LaCie D2 Quadra 2 TB
Tuesday, February 16th, 2010 at
12:02 pm
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| LaCie 2 TB D2 Quadra Hard Disk eSATA/FireWire800/FireWire400/USB 2.0 External Hard Drive 301500U | |||||||||||||||
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| The d2 Quadra is fully loaded with all the best interfaces—eSATA 3Gb/s, FireWire 800, FireWire 400, and USB 2.0—this all-in-one professional hard disk offers universal connectivity for PC and Mac users. For easy setup, the LaCie Setup Assistant helps format your disk according to your needs. Perfect for digital content creation, audio/video editing, DVD authoring, Web animation, etc., the d2 Quadra can handle multiple demanding professional tasks. It can be daisy-chained via FireWire or connected to your DV camera and is even bootable in FireWire for Mac and in eSATA for Mac/PC. With the LaCie Shortcut Button***, you can easily launch any application in one push, such as the included Genie Backup Assistant software with data restore for Windows or Intego Backup Assistant software with data restore for Mac. The unique, fanless aluminum heat sink design with 60% more surface area for heat dissipation keeps it quiet and safe. Box Contents: LaCie d2 Quadra Hard Disk, SATA-to-eSATA cable, FireWire 800 (9-to-9 pin) cable, FireWire 400 (6-to-6 pin) cable, USB 2.0 cable (USB 1.1 compatible), External power supply, Drive stand for upright desktop use, LaCie Setup Assistant; LaCie Utilities (preloaded) Genie Backup Assistant software with data restore for Windows 2000, XP, Vista; Intego Backup Assistant software with data restore for Mac OS X 10.4 |
- Quadruple interface for full PC/Mac compatibility
- Sturdy aluminum d2 heat sink and ergonomic design
- Fast burst transfer rates: up to 115MB/s** (eSATA)
- Genie and Intego Backup Assistant included
- Apple Time Machine compatible
 Very nice external drive |
| Review Date: December 17, 2008 |
| Reviewer: RCP, Texas |
| This is a newer version of an earlier model that is very similar (LaCie 301827U d2 Quadra 1 TB eSATA/FireWire800/FireWire400/USB 2.0 External Hard Disk). I talked to a salesman at J&R Computers and he told me the only difference is that this model has 32MB cache and the older model has 16MB cache. The older model has over 100 reviews so you may want to look there as well.
COST: This costs more than some other external hard drives of the same capacity but there are good reasons: You are paying for the multiple interfaces (eSATA, Firewire 400, Firewire 800 with second daisy-chain port, USB 2.0) and the complete set of cables that come with it. The eSATA support is 3Gbits compared to 1.5Gbits for less expensive drives. The well-constructed case may also add some cost. I'd like to think that the included disk is of a higher quality too, but have no way to judge. PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS: The drive has been working fine for about a month now. It feels VERY sturdy. It is heavier than other external drives I am familiar with. It is only slightly warm to the touch when running. The all-metal construction with the exterior ridges seems to do a good job of keeping it cool. It is VERY quiet. If not for the blue light I couldn't tell that it was turned on. Even when I put my ear right next to it I can hear very little. Even when it is actively seeking it is basically silent. There is no fan. It does make a few noises when starting up or shutting down. I THINK one of the noises I hear is the heads parking and unparking. I am using it as a USB 2.0 device right now. I have an eSATA card on order and will update this review to let you know how that goes. UPDATE: The drive works just fine when connected via eSATA. I have not done any performance experiments. It does have a slot in the back for one of those Kensington cable locks. I didn't see this mentioned in the sales literature, although other external drive manufacturers make a big deal of it. There are a lot of those locks available, especially if you consider the clones. The following is probably the best: Kensington 64343 MicroSaver DS Notebook Computer Lock with Keys (PC/Mac). Oh, yes, one more thing. The blue light reminds me of HAL in 2001 Space Odyssey, except that HAL had a red eye. |
| Great Piece of Equipment |
| Review Date: January 28, 2009 |
| Reviewer: zugzwang, |
| I finally received my LaCie hard drive. This is a well made piece of equipment - it has a solid, heavy construction and an elegant appearance.
I was relieved that the light is a pleasant shade of blue and is not bright at all, unlike other hard drive lights with blindingly bright LEDs. This drive is not silent, though it is fairly quiet. I can clearly hear the drive running from several feet away but it's not disturbing. The fellow who said that he can't hear it with his ear right next to it, well the drive must not have been running at that moment. I'm using this as a Time Machine backup drive. With a Firewire 400 connection to my old G5 iMac, it backed up 270 GBs in under 5 hours. At first the Time Machine backup was dog slow. Then I remembered to turn off my virus software, AND most important, I changed the Spotlight preferences by selecting the Privacy tab and adding my backup drive to prevent Spotlight from indexing/searching it. After that the backup process just flew! After writing data for 5 hours the drive was warm, but not hot. The aluminum heat-sink case seems to cool the drive very well. Eventually I will attach it to an Apple Airport Extreme via USB to use it as a network drive for wireless use by my laptop as well. Unfortunately the Airport Extreme wireless router does not provide a Firewire 400/800 connection - just ethernet or the much slower USB 2.0. I'll provide an update on the performance at that time. All in all, I am quite happy with this purchase. |
| Quiet, Capable, Cool n' Capacious "Quadra" |
| Review Date: September 5, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Spockter Seuss, Vulcan's Mullberry Street |
| Our circumstances:
-- Bought this puppy from Amazon for my wife's new (2009) Mac Mini that we recently purchased. -- Amazon delivered it overnight for just a $3.99 premium over the free shipping and it arrived well packed and on time. -- Though our Mini is the low end model with but 1GB RAM and a 120GB internal HD, the next model up, which features a 320GB drive and 2GB RAM, costs $200 more and was otherwise identical! I upgraded our RAM for $45 then bought this LaCie d2 drive for $153 and now have a 1.12TB Mac Mini for less than Apple's much more space limited 'upgrade' model--an especially good deal if you factor in tax savings! Pros: -- Quality! Feels really well made with high quality 3-way on/off/auto switch, well anchored ports and--and this was key for me--*all 4* cables that you might need--USB 2.0, eSATA, and both Firewire 400 & 800--a rarity! And... all are of reasonable length (ie., none of those 7-inchers some cheapo manufactures include). Quite heavy and definitely not what you'd consider casually portable, esp. with its required power brick (though it's rather svelte for a brick!). I consider this a positive for desktop applications. -- Quiet! Have it sitting behind the monitor and it's barely perceptible. Much, *much* quieter, for example, than the Fantom 250GB external drive I have on my Windows machine. -- Cool! Thick, heavy aluminum case is fanless and ribbed... pretty much a hollowed n' hefty heat sink that was just barely warm after transferring our 90GB of data... seems equally fast or faster than the internal drive... and way faster than the USB bus-powered Western Digital 250GB drive I'd had hooked up earlier; we're now attached via the included high quality FW 800 cable. BTW: Set up with the Mac was a complete no brainer... plugged it in and it asked if we wanted to optimize it for Mac or Windows/Linux... one click and about a minute later... Voila! Ready to rock! Furthermore--and this may be very important to some of the greener Mac owners--this drive reliably auto-powers down and then rapidly spins back up when you wake your Mac; apparently some of the currently available so-called "Mac friendly" Western Digital drives fail to power down & back up automatically, particularly when connected via Firewire (check the reviews!). -- Capacious! Comes in around 936GB, the usual... not sure what to do with all this space, so tried turning on the Time Machine feature of Leopard and no troubles there. -- Comely! The brushed aluminum exterior is refined with no sharp edges/burrs and a fairly close match to the Mini's, though admittedly, the ribs do lend it a different, slightly more 'aggressive' vibe. Cons: -- Cost... and this just a minor gripe... On Newegg and Amazon these days you can easily find 1TB drives for under a hundred bucks, though admittedly, these are not quad interface models with all cables and back up software--and perhaps more importantly, did not enjoy the positive reviews this drive's garnered. -- Reliability? Too early to tell... will hope for best but so far no signs it's gonna 'byte' the dust! And if it does... well then C'est LaCie! (heh!) Summary: I highly recommend this drive... especially for those of you with eSATA or Firewire 800 ports who want to take advantage of all that extra bandwidth, and/or those of you out there with Macs who--like me--*really* appreciate a hassle-free experience. ~ UPDATE 1/1/2010: Three months in now with no problems--still runs much quieter than Tiger's rapidly reversing Escalade, faster than his fleeing sponsors and more reliably than The Enquirer's coverage of his 'front nine'... 'Cie ya'! ~ |
| Reliable product, above-and-beyond customer service! |
| Review Date: April 24, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Mark Drury, Colorado Springs, CO USA |
| I bought this drive in July 2008 and it worked flawlessly for 8 months until I confused my wife's laptop power supply with the drive's power supply, thereby showing the drive 19V instead of the correct 12V. Not good. The big blue light forever after slowly blinked on/off repeatedly and the drive wouldn't spin up. It was dead.
The bright side to this is that when I e-mailed Lacie Tech Support - being very upfront about my boneheaded mistake and just wondering if the drive might be fixable - they still covered the unit under it's 3-year warranty! WOW! They initially sent me a new power supply free of charge, thinking it might possibly be that (I was sure it wasn't), then after that didn't do it, they gave me authorization to return it to be repaired free of charge. I paid to ship it to them, they replaced the internal drive (a 500GB Seagate Barracuda, I might add) and shipped it back to me within a couple days. So, for only the $12 I paid for shipping, I got a virtually new drive in under a week...which they didn't have to do, since it was obviously negligence on my part that fried the drive. So, I have to strongly recommend this Lacie drive both because it's a reliable and well-made product and it's backed up by above-and-beyond customer service! |
| sturdy, attractive drive |
| Review Date: March 13, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Noah, Oakland, CA |
| I've had this drive for about a month now, and so far it's performed perfectly. I have a Macbook, and I use this drive with Time Machine. When I bought it, it was definitely more expensive than other 1TB drives, but I wanted to spend the extra 30 bucks or so for 3 reasons:
(1) It has all the different connection options (USB2, Firewire 400 & 800, eSATA). (2) I'm a sucker for the metal casing, which I find much more attractive than pretty much all the other options out there. Also worth noting is that the drive's feel matches its look -- it is heavy and very solid. (3) This hard drive's very similar predecessor, the LaCie 301827U d2 Quadra 1 TB eSATA/FireWire800/FireWire400/USB 2.0 External Hard Disk, had one of the best average star ratings of any hard drive (please note that when I bought this particular drive, there were only a few reviews up on this product page, so I trusted the 100+ positive reviews of the previous model). Since my purchase it looks like some 1-star reviews have been written about this drive (at the time f this writing, there are 4, 3 of which state that their drive has failed). The one-star reviews of this product make me nervous that my drive will crap out after a year -- but honestly, look at the reviews for ANY hard drive on the market, and you'll find those same 1-star reviews. I'll update this review if I do experience any problems in the future. For now, I couldn't be happier! |
Tagged with: 301500u • disk • drive • esatafirewire800firewire400usb • external • hard • LaCie • quadra
Filed under: $200+ • 2 TB • Desktop • Firewire • LaCie • PC-Mac • USB2 • eSata
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