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Hard Drives
Wasn’t sure where to post this so I thought I’d ask the people closest to the issue.
What kinds of hard drives are you guys using? We typically buy the LaCie Rugged drives in bulk and use them to dump media in the field, store old client projects/files, etc. They’re cheap, readily available at any Mac store and seemingly tough.
However, lately I’ve heard horror stories about the actual internal drives — that they’re no-name cheapos that LaCie buys from the lowest gray-market bidder. It seems everyone I talk to, including my local Mac repair guy, is telling us to stay away from LaCie.
I’ve never had one break but I’m definitely worried enough to change.
What kinds of external drives are you guys using out there to move files around?
Thanks!
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4 Replies
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All hard drives fail — it’s a matter of when, not if.
Every piece of advice here on which brand to buy will be anecdotal, and should include the caveat “your mileage may vary.”
Whether you buy Lacie, G-Tech, or bare drives with Wiebetech drive docks, back up anything that’s important to you. If you only have one copy of a file, you are a single equipment failure away from having no copies.
Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events -
“All hard drives fail — it’s a matter of when, not if.”
I’ve had them all fail, usually the day before I have to output.
is it important? Have at least 2 copies and a Raid 5 or better.
Last, ‘about two years’ is when google found that enterprise class hard drives tend to malfunction more frequently. Citation
Best,
Jeff G
Apple Master Trainer
Avid Cert. Instructor DS/MC
Avid & Color Videos Vasst.com
Compressor Essentials Lynda.com -
Excellent point and very true!
In an effort to have as many things stacked in my favor as possible, I want to stay away from drives that fail more than others. Every time I pull a LaCie Rugged out at a shoot people cringe and I’m wondering if the whole world knows something I don’t.
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LaCie got a bad reputation because some of their products failed, but I don’t really know if LaCie-branded drives empirically fail more often than other manufacturers and integrators.
I have this (totally unsubstantiated, so take with a huge grain of salt) theory: LaCie used to be the external hard drive sold in Apple retail stores, so I’d guess they had a much higher penetration in video production and post-production shops than other brands as we (as an industry) were using them like big floppy disks. With LaCie over-represented in our market, a normal and acceptable failure rate would seem like an epidemic.
But back to my point — all hard drives fail (and as Jeff pointed out, they only ever fail when you need them). Seagate got a bad reputation when a batch of drives failed, too. I owned tons of Seagates. I had a couple from the bad run, and they failed. That doesn’t automatically mean the rest of my Seagates will fail tomorrow, nor does it guarantee that my Hitachis won’t fail tomorrow.
Portable hard drives have the added stresses of constant shock. Personally, I use SSDs for my portable drives now to reduce the likelihood that the drive will fail from shock, but even that still doesn’t mean that the enclosure or controller is invincible.
Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events
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