Home > Consumer Reviews > LaCie 301269U Ethernet Disk Mini Home Edition 500 GB Network Attached Storage Hard Drive

I got this a couple months ago to use primarily as a music/photo server and backup drive for both Mac and Windows laptops. I had never set up or used a home NAS before this, and was expecting it to behave like a "regular" external hard drive i.e. show up as a hard drive icon on the Mac desktop.

The setup process seemed straightforward, but after the setup the LaCie software could not see the drive. I followed the online troubleshooting guides, and learned quite a bit about router and firewall configuration, port forwarding, and other networking intricacies I had previously never had to mess with, but it still wouldn't work. Finally I tried uninstalling the VPN software I need for my job, and the drive appeared and the LaCie/Hipserv software worked perfectly. Had there not been the VPN incompatibility, it think it would have set up fine in 30 minutes or less.

Once it was setup, I found that it's more like a adding another computer to your network than a hard drive to your computer. It's pre-configured with folders with cheesy names (will we ever be rid of the "My" cliche? I hate that everything sounds like it was named by a greedy 2-year old.) In Windows I mapped a drive to it, but I have to re-connect and login every time I start or wake the computer.

On the Mac side, it shows up as "hipserv" under Shared resources, and Time Machine will not recognize it as a drive that can be used for backups. Time Machine was one of the primary reasons I bought the NAS, so it's a total bust in that regard. It did come with an automated backup utility "Destop Mirror" which I thought I setup for my Windows documents, but seems to be only recording changed items, not the original folder contents. I'm sure I can get this straightened out, but the backup configuration is not intuitive.

I was able to move my iTunes libary to the drive, and it works well. I can access a single music library from Mac or Windows without much problem. I was also pleasantly suprised by the ability to access the drive from the Web. I can get to my home files from work, and share music and photos with family across the country. However, the HipServ software was developed by a 3rd party, and there is some confusion about what website you go to for web access and software updates.

Overall, it does everything LaCie said it would, but not the way I expected/wanted it to. It's not a smooth, fully controllable OS-level interface like a directly-attached drive - it's more like a storage rented to you by the HipServ people. Much of this I'll chalk up to my general ignorance of NAS's

Pros:
- 500gb of file storage accessible to multiple computers
- Drive can be accessed over the web via LaCie/HipServ website
- Low price

Cons:
- Cannot be used with Mac Time Machine
- Must login to access (downside of web accessibility)
- Intermediation by the LaCie/HipServ software is a nuisance
- Initial setup can be difficult
- Doesn't work with VPN client software on the same machine

I purchased this drive to have a shared storage device for our computers, and to share media (music and movies) within our house.

It does what it's supposed to do to a point. If you are running windows, and have their software installed, it seems to be easy enough to use. If you have a Mac, the interface seems to struggle. I have a Linux machine, and the web interface doesn't really work so good, even though it runs on a Linux platform itself. The web interface is basically annoying and somewhat sluggish, walking you through folders and files. What makes me dislike it, is that to get files on to the drive, you have to use a Java applet, which failed under Linux and didn't work right under Mac either. So at that point, you had to drop in files one at a time, which is unnacceptable considering I had some 10,000 music files to load in. Gaining access through a network connection, and using a 'backdoor' approach, you can easily drag in piles of folders and files - but this would be confusing to novice users. I was able to get my files in there no problem that way through both computers, but again, this would not be easy for someone who did not know how to do it. Once files are stored in the drive, the interface again only allows you to 'download' files back out one at a time, unless you use the same approach. So sharing is greatly hindered through the web interface that they expect you to use.

The other part thing that I find confusing, is that in order to log in through the web page, you have to go to Lacie's website, then log in which portals you back to the drive that is sitting under you desk. This would be fine for logging in from the office, etc..., but it's kind of dumb if you're at home and the drive is a few feet away. Ultimately what bugged me the most was how much it was doing on it's own. I watched it when no one was logged in, and none of our home computers were on. It was constantly sending/receiving info on the internet, and writing some kind of info to the drive - not sure if it was logging info or time or what, it does not automatically update or anything like that. If I have a locally shared drive on my home network and I'm not using it, I would expect it to be idle. Last night it was frequently using the internet connection, and you could hear the drive writing, which to me doesn't make any sense.

Overall, it's a nice compact drive, great price, large storage capacity, and really seems to be simple enough to operate from a Windows platform. If you're on Mac or Linux, and know how to connect to 'remote' servers on your network, you can add/remove files easily. Otherwise, the web logging (or whatever it was doing), the flashy user interface, and the random login through [...] made this drive kind of sloppy and slow. I'm not overall against it as a storage device, I would just like something a lot simpler from a technical standpoint.

I bought a slew of these to use for backing up large design files. I've experienced a 100% failure rate inside of 2 years, with most of the drives I purchased failing within 6 months. Someone should go to jail for how bad these LaCie drives are. You might as well take a magnet to your data if you buy anything with their name on it, that's how well protected it will be.

Heed the warnings you see from many disappointed consumers. I saw them before I bought this, but thought, "Ah, I'm a pretty savvy home computer user and the price can't be beat. People are probably just belly aching."

Well, it's really not worth the hassle to save a few bucks. I've sent it back to LaCie for repair TWICE, and I continue to have problems with the drive unexpectedly disappearing from the network and not reappearing after many reboots. They've also sent me THREE replacement power supplies, and have refused to refund my money. The drive will work for a week, a month, two weeks, but never fails to drop off the network and not return after some time.

In their defense, they've been timely and responsive to my support tickets. But I've requested a refund twice and they're still electing to have it repaired.
Don't trust your data to this unreliable product. Pony up $200 for something reliable.
...Brian in Milwaukee

This was hard to setup initially, I have a good knowledge of networks and working on them, but setting up this drive wasn't a simple matter of knowing networks, it takes some luck, the installation is anything but streamlined, but once you get it figured out and get everything working, it's a great piece of equipment, I bought it for $116 and saw it a few days later at a store for $190, a steal for a TB network drive, just make sure you're pretty patient and don't get yourself thinking this is plug and play, expect 30-60 minutes to have the thing up and running

the speed is okay, not amazing, especially with multiple large files, but once you have your data on the drive it accesses quite well, the web interface is cool, but tricky at times...not a whole lot about this drive is self explanitory like you'd think.