[dm294]

I am considering getting an eSata Expresscard for my new macbook pro, in order to connect an external hard drive. First of all, is it worth the extra money and added weight/bulk, or is there not a huge difference between this and the firewire 800? If it is worth it, does anyone have a suggestion as to what brand will be the most compatible/reliable? I do some video editing, tons of multi-track music recording/editing, and some light photoshop work.

[mduell]

Yes, I think it's worth it.

• eSATA (300MBps) offers more bandwidth than FW800 (80-100MBps); consider that even single drives can push 100MBps these days and multi-drive enclosures can push 200+.
• The ATA-FW800 conversion also adds a lot more latency than SATA-eSATA.
• eSATA is actually cheaper than FW800 at the single drive level and gets cheaper as you buy more external drives: $35 eSATA card + $20-40 eSATA enclosure (I like/own the $28 AZiO) vs $70-125 FW800 enclosures

The downside is that you have the little head of the ExpressCard poking out the side of your laptop. Hopefully the next revision of the MBP will have built in eSATA.

[mfbernstein]

Brand doesn't matter much since most eSATA cards are based on the same Sil3112 chipset, and use the same drivers. I tried one a few months back, and was disappointed by the (lack of) stability. Lots of problems with sleep and several odd kernel panics. Hopefully, that's improved.