OWC intros 7,200RPM 320GB Mercury On-The-Go bus-powered drive

It's not the biggest portable hard drive OWC has to offer, but if speed is your top concern, you can now get a still impressive 320GB model from the company, which will spin at an always-desirable 7,200 rpm without the need for a pesky AC adapter. As with OWC's other Mercury-on-The-Go drives, you can also get this one in your choice of FireWire 800/400 + USB 2.0 Triple, FireWire 400 + USB 2.0 Combo, USB 2.0 + eSATA, or plain old USB 2.0 versions, each of which include a handy carrying case and the requisite backup software (for both Mac and Windows), and will set you back $280, $260, $258, and $240, respectively.

[waiownsyou @ Jun 25th 2008 1:19PM]

Nice but who the heck is OWC?

[catachip @ Jun 25th 2008 1:47PM]

Other World Computing (OWC) is one of the largest and reputable Apple resellers. They are otherwise known as macsales.com

[Flashpoint @ Jun 25th 2008 1:26PM]

A better question is which of Engadget's Apple editors felt that it was neccessary to put a Mac as a background for a product THAT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH APPLE.

[natels @ Jun 25th 2008 1:35PM]

Well it does have to do with Apple in that it works for both Windows and Apple and supports Firewire. Stop hating and accept competition from other companies to ensure better products and product design.

[cheng @ Jun 25th 2008 1:36PM]

how about the product photos used the macbook pro as background? does that explain things?

[Rich @ Jun 25th 2008 1:37PM]

Um, well considering the OWC is historically a MAC company, it makes since to have a mac in the background. The image was probably ripped from the OWC website. OWC's website is macsales.com.. so well.. go figure.

[catachip @ Jun 25th 2008 1:48PM]

The product may be cross platform, but, OWC is one of the largest Apple resellers on the Internet and that image is from their website. According to their banner they have been "serving the Mac universe since 1988".

[Zak @ Jun 25th 2008 1:59PM]

Flashpoint... how do you survive on a day to day basis? People with your level of retardation usually require a wheelchair to get around. Engadget didn't take that picture, you moron. It's from OWC. Hence the big OWC logo on the bottom of it.

I mean... just wow.

[spyder91 @ Jun 25th 2008 2:02PM]

Would you have preferred a PC in the background?

[wilcoholic @ Jun 25th 2008 2:36PM]

Just because they are a 2nd party developer for Apple doesnt mean they have to promote it with a macbook. It has literally zilch to do with a Macbook. Its a universal device.

A few pages back there was this article about some fancy speakers and earplugs and they hooked it up to a macbook and an ipod. Those products are totally unrelated. Whats the fuss with that? This apple gratification in the media is really getting out of hand. Its completely ridiculous. Why didnt they hook it up on a vaio or an iriver? Some people just dont like macs!

So do Engadget get money from Apple for promoting their products or what?

[Zach @ Jun 25th 2008 3:25PM]

@wilcoholic

Did you even read what everybody else said, or did you just hit reply and start rambling? I would say that everybody just got through telling you that the pic is from OWC, not engadget, but that would just be redundant.

[dani @ Jun 25th 2008 3:26PM]

I hate to add to the I told you so comments, but they're an Apple reseller, you prat. Their website is macsales.com

[Luke. @ Jun 25th 2008 3:36PM]

@ wilcoholic

What?

A MacBook is a notebook, this is a hard drive, tell me why it has nothing to do with it.

Your second comment is an absolute farce. 'Well there was this one article - myriad pages back - where these speakers were hooked up to a MacBook! I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS! STOP THE PRESSES!'

Jesus. Firstly, it looks cleaner, and better *in general* than their PC counterparts. Would you rather them hook it up to an Inspiron?

'Some people just dont like macs!'

Well, presumably -like most sane people-, they will take their hate for an inanimate object and put it to the back of their mind, instead of having an active protest.

Please grow up.

:D

[Tim @ Jun 25th 2008 1:28PM]

I'd never really thought about it, as I don't own a macbook pro, but from the right angle the dock in leopard really makes the screen look like a 3d extension of the keyboard. sweet.

[Haikibutsu @ Jun 25th 2008 1:30PM]

I was just about to say that!

[Kimo @ Jun 25th 2008 1:30PM]

OWC also known as macsales.com

[kastonie @ Jun 25th 2008 7:02PM]

I know it has been mentioned 32 times already....

[HAI 2 U @ Jun 25th 2008 1:31PM]

Are you sure that isn't a G4 Cube on a Macbook ?? I could have sworn ...

[qwert @ Jun 25th 2008 1:44PM]

And obviously it also does support that new wireless usb, with power over the air.

Or am i just not seeing the cable that makes the led on this thing glow?

[Russ @ Jun 25th 2008 1:59PM]

I was thinking exactly the same...

[Lowest Ranked @ Jun 25th 2008 2:48PM]

Its a fauxtograph.

[Timmay @ Jun 25th 2008 2:52PM]

I was thinking the same thing! Photoshop fuck-ups FTW

[Galley @ Jun 25th 2008 1:47PM]

How many WIndows laptops have FireWire 800 ports?

[catachip @ Jun 25th 2008 1:54PM]

There are no Windows-based laptops on the market that have FW 800, it's exclusive to Apple. FW 400 is hard enough to find on most consumer PCs.

You can, however, buy laptop expansion cards with FW 400 or 800 ports. Although, they are called IEEE 1394 for most non-Apple manufacturers because Apple developed the specification and requires a royalty fee for use of the name "Firewire".

[Timmay @ Jun 25th 2008 2:54PM]

Give credit where credit is due, Apple didn't create FireWire all alone. it's an IEEE standard.

"FireWire is Apple Inc.'s name for the IEEE 1394 High Speed Serial Bus. It was initiated by Apple and developed by the IEEE P1394 Working Group, largely driven by contributions from Apple, although major contributions were also made by engineers from Texas Instruments, Sony, Digital Equipment Corporation, IBM, and INMOS/SGS Thomson (now STMicroelectronics)."

[Don Corleone @ Jun 25th 2008 1:50PM]

Nice drive. BTW OWC is a great company to deal with.

[moose @ Jun 25th 2008 2:12PM]

eh. I don't really see the need for 7,200RPM, F800, or ESATA in a portable bus-powered drive. On my 320GB WD passport elite, I get realized transfer speeds in excess of 16MB/s; it is 5400RPM, USB connection, bus powered. The case on this OWC looks really junky compared to the WD too...

I wanna see some benchies comparing the different transfer speeds of the different connection types and drive speeds for bus-powererd drives.

[Raymond @ Jun 25th 2008 9:46PM]

For your information,

Firewire 800 can do around 7X mb/s read, 60mb/s read.

For eSATA, should be the same as directly connecting this drive by SATA.

[culbeda @ Jun 25th 2008 2:18PM]

Does "bus-powered" also mean it smells like urine and I have to avoid making eye contact?

[Jake @ Jun 25th 2008 2:30PM]

I like the clear case. Usually the cases for external HDDs are aluminum to disperse heat, but, besides looking cool, this would let you see how big your drive is before you plugged it in.

-jp

[eric f. @ Jun 26th 2008 8:44AM]

The SATA Mercury on the go has a heatsink which sticks out of a rectangular opening in the bottom of the case. nice design.

[sonick @ Jun 25th 2008 2:32PM]

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes
(turn and face the strain)
Ch-ch-changes
Dont want to be a richer man
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes
(turn and face the strain)
Ch-ch-changes
Just gonna have to be a different man
Time may change me
But I cant trace time

[Andreas @ Jun 25th 2008 2:39PM]

Hitachi TravelStar 7K320 goodness! Been waiting for this, ORDERED!

[Piers Rippey @ Jun 25th 2008 2:41PM]

Is it just me or is that dock off center?

[Timmay @ Jun 25th 2008 2:56PM]

good catch, between that and the LED being lit on a cordless drive they have some serious Photoshop issues

[Hotrod @ Jun 25th 2008 2:59PM]

Yeah it looks off center. I'm not sure if they're using MacPilot or a Terminal command which allows the dock to be positioned either to the left or right of the screen.

[Bart Rijksen @ Jun 25th 2008 5:56PM]

I was just going to comment on the same thing. the dock is off center, and a lot.

[Bart Rijksen @ Jun 25th 2008 5:56PM]

Also it doesn't say "MacBook Pro" in the middle, under the screen, and there is a little grain of dirt between the Enter key, and the Shift key.

[sotec_productions @ Jun 25th 2008 6:24PM]

@Hotrod

That's because this is a Psystar laptop, not a real Macbook.

or

Since they were in photoshop, they decided to just clone stamp over the Macbook logo so that they didn't have to pay Apple royalties for using the photo.

[Hotrod @ Jun 25th 2008 2:57PM]

Really off topic, but I forgot how sexy the MacBook Pros are. I really regret selling mine a few years ago, when times had gotten tough.

[ovet @ Jun 25th 2008 3:01PM]

I wonder if I could just take the hard drive out and install it in my macbook, and put the macbook hard drive in the case.
I was looking at the Western Digital Scropio Black 320GB drive, but this is $10 cheaper and has a case to put the old HDD in. Hmm.

[Lars @ Jun 25th 2008 3:34PM]

If that's the case, then you've got some serious problems with your laptop. SATA drives have lower power consumption than previous HDD technology.

Kinda silly that Engadget is making a big deal of a bus-powered external drive, which is just a SATA drive in an enclosure... They've been around for some time.

[w00t @ Jun 25th 2008 5:28PM]

@wilcoholic

Fortunately most people are not rabid fanboys and just think "Huh, it's connected to a laptop." and not "OH MY GOD HOW DARE THEY DEMONSTRATE THIS PRODUCT WITH A PRODUCT I DISLIKE!?!?!?!!!11oneone *mouth foam*"

[James @ Jun 25th 2008 6:06PM]

I purchased thier 200GB 7200 RPM drive some time back for use with my XP-based Tablet. I would never do that again. Had to load drivers and still get write errors frequently. So much so that it's sitting on my desk connected to nothing and I went out and bought another pexagontech drive which as been wonderful just like the first one I bought.
Maybe OWC works well for Macs but not my XP system. Anyone want a 200GB 7200RPM drive...?

[marquis @ Jul 26th 2008 2:36PM]

Define "want" sell, give away, barter??

[Candradasa @ Jun 26th 2008 5:16AM]

I've been using the 500GB version of this for a few weeks, and it is absolutely great. It's solved a big problem for Powerbook G4 users, in that the latest generation of small, portable drives (eg. Western Digital's Passport series) can't draw enough power from the bus to mount, so are, effectively, useless on older mac laptops.

The OWC drive has been mounting and working perfectly since day one, and though it's not as sleek as a Passport, it draws its own admiring glances! See-through goodness, from people who really understand how Macs work...

[Quip @ Jun 28th 2008 5:21AM]

These are just rebadged Yuan Gu cases. Despite being Chinese designed, they're very high quality. I've had a few over the years and they're pretty good. The case design hasn't changed much either.
Yuan Gu also does a lot of OEM manufacture for the major brands external drive enclosures.

http://www.datastorage.com.cn/

[marquis @ Jul 26th 2008 2:46PM]

Hi,
Newbie here... you folks are obviously well acquainted with Mac.
I am looking for advice.
I’ve been into pc’s for a few years I own 2 avid edit bays and 4 Pentium systems. We have a very tiny school.
I saved up to purchase a Mac book pro to help improve my DVD authoring abilities and to try to be involved in both worlds for better employment ops. I am having a great time but I am also very elementary in my understanding of the way the systems actual operate and/or communicate with each other.
I also purchased an OWC 7200rpm 200 GB mercury portable so that I can write files and conserve onboard power and space for the huge edit programs that I am using.
>I was wondering why the 200GB port has only 186.3GB available 13.7 GB seems like a lot of unusable space, maybe this is normal.

>Also the heat-sink (plate)??? At the bottom gets screaming hot…is this normal as well?

>Another newbie question…would it be a good idea, or is it possible to reformat one of my external fire wire drives to (Fat 32) and use it as a data transfer between my Mac and my PC network via fire wire cables?

Sorry for the long post, but I’m sure that I will greatly benefit from your input.
Thanks,
mq