External Hardrive(s)

It depends on the interface, size and capacity you'd like to get, and of course how you'll be using it. Most people tend to buy a ready-to-use USB HDD, but those often are fitted with the very cheapest drives of their manufacturers. If you plan to keep the drive running for 24x7 that's not a good idea.

Good solutions are:

- 2.5" generic USB drive, fi. Samsung S2 1TB. Cheap, fairly reliable, and being powered over USB means this drive shuts down when your PC shuts down.

- 3.5" generic USB drive, fi. WD Elements 2TB or Samsung Story Station 2TB (USB 3.0). These drives are mainly used because of their price. You have to turn them off if you shut down the PC, or expect to replace them sooner rather than later.

- 3.5" WD20EURS drive in enclosure of your choice. This is an AV-GP drive, which means it's capable of running 24x7. As such it's slightly more expensive than the standard drives. But it's much cheaper than a true enterprise drive like the WD RAID drivers or a Seagate Constellation drive.

You have a Mac Mini so FireWire is definitely the way to go for a number of reasons. Firstly, you can daisy-chain when you add more. Second, the speed is faster than USB 2.0 as well as more stable. 

I'm going to disagree with LeonvB and say there is no reason you should ever buy a pre-built hard drive. Why? Because, as you've noticed, $100 or so gets you a 1 TB drive where you can buy an enclosure and a 2 TB drive for the same price.

As for which ones to go with, as cyberspider suggested Macally makes a great enclosure. If you want FireWire there is no one better. The only question is do you want FireWire 400 or FireWire 800. 400 is (technically) slower than USB 2.0 but it's still a better data connection, in my opinion. FireWire 800 is definitely faster than USB 2.0, however, the enclosures are usually $20 more.

When it comes to drives, to be honest they're all about the same. Personally, I prefer the Samsung 2TB drives to the Western Digital models. And I wouldn't buy Seagate for at least a year. I say at least a year because they just bought Samsung's hard drive division and I give it a year before the transition is complete and I can consider trusting Seagate again as of late their drives have been crap.

All told, if you buy a case and drive you can build your own external 2 TB drive for between $100 and $150, depending on the interface you choose. And, as always, Newegg.com or Amazon.com for purchasing. Right now, pricing on both is pretty much the exact same. I tend to go Amazon because I'm a Prime member and I get free second day.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Abovetheair 

@Doug, what Samsung hard drive are you using?

I can't tell you the exact model but it's a 2 TB Spinpoint. I believe the drive speed is either 5,400 RPM or 5,900 RPM. Either way, it's one of their lower powered drives. I've found it to be very reliable so far.