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dustinbrown · 2009-02-11, 00:00

I'm in the market for a hard drive for my Mac Mini media server and I'd like some recommendations. Looking for something reliable, and quiet. Not looking to spend a grip of cash on a hard drive though.

A buddy of mine was telling me you can buy a raw hard drive and an enclosure with ethernet for less money than you would pay to buy it all in one.

Suggestions are appreciated. Thanks.

krypt2nite · 2009-02-11, 00:20

This is possibly a subjective subject, but I have 10 Terabytes of these guys http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...6822136317

Used alot, always on, quiet, low power consuming, and efficient drives. Highly reccomended. Nerd

**Aenima99x** · 2009-02-11, 02:34

krypt2nite Wrote:This is possibly a subjective subject, but I have 10 Terabytes of these guys http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...6822136317

Used alot, always on, quiet, low power consuming, and efficient drives. Highly reccomended.

+1 on these....I've got 3 currently and will be adding more soon. Nod

harryzimm · 2009-02-11, 02:42

+1 also, using a couple atm, much cooler than my other tb drives.

cheers.

david81 · 2009-02-11, 04:36

Another happy user here for that drive. I'm currently filling it up with all of my DVDs as they are converted to h.264. A long process when you have a few TB of straight DVD rips.

kizer · 2009-02-11, 17:27

I have 2 500gig drives of the same sitting in a DNS 323. They are super quit and spin down when your not abusing them. Rumor has it they slow down to 5400rpm opposed to staying at 7200rpm they take a second to recover up to full speed so its not instant access when you need to use them at max speed. However I've not personally seen any issues.

I can easily move files across my network at 10,000kbs and I'm sure it would be faster if I had a gigabit network. The drives perform well so far from what I can tell and read. Some people in some NAS setups have reported that the drive doesn't hibernate very well with certain firm wares, but works for me. Wink

dtviewer · 2009-02-11, 17:39

kizer Wrote:I have 2 500gig drives of the same sitting in a DNS 323. They are super quit and spin down when your not abusing them. Rumor has it they slow down to 5400rpm opposed to staying at 7200rpm they take a second to recover up to full speed so its not instant access when you need to use them at max speed. However I've not personally seen any issues.

I can easily move files across my network at 10,000kbs and I'm sure it would be faster if I had a gigabit network. The drives perform well so far from what I can tell and read. Some people in some NAS setups have reported that the drive doesn't hibernate very well with certain firm wares, but works for me.

I use a DNS 321 NAS with 1tb drives and am very happy.
(About to buy a second)

dustinbrown · 2009-02-11, 18:13

Thanks guys, sounds like the WD Caviar Green is the way to go.

krypt2nite · 2009-02-11, 18:23

dustinbrown Wrote:Thanks guys, sounds like the WD Caviar Green is the way to go.

Yeah, definitely the best storage hard drives you can find. Like said they do spin at 5400-7200RPM but it's not a problem if you are just using them for storage.

kizer · 2009-02-11, 19:15

5400 isn't bad for storage at all and they do spin up. I've just read many times that they are not the greatest for high demand and for some OS's for booting. However if you where to install these in an Xbox they would be perfect because they are low speed and don't generate much heat. However if I recall I believe they are all SATA and the Xbox uses IDE.

Don't let my talk of them being not good for OS's or booting up. I have no testing conducted and many report they are just fine.

Here are some more reviews just for your research.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLis...ital+green

Quick link to all the reviews of the 1TB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductRev...6822136317

dustinbrown · 2009-02-11, 22:55

What I think I'm going to do is put one of those WD's in a miniStack enclosure and put my Mac Mini on top of that.

I'm branching away from the original point of this thread (and this forum for that matter), but my next question is on implementation. The Mac Mini is the primary media server, so I planned on connecting the external drive to the Mini via USB2. But I've also got a Windows XP laptop that I would like to access the music on that drive via Wi-Fi.

My understanding is that OS X can access a NTFS drive, but Windows XP generally cannot access a HFS drive. So I planned on NTFS, despite the fact that my server is a Mac, purely because I want the option to access the drive in Windows.

Is USB the best way to go if I want to access the drive with multiple machines? I planned on just sharing the drive so other computers on my network could access it.

krypt2nite · 2009-02-12, 02:02

dustinbrown Wrote:What I think I'm going to do is put one of those WD's in a miniStack enclosure and put my Mac Mini on top of that.

I'm branching away from the original point of this thread (and this forum for that matter), but my next question is on implementation. The Mac Mini is the primary media server, so I planned on connecting the external drive to the Mini via USB2. But I've also got a Windows XP laptop that I would like to access the music on that drive via Wi-Fi.

My understanding is that OS X can access a NTFS drive, but Windows XP generally cannot access a HFS drive. So I planned on NTFS, despite the fact that my server is a Mac, purely because I want the option to access the drive in Windows.

Is USB the best way to go if I want to access the drive with multiple machines? I planned on just sharing the drive so other computers on my network could access it.

With USB you will be limited bandwidth wise, so I honestly suggest looking at some esata options. You can find a nicely priced external esata enclosure that probably comes with a pci-esata bracket also. However I'm not familiar with mac minis and it looks like in order to achieve this with that PC you will need to do some modding =( http://www.erebos.net/articles/macmini_e..._esata.php

USB will be fine just don't expect the greatest bandwidth.

TomJensen · 2009-02-12, 04:01

You have 3 speed bottlenecks: wifi throughput, USB throughput, and CPU of host computer. WiFi (even 802.11n) is much slower than USB 2.0, so you can have two concurrent accesses to said USB drive and it shouldn't be a problem, as long as they're not hi-def stuff. I think USB only suffices for a single HD stream, but not sure.

The 3rd bottleneck is the Mac Mini's CPU. If it is maxed out in rendering a 720p movie, then it will get choppy if you hit it with a USB access. So, for both CPU-wise and storage interface-wise, I think you'd be OK with SD content, but not HD.

What you're describing is a low-rent solution, which should be OK as long as you're not spending any money. But if you have to buy new hardware anyway, then go with what krypt2nite said and get use eSATA if the Mini can support it. Even then, you'd still have to contend with the CPU bottleneck. The ideal solution is to go with a low-end NAS and avoid the Mini altogether, but that costs more and requires at least a partial wired network.

dustinbrown · 2009-02-12, 18:14

Yeah I have a couple Buffalo Terastation NAS' at work and they're great. The cost is prohibitive for me though. I think I'll take my chances with USB2. 90% of the time I'll be pulling my media via the Mini, which will be directly connected to the drive, so that at least takes care of the Wi-Fi bottleneck. The only thing I would likely stream over Wi-Fi to my PC laptop is music in iTunes. I think I'll be fine.

Thanks again guys, you've been a great help.

-Dustin