Ximeta NetDisk 80GB Review

[dang]

Checkout our latest review of the Ximeta NetDisk 80GB (http://reviews.designtechnica.com/review429.html)Ximeta’s NetDisk external hard drive changes the way networked storage is done with its USB 2.0 and integrated 100/Mbps Ethernet capabilites.

[Ioman]

I hope everyone enjoyed my review. I am very impressed with this product and will no doubt trade my LaCie pocket drive for the NetDisk. I like the idea of aggregating the drives in RAID mode for increased storage.

I just wish that there was Mac support. When we had our Apple iMac in the house, I liked that it could access files on my Windows based machine.

Also, because you have add NetDisks software to any system accessing the drive, consumer products like music servers and networkable DVD players will not be able to access it on the network unless it is attached to a computers USB bus.. That is a bummer.

[IronSerif]

Good review, I like how it has the USB 2.0 and Ethernet ports. Throw in a firewire port and you have unlimited options.

This product looks very aesthecally pleasing. I haven't worked much with NAS but man, this one is grabbing my heart. Maybe it's just the fact that I'd like to tell people that I have NAS hooked up to my home network :)

[Cloud]

I think this drive is cool. It sucks that you need their software to see it on the network, but otherwise its a neat idea. I am not too concerned about the performance of external drives too much, especially since they are used for storage and not to run your day-to-day stuff off of.

[SeaComp]

Good Review!

How well does the drive do when more then one workstation
is trying to read from it?

Can more then one workstation write to the drive at the same
time as in a file server setup?

If this unit is in a network with 3 or more WS its a good chance
that there will be reads & writes to it at the same time from
different computers.

Thanks for the info

SeaComp

[txtad]

This device has several clever features and the market needs a quality NAS device at this price point, but until this device can be completely configured via a web interface, it remains useless. I purchased one of these today and ignored the Windows XP/2000 sticker on the box because ALL devices have that to reassure the amatuer computer user. However, it turns out in this case it applies and should actually have an "ONLY" there as well.

Happily, there are no Windows machines at my location, and even if there were, this device would be a disappointment because it cannot function as a portable storage device. To anyone considering this device, I strongly recommend you avoid it at this time.

Hopefully there will be a future version that doesn't need a dedicated administration machine. It would be nice if the improved version would also offer NFS.

Tad

[acheslow]

I understand that only one PC on the network can have read/write access to the Netdisk at a time, and that you must manually reassign write access to another PC if you want to change which PC has read/write access.

Is this also true if the PC with read/write access shares the drive letter using MS Networking? In other words, if I have computer A with r/w access to the NetDisk share the drive as \\computerA\driveX then can computers B and C mount that network share and both write to the drive at the same time? I would think that the Netdisk would only be "aware" of computer A having write access.

[willman]

They just sold it out,then you will very hard to contact them. the service is so bad. just a lier.

[edomingox]

the drive i have works great on both my computers but i upgraded one of them to the windows 64 bit edition. so, because of that, the software doesnt fully install now. it says there is a bus driver failure to load. anyone know how to fix that? i emailed ximeta but no reply yet, being a saturday and all.

their website doesnt have any 64 bit drivers either.

[ECA]

Some questions.
USB2?? but that STILl has a max transfer rate about 40gig per...Why not fire wire?
Network?? isnt that limited also, to 1000gig per?? Which is nice..but...
HIt the buy NOW and you get a bunch of Juicers...

I could install a HOT swap, into my comp, and do the same for ALOT less.