Maxtor 1TB Shared Storage
 

I have been checking out a lot of different storage systems:

Medea
Wiebetech
Firmtek

I have come to the conclusion that a case
with a bunch of drives would be my best move really with the use of esata.
Because it would be a lot better to have 3 drives than 8 different drives that cannot connect at the sametime,
or that create a bandwidth bottle neck by saturating the firewire connection

Without getting into all the details of what I'll be doing it blows down to space and speed (compressing, exporting, saving projects, creating reference files) all to be down in finalcut pro.
I am working with mainly DV footage, but I will be going DVCPROHD come 3rd quarter so I will need something that can last.

Then I saw this:
http://tinyurl.com/3ygfzn

I wanted to know what the pro's think of this item.

What are some pros and cons of network storage (using gigabit that is)

My only comment would be steer clear of Maxtor drives. I know a professional photographer who backs up his RAW files to external drives and has had two Maxtor's fail on him in the past year. He bought them because they were inexpensive, but ended up spending much more to a data recovery service. The IT department where I work (200 + employees) won't let us buy Maxtor drives for our computers (because they've seen first hand the high failure rates of them).

I've been editing with WesternDigital IDE and video for years and haven't a single failure problem.

Just my 2 cents.

Grant

I've recently become an all g-tech editor as I've had the best experiences with them and I've heard the best feedback from others as well. The Maxtor will probably crash on you. It's not built for this kind of thing. It's a network drive, good for housing your music and pictures over wireless or something. While ethernet can clock in faster data transfers, firewire is always the best solution for video. In my opinion, this is not debatable, it is a fact. The same goes for USB 2.0. Even though it clocks in faster than standard firwire, its throughput is lower, so again, firewire wins for editing. If firewire 800 is an option, then go for that, especially for your DVCPROHD stuff. Even though it's a pretty tiny and tame codec, waiting even for a drive to boot the footage over the 800 wire can be annoying. You're housing entire projects on these drives, throw in the extra cash for a more reliable product. The result is you will finish your project as opposed to the alternative...losing it into an abyss of binary oblivion.

I am fond of seagate drives with thier 5 year warranty and superior reputation. Here is a external drive that might meet your needs.

FreeAgent™ Pro 750-GB USB 2.0, eSATA, FireWire External Hard Drive

Reviews say it runs quiet.

Regards

Wow thanks for the info all, but on question cuz I too was skeptical of Maxtor,
I thought Seagate brought them out? If that's the case wouldn't that make them a bit more stable?

Yes, Seagate bought them out but Seagate carrys a longer warranty and in my opinion is a better drive. In fact many consider it top of the line. I don't believe Maxtor has been brought up to the Seagate standards and is marketed to a lower price point. In other words Seagate is trying to market products from the low to the high end.

Wow, I'm the exact opposite. I love Maxtor drives and won't use anything else. They have been SUPER reliable for me and every other drive I've had has taken a poo.

True story: :)

Although this isn't directly related to the current reliability issue, I found an old 40gb maxtor drive laying in a box full of random stuff like screwdrivers and nuts and bolts. It was scratched to all hell and just destroyed. I figured what the heck I'll call them and see if I can return it. They gave me an RMA number and I sent it in. A week later I had a brand new one (and bigger because they didn't offer the 40gb model anymore) waiting for me. No questions asked.