LaCie d2 3TB w MacBook Pro Questions

[NoiseRoom]

I've been looking into the LaCie d2 3TB thunderbolt external 7200 RPM hard drive as an option for the audio drive for my MacBook Pro.

I was wondering if anyone has experience with this drive. Also, does anyone have any thoughts on partitioning the drive? I'm looking to store my sessions on here as well as my samples.

Thanks in advance,

Steve

[Craig F]

Personally I think they are poor quality hardware.

Partitioning would be counter productive. It makes the heads have to jump back and forth when there is a call to load the sample from the drive.

[Darryl Ramm]

You never want samples on the same drive as audio/session files. Putting them on a different portions on the same drive is worse than on the same partition.

I'd also be looking at SSD options, spinning HDD are so last century.

Lacie also make Thunderbold RAID drives with two HDD (http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10573]) that you can use a JBOD and put sampels and audio/session files on separate drives. They may make an SSD version of that as well, not sure. Or you can leave your sample files on the boot/system drive (especially if its an SSD).

What type of MacBook Pro? And what current boot/system drive does it have? If it is and non-retina MacBook Pro, I'd be sticking two Samsung 840 Pro or Evo SSDs inside of it. (or upgrading the boot/system drive to one and using it for samples as well).

[NoiseRoom]

OK, so it looks like SSD is a better option.

Can anyone recommend an external SSD Thunderbolt drive?

While I do almost all of my work at home, I'm trying to put together a remote system so I can record anywhere. Realistically I would do this only 2 to 6 times per year.

Thanks

[JFreak]

Originally Posted by Craig F

Partitioning would be counter productive. It makes the heads have to jump back and forth when there is a call to load the sample from the drive.

Yes, if you use the drive for two functions simultaneously. Never a good idea.

But if you only use it for one real work and have the rest of the drive for backup or whatever, then partitioning will make it perform better (reduces latency because heads won't have to jump back and forth). You can pretty much blindly set it up as 50-50 for real work and storage, and you should see benefits.

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by OnlineRock

OK, so it looks like SSD is a better option.

Can anyone recommend an external SSD Thunderbolt drive?

While I do almost all of my work at home, I'm trying to put together a remote system so I can record anywhere. Realistically I would do this only 2 to 6 times per year.

Thanks

So Lacie own SSD options include http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10549 (these are not silent, be aware of the cooling fan noise). and http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10599

I might buy these SSDs (don't own one), I'm not a huge fan of all Lacie's HDDs but their SSDs seem OK, if a little overpriced (welcome to the captive Apple thunderbolt market...).

You are paying an apple tax for any of these Thundrbolt external drives. Other folks (here and elsewhere) have also repoeted buying a low end HDD based lacie little Big disk and swapping in their own 2.5" SSDs (and again I'd use Samsung 840 Evo or Pro).

If I did not need a fully portable external Firewire SSD drive. I'd get one one these 4x trays and install those Samsung SSDdrives. http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...ure_Empty.html I like the 4x 2.5" drive capacity.

There are questions with any external SSDs and whether they can support TRIM (used to efficiently reclaim free space on the SSD, how much it helps/is needed at all depends on the SSD). It would be nice to confirm that third party TRIM Enabler utility on OS X enables TRIM OK on a Samsung drive when used in different Thunderbolt enclosures (anybody want to check?). The lack of TRIM support is an issue with USB and FireWire external SSDs.. well really only with USB3 as its otherwise fast enough where TRIM support gets more intersting.

But again, exactly what Macbook Pro (date/code/model from System Information utility) do you have? If it is a non-Retina model with an internal optical drive I'd be stuffing a Samsung 840 Pro or Evo (not just an old "840" non Pro or non Evo) SSD in the optical bay (use an optical bay caddy from OWC or similar, buy the Samsung drives anywhere) and maybe replacing the current boot/system drive as well (what boot drive do you currently have? Again from System Info.) That gets you maximum SATA III performance (on recent MBP), guaranteed TRIM operation and no dicking around with external boxes and cables. If you still occasionally need an optical drive external ones are cheap, or you can put the current one in a external chassis.

Darryl

[b mcgibney]

Have to say I hAVE USED LACIE drives for hundreds of hours with only one failure in 13 years

[JFreak]

Originally Posted by b mcgibney

Have to say I hAVE USED LACIE drives for hundreds of hours with only one failure in 13 years

Zero failures here. Lost count how many Lacies I've used but that is a huge number. Now that said I don't like all of their new models because they have fans. I've only used the passive cooled ones and they've worked like a charm.

Now that said; the early D2 models were notorious of their weak FW400 connectors. It was a non-issue for me, because I know how to handle things without breaking them, but for sure that was something that I was always a little worried about.

But still, zero failures. I could think of buying more Lacie, once the time is right for a nice Thunderbolt SSD with high enough capacity. Currently those cost way too much.

[Craig F]

I've had a lot of port failures with Lacie drives.
Plug and leave is probably OK, but plug/un-plug repeatedly is were Iv'e had my problems

[NoiseRoom]

Thanks again for the replies.

My Macbook Pro is non-Retina model with an internal optical drive but I don't want to add an internal drive as I won't be using it that often for recording and when I do, want to be able to plug the external drive into my Mac Pro at home to work on the sessions.