LaCie Skwarim Blue 60 GB

Advantages: Probably the biggest drive for consumer use
Disadvantages: Takes some time to defragment or format

...The LaCie d2 ‘Big Disk’ is the fastest and biggest external hard disk drive that I’ve ever seen for consumer use. I handle so much data for the three businesses that I run that I needed a back up drive that could handle everything I had. This meant backing up entire, built in, drives and imaging them to the LaCie d2 ‘Big Disk’ (as they now call it). LaCie now manufacture even bigger capacity disks but they have a price to match, this one is available at around £250.00 on-line. It’s heavier than you imagine when you actually get to take it out of the box, but what superb build quality, so solid and robust. It runs quietly as the casing acts as the heat sink, no noisy fans. Only when you’re transferring packets of data do you occasionally hear the faint sound of disk access. A blue ‘on/off’ button is the only control built... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful

Advantages: Very quick with firewire, quiet (no fan), sturdy and well-built, 4-6-pin firewire lead, looks cool!
Disadvantages: No backup/partitioning software included

...could afford and see this as a sound investment because you can never have enough solid HD storage! First impressions out of the box: quite heavy, nice tactile anti-scratch metallic finish (for dissipating heat), looks cool with glowing blue switch (like an eye!), clear instructions, AND a big plus for laptop 4-pin Firewire users, the package includes a 6-to-4-pin lead!! After formatting it to NTFS which takes a while with 250GB as you can imagine, and doing some file transfer tests, I can confirm that this disk flies along and is very quiet. Compared to my laptop's 4200rpm speed, the LaCie's 7200rpm speed is a revelation! It is of a fanless design, and the low hum it makes is easily drowned out by the noise of my laptop fans. Some example timings then: using a 560MB file, Windows XP Home, NTFS filing system, with write-caching turned off... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful

Advantages: So easy to set up
Disadvantages: Firewire not the most popular port

...I chose an external hard drive over an internal drive as when I chose it my pc at the time had the maximum number of hard drives, which would fit in my pc. However I still needed space and felt it was a waste to take out a smaller drive to replace for a larger one so as a last resort I looked at the external option. It was then I saw LaCie and the d2 range and I knew I had to have it. I looked at higher capacity LaCie drives, but at the time I purchased it, the 120 Gb was the highest one, which also seemed to have a reasonable and worthwhile price. Now after owning for over two years I still find it ample space!! I found the drive simple to connect, I only had to load on the software (drivers), plug it in and follow the simple instructions and it is completely formatted to your chosen specifications. Also once it has been formatted... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful