would have already moved it off and you wouldn't have posed this question. This, of course, as opposed to not having enough space and having to always have the external with you anyway. It sucks forgetting stuff like that.

And I don't honestly recall whether or not the USB cable is needed when running on eSATA, but I believe that it is.
 
byakuya said:
thanks for the clarification...and how is the heat caused by the faster spinning HD?

byakuya
Click to expand...

I don't know how it compares to the 5400 rpm drive but it does get a wee bit warmer on the left than the right. But once you start typing for a while both sides warm up to about the same temp.
 
jdechko said:
So your setup is MBP (with no HD currently installed?), 2 FW800 MyBook Hard Drives, the original 250GB 5400RPM drive in the USB/eSATA enclosure, and a 200GB 7200 RPM drive on the way? Wow.
Click to expand...

i know this is getting confusing isnt it?

ok, currently my mbp has the 250gb 5400 RPM drive installed that i got a week after buying the system, i took the 160gb 5400rpm drive the system came with out, and stuck it in that vantec enclosure, the two mybook FW800 drives sit on my desk and i plug them in when im doing video editing

i have 68gb currently free on the 250gb osx drive, mainly pictures and music, and FCS2 as far as i can tell FCS 2 dosent let you keep the templates on a separate drive anymore like FCS1 did, or i missed it, otherwise id have lots of extra free space on the internal drive.

so if i can figure out if thats possible (putting the templates on the external drive) then ill swap out the 250 5400 for the 200 7200 because then i should have lots of space and will benefit from the faster drive, without having to worry about behind low on space

OR

i might just stick the 7200rpm drive in an external and keep older video projects on there

did i lose you yet JD?
 
Did a little digging for ya, squeeks. It appears that it is possible to put the templates on an external. Check it out. (Ironically, the google search turned up this thread as hit No. 2).

Hopefully this solves your dilemma. :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back