Review: LaCie 1 TB d2 Quadra Hard Drive

[I wrote this review, with additional revisions here, for a major electronics purveyor's Web site.]

“No problems so far,” written 3/26/2010

Pros:
Easy to setup, High capacity, Easy to use
Best uses:
Backup, Additional storage
Describe yourself:
Casual user
Primary use:
Personal

I know starting my review with the headline “no problems so far” doesn’t convey much confidence. But before I bought the d2 Quadra, I did a lot of research into an external hard drive for my ancient PowerBook, and it seemed like for every review I found praising a hard drive, another was posted in which the consumer complained the drive failed out of the box.

In the end I went with the d2 Quadra primarily because I felt it was the best VALUE. I thought the Western Digital and Seagate external hard drives were more aesthetically pleasing. But I didn’t like the idea of having to use the WD software (necessary, I believe, if one wants to take advantage of the drive’s energy saver option). And I didn’t like that the Seagate drive had only one orientation, according to a reviewer who wrote that the drive’s base doesn’t allow it to fully rest on its side.

The d2 Quadra was several dollars cheaper than the WD and Seagate drives I looked at. I consider LaCie a pretty reliable brand. I have another external LaCie drive, a small, portable model that’s a few years old now that I still use . And I liked the d2 Quadra’s PORTABILITY, or FUNCTIONALITY, with its four interface options (eSATA, FireWire 800, FireWire 400, USB 2.0). I expect this hard drive will be around when my computer meets its demise, so COMPATIBILITY with future computers I might get was a must.

The d2 Quadra is UGLY, however. The weight and noise, which other reviewers have mentioned, haven’t bothered me, however. I keep it upright and plugged in on my desk. I was easily able to create three partitions on it. Every few days I turn on the d2 Quadra, connect my laptop via FireWire 400, and do a Time Machine backup as well as a Clone update with SuperDuper!

Which reminds me of another great feature of this hard drive: its SIZE. I can’t comment on how much of the advertised space is actually accessible to me because I’m nowhere near reaching the limit. With 1 TB at my disposal, I don’t have to worry about running out of disk space.

War on Civilians in the Dem. Rep. of the Congo

The most devastating piece of news that I heard last week was a report filed from the Democratic Republic of the Congo:

Woman Tells of Congo Murders (RealAudio file)

Fifty people from this woman’s village were captured by the Interahamwe, armed Hutu militia from Rwanda who were involved in the genocide in that country. The woman was the only survivor of that attack.

Excerpt from interview:

After they killed the members of my family, 19 members of the Interahamwe raped me. And then they killed two of my children in front of me. And then they took the baby off my back, and they tied a rope around its neck, and they forced me to pull the rope and kill my own baby.

Also check out the BBC news article “DR Congo’s Unending War” for some background on the situation there.

Peanut Butter Jelly Time

To answer Slayve’s question, it’d be best to watch this instructional video:

Brian, in a banana suit, holding maracas (from Family Guy).

According to a Wikipedia entry,

“Peanut Butter Jelly Time” is a Flash animation that emerged in the early 2000s and became an Internet phenomenon. Based on a song of the same name recorded by the Buckwheat Boyz, the best known version of the animation (usually distributed as a Flash clip) shows a pixelated dancing banana moving back and forth to the song’s repetitive chorus.

The dance that the male Tauren from World of Warcraft does is basically the peanut butter jelly time dance. But without the maracas.

Where the Hell Is Your WoW Character?

Last year, I blogged about the musical genre known as wizard rock, which is music based on the Harry Potter universe. This year, well, today, a friend caught me up to speed on World of Warcraft (affectionately called Warcrack), the massively multiplayer online game. I’d asked him about it because of a phenomenon I’d noticed on YouTube. Specifically, people emulating the Where the Hell Is Matt? videos.

“Where the Hell WAS Matt?” The original video, made in 2003-04.

Matt Harding really started a phenomenon with his video, which depicts him doing the same silly dance in various locations around the world (Mongolia! Summit of Kilimanjaro! Siberia!) with Deep Forest’s “Sweet Lullaby Dancing Remix” playing in the background.

In tribute to Matt, several people have created videos set in Azeroth, the Warcraft world, using characters from the game. By the way, you’ll appreciate the following videos more if you watch “Where the Hell WAS Matt?” first.

There’s “Where the Hell Is Rudinio” by Rudysin. Great transitions and his human character Rudinio’s dance moves are well timed to the music, the same music as in Matt’s video. What’s hilarious is the fact that other players occasionally wander across the screen. At one point, another player even jumps over Rudinio while he’s dancing.

Rudinio at Ironforge.

Another favorite of mine is “Where the Hell Is Grylax” by bucko415.

Grylax at Ragnarous’ Lair–The Molten Core.

I wish the character was a little closer to the screen. But Grylax the orc has got some great dance moves and even convinces his friends to join in at the end.

I got a kick out of the fact that the characters in World of Warcraft can even dance. There’s a whole page dedicated to dancing on the World of Warcraft Community Site. All the different races have their own gender-specific dances. And apparently some of those dances are based on “real” dances, like peanut butter jelly time.

Daemons

While reading Philip Pullman‘s His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass, I’d wondered what kind of daemon I’d have if they so existed. In the book, a daemon is an outward, physical manifestation of a person’s soul. It appears as an animal that reflects a person’s true nature.

A friend who introduced me to the His Dark Materials trilogy told me about this quiz on The Golden Compass movie Web site. After answering a series of 20 questions, I found out my daemon’s a fox.

I am “modest, spontaneous, sociable, inquisitive, and dependable.” Sound like me? On a previous run-through, I’d scored a crow daemon. As much as I love crows, I have to admit the fox traits more accurately describe me.

Anyway, I highly recommend the trilogy, which though marketed as a young adult fantasy, is actually a very smart, philosophical inquiry into religion and the meaning of life. The Golden Compass (which incidentally co-stars Daniel Craig and Eva Green, who were in Casino Royale together) comes out this Dec. 7, so there’s still time to devour the books before then.