External hard drive for Xmas gift

[sleipnir]

My wife is the Mac user in our household. She wants an external hard drive. I know nothing about Mac hard drives. She works on a G5 which is a few years old. I think that she can connect USB 2.0 or firewire. Where should I look? What do I need to know? What questions am I not asking?? I'm lost here....

[benos]

She if her machine has Firewire 800. (I'm guessing it will.) If so, then it's a solid notch faster than USB 2.0 or Firewire 400.

Over the years I've bought most major brands of external Firewire drives, and they are all still working.

Google:

Firewire 800 mac external hard drive

... and you'll see lots of worthy results.

[dapribek]

I'm a Mac guy and recently boughtbthisvdrive from Amazon. I'm vey happynwith it and I'm sure your wife would too.

Product Description

From the Manufacturer

MiniMax™ Desktop

Hard Drive - 1TB

The Iomega MiniMax Desktop Hard Drive adds stackable storage for your Apple Mac mini! You can also share drive access using the Mac mini with Snow Leopard (Apple products sold separately). The MiniMax includes 2 fast FireWire 800 interfaces, a USB 2.0 hub, plus a FireWire 400 to 800 cable. With multiple interfaces you can easily add other peripherals like a printer or other external storage. Up to 2TB of capacity with HFS+ format allows you to easily save all your music, photos, and videos. Complete software suite that includes Iomega QuikProtect, Trend Micro Smart Surfing for Mac (12 month subscription), and MozyHome Online Backup service (2 GB free) - all free via easy download. The MiniMax also comes with a three year warranty with product registration.

[sleipnir]

She if her machine has Firewire 800. (I'm guessing it will.) If so, then it's a solid notch faster than USB 2.0 or Firewire 400.

Over the years I've bought most major brands of external Firewire drives, and they are all still working.

Google:

Firewire 800 mac external hard drive

... and you'll see lots of worthy results.

Ignorant PC Person Here,

How do I tell if it is Firewire 800 or 400?

I distracted the wife momentarily and got to her baby. Upder Applications/Utilities/System Profiler/Hardware/Firewire (whew!) I found this information? Looks to me like Firewire 800 (highlighted), but what do I know? I know 800 is backwards compatible, but if she can handle 800, that's the way I want to go.

FireWire Bus:

Maximum Speed: Up to 800 Mb/sec

OEM SATA Device 00:

Manufacturer: OWC

Model: 0x0

GUID: 0x30E007E01D011C

Maximum Speed: Up to 400 Mb/sec

Connection Speed: Up to 400 Mb/sec

Sub-units:

OEM SATA Device 00 Unit:

Unit Software Version: 0x10483

Unit Spec ID: 0x609E

Firmware Revision: 0x110

Product Revision Level:

Sub-units:

OEM SATA Device 00 SBP-LUN:

Capacity: 232.89 GB

Removable Media: Yes

BSD Name: disk2

Mac OS 9 Drivers: Yes

Partition Map Type: APM (Apple Partition Map)

S.M.A.R.T. status: Not Supported

Volumes:

BACKUP #2:

Capacity: 232.76 GB

Available: 71.34 GB

Writable: Yes

File System: Journaled HFS+

BSD Name: disk2s10

Mount Point: /Volumes/BACKUP #2

Unknown Device:

Manufacturer: Unknown

Model: Unknown

Maximum Speed: Up to 400 Mb/sec

Connection Speed: Unknown

Edited December 1, 2010 by sleipnir

[maineshootah]

She if her machine has Firewire 800. (I'm guessing it will.) If so, then it's a solid notch faster than USB 2.0 or Firewire 400.

Over the years I've bought most major brands of external Firewire drives, and they are all still working.

Google:

Firewire 800 mac external hard drive

... and you'll see lots of worthy results.

Ignorant PC Person Here,

How do I tell if it is Firewire 800 or 400?

See the item for sale in the link..

http://www.amazon.com/Tripp-Lite-F017-010-Firewire-Hi-speed/dp/B000AAZQLS

The connector on the left is Firewire 800, Firewire 400 is on the right.

The ports should be on the back (right) of the G5.

Edited December 1, 2010 by maineshootah