External Hard Drive Recommendation

[ryee3]

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I have had external hard drive failure ie 4tb. Does anyone have a strong recommendation for brand that has good history for being reliable?

 

Thanks

[CalArts 99]

fwiw, my partner has spent her life in the recording industry and I've gotten to know many audio engineers and musicians who all recommend these: Glyph - Testimonials

 

I've been using Glyph drives now myself. Several colleagues in motion picture post production also use them.

 

There are not many actual hard drive companies (the disks themselves) out there, but the enclosure, the method of cooling, and the bridge (i.e., how they are put together) does make a big difference and Glyph is one of the best. And an extra plus is that they don't need a 'wall wart.' For people who move from studio to studio, that means just packing up the drive and not needing an extra power pack (a standard wall plug is all that's needed.) They also have the best warranty and with data recovery services.

[zeitz]

You can take the plunge and buy solid state hard drives. They are over 5x the price of spinning disk hard drives. Sizes are approaching 1TB.

[flyalf]

Another option is to purchase a NAS with more than one HD and set up RAID and be able to swap the HD as they fail (as they will) without loss of data . Sorry for a bit OT answer, but one cannot rely on any HD to not fail

[kdriceman]

I have been using the Lacie 2Big 4TB in RAID mode with Thunderbolt connectivity. I've been pleasantly surprised.

 

http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10573

[Angora]

I have had external hard drive failure ie 4tb. Does anyone have a strong recommendation for brand that has good history for being reliable?

 

Thanks

 

No. I've had my share of Seagate and WD drives, i.e. the two biggest players as of now, and had failures occuring with both. Also had or still use IBM/Hitachi, Fujitsu, Samsung, etc. with either good or bad experiences. Bottom line: there's no outstanding brand out there.

 

What you can do, as some suggested:

- buy an SSD (especially if you plan on plugging/unplugging the drive a lot)

- buy a NAS configured e.g. in RAID1 (two disks minimum) or RAID5 (three disks minimum)

- buy an enterprise-class drive (more expensive but more robust)

[philipus]

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I've used WD a lot and have found them to be reliable. At one point I ran two 2-drive software RAID 0 in my Mac Pro, working them pretty hard, one array for the user directory and the other as a clone thereof, which was SuperDupered every night. I used them for three years (at least) until I changed last summer to two Seagate Barracuda 3TB. I had zero problems with those drives (by now pretty old models, the WD640AAKS).

 

I continue to SuperDuper one Barracuda to the other every night. I read some bad press about the Barracudas when they were launched but so far, touch wood, after a year of service I haven't had problems.

 

For the current state of storage check out Storagereview.com's Leaderboard and their reviews. They also have a section among their reviews concerning Enterprise drives.

 

For an external drive I'd pick the internal HDDs I want and put them in a good enclosure. The reason is that it is sometimes difficult to know exactly which drive a manufacturer has put in an external enclosure. For reliability that's pretty crucial to know.

 

About SSDs, though. I have had three OWC Mercury Extremes break without any reason whatsoever. And this within the first 2-3 months. OWC is hit or miss in my experience and I have now decided to go with the Intel 520s which are supposedly very reliable.

[Paul J]

Hitachi Deskstar 3TB or 4TB.

 

They were the fastest in class when I bought them, not sure about now as Ive not bought any since. Mine get mostly 24/7 use and they have been rock solid. I have 12TB in RAID 0 and it ridiculously quick. There is a good review on them on macperformanceguide

[peter_n]

Hitachi Deskstar 3TB or 4TB.

Most techs I work with rate Hitachi enterprise level drives as the most reliable over the long term. My client companies that run servers 24/7 use the Ultrastars, but the techs rate the Deskstars in the same class for MTBF. I personally use Hitachi Deskstars in OWC enclosures with basic formatting (not dynamic) and have had great reliability.

 

The Hitachi drive business is now owned by Western Digital who's Red series are apparently a good value, although I have no personal experience with them and I'll continue to use Hitachi.

[roguewave]

Glyph is very popular in the recording industry, but I don't think it is superior for storing imagery. The 2 uses are quite different. One is a continuos file, the other discrete.

 

I have had enormous success with myThunderbolt 6TB Duo. I own two units, one as a backup & the second as a 3TB Raid. They have been up & running for 7 months without a single hitch.

 

They are fast, almost silent and can be chained with other Thunderbolt drives. The transfer times make all the difference for me.

[CalArts 99]

Glyph is very popular in the recording industry, but I don't think it is superior for storing imagery. The 2 uses are quite different. One is a continuos file, the other discrete.

 

I was curious about what you were implying by this and so I spoke with Adam Day at Glyph. He wasn't quite sure what you meant either. A file stored is a file stored. It doesn't matter what kind of file it is. However, if you mean that a Glyph isn't really necessary and might be considered overkill for just storing imagery then I agree (he did, too ) I assume that's what you are saying. One can store a file on anything. It's when the file is constantly worked on and reading and writing that it does matter in respect to the disk (especially the speed) and the build of the enclosure (especially the cooling.) fwiw, I use an external scratch drive for PS and some NLE work, too.

 

And as we all know there are only a handful of actual drive manufacturers. The enclosure, bridge, cooling, company support, and warranty/recovery are equally important in the overall package. Glyph is pretty good in that respect.

[Jeffry Abt]

Is there a "Thunderbolt" Glyph drive?

[CalArts 99]

Is there a "Thunderbolt" Glyph drive?

 

Not yet. Only eSATA, FW800, USB 2 and 3.

 

Apparently vendors have been complaining that Intel hasn't been very forthcoming about the licensing and certification process, and that they are holding up things intentionally while cherry picking the vendors that they will certify and license (it was Apple that got Intel to develop it in the first place when it was called "Lightpeak.")

[gadibbleiii]

I bought two Drobo 5D enclosures and stocked them with 3TB WD Red drives. Each Drobo can hold 5 drives. The Drobo supports Mac Thunderbolt and USB 3.0. If a drive is about to run out of space or is unstable, warning lights and software indicate which drive. It can then be hot-swapped out with a replacement drive. One Drobo is for data and the other my Time Machine backup. The WD Red drives are built for NAS. Drobo web site will give you details on all the products.

 

George