Customer Reviews

LaCie Desktop Hard Disk 301285U 500 GB USB 2.0 External Hard Drive

5 star:		(27)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

Great price, very reliable...I use this to back up my archival stores, many of which are the same brand 120 gig and 160 gig drives...Then I turn off and store the older drives, using them as a final backup...Have only had one LaCie problem in 6 years, and that drive was bad from the start, so nothing was lost.
And, oh by the way, I have TWELVE of these chained together, so it makes it easy for me to have them on line all of the time.

Nice little drive. Speed seems on par with other USB drives I've used, but this is the quietest. It is virtually silent. The only thing lacking is an on/off switch (minus 1 star). No problems during the first month of use.

Hi.

I bought this drive about a month ago, and it has been as good as advertised, if not better.

I use it for two purposes. First as a "Time Machine" backup drive for my MacBook, and as the primary drive for my iTunes library. It has performed both functions flawlessly.

One of the many great features I like about it is that it goes to "sleep" along with the rest of the system I have it hooked up to (the computer and my home theater) when it's not being used. So if I happen to fall asleep in the middle of movie being streamed from iTunes, once the movie is done, my laptap goes to sleep, and the drive stops spinning. Once I press a button on the laptop or the remote, the whole thing starts up again. So it's a nice addition to my computer-based theater system.

The price can't be beat. Amazon had the lowest price of all the companies I checked (sort of...the price was just a little higher than the MacMall, but Amazon had free shipping, making their price the net-lowest). Considering my brother bought a LaCie 160 GB drive a couple of years ago for almost $200, it's an outstanding value for the price.

The USB cable could stand to be just a bit longer.

==>Pete

I ordered this device for my wife since she takes a large number of digital pictures as well as download a lot of music (legally, of course). The hard drive has performed flawlessly. It was well worth the purchase price & has been a great help with the storage of the pictures and music. The device can be left on for hours & there is no issue of it overheating.

After having to send this back twice on my dime to LaCie because it simply will not back up (prepares and prepares and never backs up) here I have it again a third time in one year. Service has been awful, and as much as I wish this had worked, it did not. I also resent the fact that I have had to pay shipping twice to get service that does not hold up. Never buying LaCie again.

It lacks a power switch, but it does have a power-save feature. It is activated after the drive is disconnected from a host computer. But if you power it on without connecting it to anything, it will spin forever. The drive must be connected to a computer and then disconnected from it before the power-save feature activates. This may be inconvenient for those connecting the hard drive to the rear of a desktop computer.

The metal shell of the enclosure is sturdy and attractive; it also dissipates heat very quickly. After most nights when it's not active, it feels like ice in the morning (I like to keep my home generally cold), which is a good thing.

The drive is speedy; its burst transfers save time. I've always appreciated LaCie's reliability and simplicity in its products.

But I'll complain with everybody else that the A-to-B USB cable that comes with it is far too short. The power supply also is a wall transformer, which may block other outlets when plugged in.

As other reviewers have said, this drive is very good.
However, the drive does not have on/off function. It does not have on/off switch, and it does not automatically go off when the connected computer goes to sleep/hibernate/off. So unless you unplug the drive, it is on 24/7.
When I saw the review that it does not have on/off switch, I assumed that the automatic on/off function is present instead of the switch. However it was my mistake apparently.
Besides that, it is very good drive. I was about to return it but instead I decided to use plugging-unplugging .. since besides the cost of return, I actually liked the drive.

There's really not much else to say. I've purchased several LaCie drives in the past and have had good luck with them, so I have no idea what's up with this model. It simply stopped working after about two months (luckily I had everything on it backed up). Symptoms were a loud clicking noise and my Macintosh OS refusing to recognize or mount the drive.

Be sure to fill out your warranty card if you purchase this hard drive, is my advice. And be sure you back up whatever is on it. I currently have a support ticket in to LaCie, no telling what's going to happen, but if I can't get joy I'll contest the purchase with my credit card company.

Oh, also: It's loud. The ads say it has fan-free operation, but the actual hard drive sound is pretty noisy. Of course, I may have gotten a bad one, which would explain the racket......

(If I'm treated well by LaCie and I get another drive that doesn't die on me, I'll revise my review...it did pretty well until it abruptly quit...)

Update: LaCie gave me something of a run-around in that it insisted the power supply was likely to blame. My husband later opened up the drive and found that it was nonoperational - as in, a problem with the drive, NOT the power supply. (He opened the case without my knowledge and voided the warranty, so I'm not able to provide any further details about LaCie's service options.) I will say this, though: Personally? I've switched to Other World Computing's Mercury removable external drives. They're sturdy, dependable, cheap, and USB/Firewire powered, so you're not having to plug and unplug a backup you want to use for your laptop. Also you can still buy them in the Firewire 800 flavor, so your data backs up soooo much faster.)

This only thing that bother me with this hard drive is that there is no switch button, so it has to be plugged in before connecting it to the computer via an usb port. If not, the computer will not recognize the device and you will have to unplug and plug the hard drive again to the electric plug...

Very pleased with this product. I use it on a daily basis and swop it between Mac & Windows computers with no problems. It does appear to get hot at the bottom after several hours of use. This is to be expected. It hasn't altered the performance, but as a safeguard , I balance it on 2 CD cases to allow a little more air circulate at the bottom. As mentioned, an on-off button would have been nice , but that really isn't the end of the World.
I paid 100 for this & believe it to be of great value