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cucswiz · Oct 1, 2006, 03:18 PM

I just upgraded by 17" Powerbook to the new MBP (15"). Im wondering how people are dealing with the HD space contraints... It seems that people these days have lots of stuff stored (Music, Video, photos etc). And apple only lets you store at most 120gb. Given that ipod are 60gigs (80gigs now i guess), that can take up a sizable chunk of storage.

I guess my question is the following:

How are people dealing with this situation?
a) Yes i know, external HD (I have one)
b) I still want to be able to be mobile e.g. still be able to listen to my music when im at a coffee shop
c) Is there some site/tutorial out there that describes this?

Just wondering what peoples thoughts are around this - it seems as media becomes more present (video/movies/music) this is going to be a pretty big problem...

mduell · Oct 1, 2006, 03:35 PM

A 160GB 2.5" drive in a bus-powered enclosure.

ghporter · Oct 1, 2006, 09:17 PM

My iTunes library is on a server-a Network Attached Storage server to be specific. That unloads a lot from my main computer. I also put all my photos on the server both for security and ease of backup: it's much easier to back up ONE device than a lot of devices.

But mduell has mentioned THE effective, efficient, timely answer.

mduell · Oct 1, 2006, 11:16 PM

To complete my earlier post:

160GB drive, $180: Newegg.com - Once You Know, You Newegg

Bus-powered USB/FW 2.5" enclosure: Newegg.com - Once You Know, You Newegg

gooser · Oct 2, 2006, 02:01 AM

Originally Posted by ghporter

My iTunes library is on a server-a Network Attached Storage server to be specific. That unloads a lot from my main computer. I also put all my photos on the server both for security and ease of backup: it's much easier to back up ONE device than a lot of devices.

But mduell has mentioned THE effective, efficient, timely answer.

i think glenn is more realistic. do any of us NEED to carry around ALL of our data ALL of the time?

inkhead · Oct 2, 2006, 11:23 PM

With iTunes 7 hold down option key on bootup to switch libraries. Keep a smaller one on your macbook, and a larger one on a second drive.

cambro · Oct 3, 2006, 12:19 PM

I think the OP brings up a good point.

HD technology in laptops is progressing at a snail's pace in comparison to virtually every other component.

HDs in laptops are slow...so slow, in fact, that they are often the worst bottle neck for day-to-day use (launching apps., loading menus, etc.)

HDs in laptops are space limited. Regardless of whether you "need" to carry around data or not, the point is that modern uses for computers result in lots of data. Digital images, digital music, digital movies, digital documents...these things shouldn't have to be left off of laptops on backup HDs.

Hopefully laptop storage will at least double in capacity and speed sometime soon because right now, storage on laptops is unacceptable.

SierraDragon · Oct 3, 2006, 12:46 PM

The expectation of larger hard drives is one reason I am waiting for a Merom MBP to upgrade. However no matter what comes in the Meroms aditional mass storage is necessary for laptops. Personally, today I use an OWC 640 GB FW 800 RAID 1 drive.

-Allen Wicks

amazing · Oct 4, 2006, 03:50 PM

mduell is right! And I've got and can recommend the Macally enclosure listed in his link, along with a 120 GB Seagate 2.5" IDE on sale from Circuit City for $125.

If you've got a large capacity iPod, then set it up to manage it manually. Backup up your music collection to DVD, then delete everything from your HD. You'll enjoy listening to your music on the iPod and you'll have it backed up in 2 places (iPod and DVD.)

Other files to delete if you're not using them: Garageband loops (5 GB), iDVD themes (1.8 GB). Run either DeLocalizer or Monolingual to delete all the foreign language support files (approx 500 MB).

gooser · Oct 22, 2006, 08:43 AM

there now, the new mce optibay will allow you to put 320g worth of hard drive space into a laptop. is this enough for ya'll?

glhart · Oct 22, 2006, 10:27 AM

For a while I used a LaCie 500 gb drive (raid built-in) with firewire 800. According to xBench, it's about as fast (95%) as a 7200 16mb cache SATA disk on a PowerMac. The built-in 120 gb Powerbook hd is less than half as fast. So if you boot up from a fast 800 fw disk, your Powerbook (and, I am sure, MBP) will seem much faster and you will have enough space for everything. Unfortunately, all your stuff will be on a huge, non-portable disk and you have to sync whatever you need with the slower 2.5 hd on your portable if you want to use the portable as a portable. I found this too cumbersome and gave up this arrangement. When I want to use iTunes, I just attach a FW disk -- the iTunes folder can be an alias.