Suggestions for External Hard Drives on my DAW?

[Joe Szymczak]

Hi all,


I am in need of some advice in reference to using external hard drives on my DAW.


Situation: I built my own DAW last October (specs below). At the time I only got two hard drives. One has my OS on it (Windows 7) and Ableton Live 8.2. The second contains my sample library and my Ableton projects. After months of creating sounds, projects, songs, etc my Ableton work is starting to get extensive so I decided to buy a third hard drive to store my self-created music. So I get a hard drive and put it in. However, during installation I noticed that the place where I connect the internal hard drive to the motherboard has a defect. The connection piece on the motherboard is raised up and off of the mother board in relation to the other input slots. I was worried that it was broken. BUT after starting up my computer I successfully initiated and formatted the disk drive and all was golden. Well three days later the hard drive just doesn’t show up anymore on my computer. In my device manager I no longer see the drive.


Problem: Soooo… either the hard drive was bad OR the connection that I noticed during installation is bad. I don’t have a warranty on the hard drive that I bought because didn’t install it right away (I know.. I’m an ass) so I can’t just return it, get another, and check. BUT really I’m worried about the obviously defective connector piece anyway.

Question: Do you have any suggestions on specific models of external hard drives? Would an external hard drive work out in this situation? Which would be a better place for my samples? On the 2nd internal drive where it is now or on the external drive? I need at least 7200 rpm and 500g. On my mother board I have the following ports for the external hard drive:


Rear Panel Ports:
4 x USB 2.0
2 x USB 3.0
2 x IEEE 1394a
2 x eSATA/USB Combo connectors

Internal I/O Connectors:
Onboard USB: 4xUSB2.0
Onboard 1394: 1x 1394a


Thank you!
-Joe



SPECS:

Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-X58A-UD3R LGA 1366 Intel X58 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
Processor: Intel Core i7-950 Bloomfield 3.06GHz 4 x 256KB L2 Cache 8MB L3 Cache LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor BX80601950
Hard Drive 1 (OS): Western Digital Caviar Black WD6401AALS 640GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
Hard Drive 2 (Samples): Western Digital Caviar Black WD6401AALS 640GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
Hard Drive 3 (Broken): Western Digital Caviar Black WD6401AALS 640GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
Ram: CORSAIR XMS3 12GB (6x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model TR3X6G1600C8 G
OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit 1-Pack for System Builders - OEM

 

[Foggy]

Why not get a caddy (USB ?) for the hard drive you suspect is damaged .
If it works in the caddy , then all good you have your external drive at the budget price of a caddy .
If it doesn't work , then it's reasonable to assume the HD took some damage , then just go and buy a hard drive and put it in the caddy .

Best way I can think of finding a remedy at minimum cost .

 

[bandcoach]

Glyph make rock solid external hard drives.

But go with foggy suggests, as it is a cheaper alternative.

 

[Foggy]

Glyph make rock solid external hard drives.

But go with foggy suggests, as it is a cheaper alternative.

It is worth a punt



Looking at the OP's specs , he states eSata connections , never used them , are they a faster reliable option .

 

[bandcoach]

The e stands for external, but otherwise it is a sata connection. so definitely worth getting.

 

[ObiK]

I would go for ahard drive dock and then add hard drives as needed.