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Right I've got myself in a bit of a puzzle as the best way to go. I need several HDs for several purposes, and as it's been a bit since I bought any, I wasn't aware they came in different colours (Western Digital, I'm looking at you), and since the last three I bought have now all died, and were all made by Seagate, they're off the list.
Firstly, I need three 3 TB USB3 external drives. These will store films / videos, music as FLAC, and a Time Machine backup respectively.
Then, I need several internal drives to be swapped in/out of a caddy for off-site backup, both of the music / videos, and my several TBs of pictures (which will be stored primarily on my 6 TB Lacie beast Thunderbolted to my iMac). As these are off-site backups, I'm assuming the best idea would be to go for several 1 TB disks, rather than few larger disks, so that if one refuses to fire up I lose less.
So, who makes the best value external drives, and who makes the most reliable internal drives? And, is my thinking remotely logical?
TBH I'm of the opinion that the are no bad harddrive manufacturers any more (not the big brands anyway), and would suggest that maybe the way there handled had more to do with there failures than the actual make.
By all mean ignore this first statement, as everyone has there own personal opinion... hdd's are no different
What your actually talking about it doing with the HDD is not a backup solution, it a storage and data transference solution. Which no doubt works for your requirements, and I don't criticize that.
What I would suggest is that with that much data you should be investing in a proper backup solution to go along side this or maybe to replace it. You have so much data there, that a single accidental drop of a hdd (ok there a more robust nowadays) or say a theft would leave you in a real mess. A tape backup with decent software is really what you should be looking at (I can't suggest an particular kit), but initial investment (tape drive) might not be the cheapest option. The tape will be easier to transport, less liable to damage & allow your to keep several version of backup.
Just my opinion feel free to ignore.
Did you see this thread? [url= http://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/cryptolocker-please-be-aware ]Cryptolocker virus[/url] 'could' cripple your current setup - ok so you've a mac.. but it an issue that will only become worse as time goes on
NINE TB? Holy crap!
Incidentally what music is it? Do you have it on some other media too ie CD?
Work in the industry, Seagate Barracuda in 1tb, 2tb and 3tb flavours all have super low return rates.
External HDD wise, western digital passport ultra and seagate backup plus are huge sellers again with less than 1% return rate.
WD Red are designed for NAS boxes so cost more for their (apparently) extended lifespan. Yellow is enterprise storage which presumably is a slightly better version of red perhaps designed for more reads/writes and blue is their HA range. I suspect Red would be fine for just backing up stuff.
TomsHardware had some data from a Russian HDD data recovery firm that made interesting reading regarding HDD makes.
Consider lower rpm drives (less heat & vibration, better reliability) if you can take the performance hit.
Thanks guys.
Yes, lots of music, all stored uncompressed, and as I have a hifi system that plays 192 kHz / 24 bit music, I'd quite like to keep plenty space free in that regard (and no, this isn't the thread for a tedious discussion whether or not that's worthwhile 😉 ).
Similarly, whilst most of my video is SD from DVDs, obviously HD is the go these days, which takes up considerably more space, so I'll need plenty of room for expansion there. I do have the originals for a lot of this, but have no intention of re-ripping it all again - I'm sure you can imagine what a job it was the first time. I'm also toying with slowly transferring my hundreds of LPs to HD audio too, and that is a task I only ever want to do once!
I would consider tape, but the cost is high, and whilst not enterprise level, I was thinking two backups on site, plus one lot sat in my office drawer at work should be enough unless Adelaide gets nuked! And in that case, most of the photos (obviously the most irreplaceable of all the data disscused here) are in full res files on Flickr. Despite their recent arsing around, they're yet to pull the plug on it!
So the answer was just buy from the main manufacturers and I'll just be unlucky if it goes pete tong?
Oh, and the reason for this: my six year old PC with about six internal and six external drives of various vintages and sizes is definitely at the end of its life, and having been using a MacBook Air for the past couple of years, for right or for wrong, I'm definitely sold on a iMac so little internal space. This also has something to do with a new arrival about to steal my home office for a nursery, and MrsZ not wanting a PC that looks like a PC at my new office in the corner of the dining room. Most of these external HDs can sit wired into my MacMini neatly tucked away in the TV cabinet out of sight.
FWIW, I just bought WD Red because it's designed for the sort of NAS work that may be of benefit to you too.
RHDD caddies - well we've used Startech rugged ones most recently, as they're sturdier than the cheap plastic ones & include some basic shock-mounts inside.
WD reds are good, you could even consider a NAS box with a RAID setup, or even RAID within the PC itself.
RAID mirror for example so you have an exact duplicate of all your stuff, if one drive fails, you simply replace and the other drive rebuilds the RAID 😀
So, update...
3x 3TB WD Red winging their way from Amazon
I just need to find some decent enclosures now, and ones that will take 3 TB disks, which is a trap I nearly fell in to. Either 3x 1 disk, or 1x 2 disk (stripe RAID with OSX Disk Utility), and 1x 1 disk. Any favourites?