LaCie Rugged All-Terrain 500 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive 301370
by Lacie
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List Price: Category: CE See more product details |
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Customers in the UK,
Buy this product at amazon.co.uk
for British Pounds
Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of LaCie Rugged All-Terrain 500 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive 301370
Customer Review: Do NOT purchase this if you plan on using it on road trips.
Summary: 1 Stars
I purchased this "rugged" drive to use as an external backup to my photographs during a 19-day trip to the British Isles. I am a part-time professional photographer, and wanted to ensure my images were always dual-backed up abroad. I also had a laptop, and limited memory cards. My workflow included copying files from the card to the laptop, then the laptop to the external drive.
For the first few days, everything worked great. The drive was living up to its reputation. It was stored in my camera bag, along with the non-rugged laptop and a bunch of other equipment. Then one night I plugged it in, same as always, and it simply didn't mount. It whirred all right, but never mounted.
I spent hours here and there trying to troubleshoot it with limited internet connections. I tried uninstalling the phantom drives (win 7), tried safe mode, tried computer management, nothing would show the drive.
So I had to live for 2 weeks worrying constantly if my images on the laptop would end up making it home okay -- laptops are prone to fail, and my 4,000+ images and a few dozen HD videos (totalling over 120GBs easily) were in ONE place. Sure, I saved what I could on my cards, but I had no intention of using them that way. The external should have worked.
I'm currently dealing with an open ticket, so I will update this review to see how they handle the situation. I certainly have concerns with sending it back with over a thousand images from my personal vacation, so we'll see where it goes.
The drive itself is built cheaply. The thick rubber belt is great - but when you take it off, you're left with a flimsy shell of thin aluminum that feels like an empty soda can. There are 3 thin metal clamps on each side, with a sticker on the middle one that reads "WARRANTY VOID IF BROKEN" -- which means I couldn't even try troubleshooting this on the road.
It says it is designed by Neil Poulton -- so Neil, if you are reading this, I'd suggest that you make sure the materials you build a drive out of should be rugged through and through -- not just the rubber belt.
Overall, I am highly disappointed with the product, and I am hoping very much customer service pulls through.
Customer Review: Drives won't work (on MacBook Pro with Snow Leopard)
Summary: 1 Stars
Unfortunately, two of these drives have failed to work with my MacBook Pro, which came preloaded with Snow Leopard. I bought this to keep a backup of my computer, one that would be portable enough to travel with the computer. As a result of selecting this drive, the computer is not backed up at all right now, so cross your fingers that disaster doesn't beset it.
Here's the scenario:
1) Attached the drive to my USB hub, and it doesn't show up.
2) Attached the drive to my computer directly by unplugging my other stuff, and it shows up.
3) Setup program says to double click to install the drive. Selected the first option, Mac format, because the setup program recommends this.
4) Part way thru, setup program tells me it failed. It says to try removing all other peripheries and trying again.
5) Removed all devices, including my mouse, and tried again. Mac cannot read the device. It asks me to eject or initialize. I have no idea how to initialize with Apple's software.
6) Contacted Amazon for an exchange. Wow! Someone emails me within an hour to say that they've approved the exchange and within 2 hrs a shipment notification comes through. Can I rate Amazon a 5?
7) New drive arrives in one day! Again, can I rate Amazon a 5?
8) Repeat steps 1 to 5.
9) Log onto La Cie's website to see if there is a solution. These are not errors listed as possible on their website, so try to contact them. This requires creating an account, registering the product, finding/reading the microscopic serial number and then completing a form. Ignored the step to create a screen shot of the problem because I don't know how, and no tips are listed to do so.
can you say UGGGGGGHHHHH! i'm a busy mom trying to juggle baby, new computer, escrow of fixer upper house, selling of existing condo, contract work for a client, etc, etc.
if anyone has a suggested disk, please comment!!!!!
Customer Review: It worked for 8 days, then went "kaput"
Summary: 1 Stars
It makes a semi-OK paperweight, and that's about it.
Oh sure - installation and the initial 'get it up and running' was as easy as pie - but on the 8th day in use (even tho it remained connected to a single computer via its supplied USB cable - and this computer is always up and running, 24/7) the LaCie icon for this little orange and aluminum "bugger" began suddenly and quite ANNOYINGLY/REPEATEDLY disappearing from my desktop (I'm on an iMac, BTW) - while I was in the middle of data/files' transfer.
I can hear the near-silent hum of it running (it makes the noise it's supposed to be making - when it WORKS), but this drive is NOT reliable.
I've tried 6 ways (no... wait... 156 ways!) till Sunday to get the icon to reappear, but nope. No help from searching online or on the LaCie site, either.
I still can't get the icon for this thing to reappear on my desktop, and I'm no "newbie" to using external drives or computers.
In my opinion, it's JUNK - don't buy it.
It makes a semi-good paperweight or something you could hurl across the room and perhaps bruise someone in the head with (it does have little rubber bumpers - might not do THAT much damage to whomever it hit...), and that's about it.
H-m-m-m-m-m-m-m... maybe doing THAT will aptly "test" it's "ruggedness"....
Customer Review: Junk, bought 10 for the company, 8 damaged within a month!
Summary: 1 Stars
Straight to the point,just go to the website Lacie.com and check the warranty.
All it talks about is purchase the 49.00, 99.00 and the 149.00, nothing about the basic warranty since the moment the item is purchased. I prefer Seagate HD which even covers full warranty replacement for 5 years without proof of purchase. They track it by serial numbers.
We bought 10 hard drives for our company because many employees travel a lot and we went ahead with the rugged to make sure the information will stay intact from the constant traveling. Total waste of money we have 8 of them already dead, seriouly stay away from the rugged. The orange rubber is a marketing hype, go with Western Digital or Seagate that offer excellent warranty support.
Go ahead visit Lacie.com and it just says 2-year limited warranty and when you click the link it takes you to specifications and back to square one. Then try FAQ specifically for the Lacie rugged HD and not even one question says anything about the limited warranty.
Good luck!
Customer Review: cute, but not so rugged
Summary: 1 Stars
My drive died within a few weeks; possibly 'infant mortality', but I've sensitive data on the drive and am, thus, unable to send it either to be replaced or evaluated. It's a nice looking box and the rubbery 'skin' round the edges provides a nice grip (preventing the drive from sliding off of most surfaces), but I'm totally unconvinced about its ruggedness: I recall seeing an indication that it oughtn't to be dropped when it's running, which makes any claims that it's rugged a bit suspect -- I've owned dozens of external hard discs over the years, and surviving a drop when the drive is *not* running is not much of an ask. Further, most 'incidents' seem to occur when drives are *in use* -- when somebody trips over a cord and sends the drive flying, something falls on the drive delivering a shock or knocking it down, it's thrown about by turbulence on a flight, etc. Not impressed.