I too only buy Lacie for my external USB drives. I like their design, reliability, compatibility (some no-name cases don't mesh too well with Macs, no matter what the packaging says), and they offer good value. I usually keep my eyes on the FutureShop/BB websites and when they have Lacie drives on sale (happens from time to time), I'll order another.
Failed 1TB External Hard disk
- Thread starter Radio_Shack
- Start date
So far i have had very good luck with Drobo's and back ups. ... i pump a bunch of 2 TB or 1.5 TB drives and it is great.
Just an FYI: LaCie does NOT manufacture actual hard drives. They design enclosures and market them. The actual drive comes from any one of the major manufacturers: Toshiba, Hitachi, Fujitsu, Seagate, WD or Samsung. They do seem to use Seagate more often than not however that doesn't mean they use it exclusively, so you might very well be using a WD drive.
No more. Bulk of their products now come with 3 years warranty as of January 2009.
http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=3188
True but if you pick through their line you can still find some with a 5 yr warr.
Their consumer lines (i.e. the ones you buy for personal and small business PCs at computer shops) are all 3 years now.
Hey, you guys are really freaking me out. I have 3 Maxtor HD's. Please tell me they will all live a long and happy life.
No big surprise. Just like memory cards and DVD discs have a hundred brand names but just 3 manufacturers make them all.
Yet just like large household appliances, there are different specifications set down for different manufacturers and the resulting product generally has a better profile and repair record. Just like tires, power tools, and so on and so on and so on.
There are no different specifications. LaCie (or anyone else for that matter) goes to manufacturer X, orders X amount of their X drive, then puts it in the nice enclosures and sells it with a one year warranty. The only thing that could remotely be different, and this is not always the case, the drive in the LaCie enclosure might have an OEM serial number to make sure the end user cannot circumvent the LaCie warranty and seek warranty from the drive manufacturer. But that usually only happens with big system manufacturers (Apple, Dell etc.) and not with external enclosure designers simply because their volumes are not that high to grant the changes.
Other than that, the drive would be identical to the ones sold as retail kits.
If you use a PC, download PCWizard from here:
http://www.cpuid.com/pcwizard.php
It will tell you all that there ever is about your PC, including the manufacturer of each of your HDs with their serial numbers. Just connect your external drives and check to see what's inside.
Maxtor went Bankrupt
Seagate then bought them because they needed more manufacturing capacity.
.......I still won't buy a Maxtor drive.
Maxtor had serious quality issues and went under from it!....
Seagate then bought them because they needed more manufacturing capacity.
.......I still won't buy a Maxtor drive.
Oh yea, the Internal Kits are still 5 years. But they cost significantly more than the bare drive you can get from any number of online retailers. I think aside from the boxed Internal Kits, the rest of their consumer grade HDs are 3 years now.
BB had internal Seagate 1 TB drives you put in a PC or enclosure on sale for $109 with 5 yr warr in Buffalo stores.
Also this week they have Ext Seagate 1 TB Expansion Desktop HDs for $99.99 but I don't know what the warr is.
You can get 1.5 TB bare drives (albeit with 3 year warranty) from NewEgg with free shipping (to states) for $109 right now. I think Canada Computers has them for $120 which is also pretty good price.
And no sales tax for you in NY to boot.
CA, NJ and TN are not so lucky with the tax.had the same problem, I've been looking for another external casing that is sata compatible, so basically mine is still a paper weight
