Can I get my firewire drive on a network

September 12, 2006 5:03 PM

Is there a piece of hardware that will let me make my firewire external hard drive network accessible without it being connected to a computer?

I've had a LaCie external, but would like to make it network accessible. I've been able to find hardware to connect USB drives to a network, but mine is firewire.

The other option is I have a few other hard drives that I could install in a network hard drive enclosure, but am having trouble finding something that seems worth the money (my budget is somewhat slim) and is also mac compatible (I can format the drives with a PC, but will need to access them wirelessly from a mac.)

posted by allthingsfixable to technology (4 comments total)

Look in the specifications for the network drives. If they don't require some kind of proprietary client, then it'll work with a Mac. Macs can connect to SAMBA shares, which is usually what these network drives create for you to access.
posted by odinsdream at 5:58 PM on September 12, 2006

If you can budget $500, you could pick-up a refresed PowerPC Mac Mini from Apple.
posted by nathan_teske at 6:40 PM on September 12, 2006

You know there's an ordinary ATA hard disk in the Lacie, and you could just swap it into a USB case, or a NAS case?
posted by cillit bang at 7:03 PM on September 12, 2006

For better or worse, all the NAS boxes out there seem to use USB and not Firewire. Have you taken a look at the NAS section on Tom's Networking? Lots of deeply geeky reviews there.

The super el-cheapo route is the Linksys NSLU2; I think this goes for about $70; you attach a (USB) hard drive to it and go. Though I do like the idea of getting a used Mini to do this job.
posted by adamrice at 7:14 PM on September 12, 2006