If you want
FAST, stay away from "ready made" external drives, and
buy a
FAST drive mechanism and a good FW800 external enclosure.
WD doesn't make any fast 1TB drives. LaCie doesn't tell you which drive they
use, and doesn't specify performance (other than meaningless "burst rates").
OWC does tell which drive they use -- and it's a not-very-fast Hitachi 7K1000.
According to manufacturers spec sheets and online benchmarks from sites
like tomshardware.com, Seagate and Samsung are the current 1TB speed
champions. Samsung has the fastest sustained transfer rates, but Seagate
beats 'em in most real-world benchmarks. No other 1TB drives come close.
There are lots of good FW800 enclosures around; just look for one with an
Oxford OXUF924DSb or OXUF934DSb chipset and whatever other features
float your boat. I like Icy Dock's MB559UEB-1S ($70 at newegg), but OWC's
Mercury Elite Pro and miniStack v3 also have a good reps.
...DO NOT buy an IDE-based enclosure -- IDE is obsolete,
LK