[lug] advice on USB external drive

[Phil Rasch]

I want to buy an external drive with a firewire or USB interface to
backup a variety of machines running different versions of linux
(mandrake, redhat), freebsd, and (perish the thought) perhaps even
some Win98 machines. 

I think I have a handle on how I want to backup/mirror the drives, but
I want a foolproof hardware solution the first time out.

It would be really really good if I didnt have to rebuild kernels to
get things going. First, because I dont want to fuss with figuring out
the idiosyncrasies of each machine, and second because some of them
use kernels that were built by others (for example those including
win4lin) and I dont want to boot to particular kernels just to back
the machine up. It is safe to assume that I am running 2.4.x linux
kernels and modern freebsd kernels. I dont mind adding modules. I dont
mind installiing a driver for Win99

An example of the drive is something like this
http://www.firewiredirect.com/firewire/products/UltraIII.shtml

Can anybody offer any advice?

I am most interested in a pointer to a real experience (good or
bad). I dont mind you telling me that it cant be done. I have looked
at the hardware compatibility guides and the USB issues are vague
enough that I figure it is better to ask.

Although sometimes it is fun, I dont want to break new ground
here. So please try to avoid starting off your response with sentences
like "I havent tried this,.... but it should work". I want something
more like "it works. it is rock solid. Here is the hardware I
bought. Here is what I needed to do to get it going".


Thanks

Phil

-- 
Phil Rasch, Climate Modeling Section, National Center for Atmospheric Research
Mail     --> P.O. Box 3000, Boulder CO 80307  
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email: pjr at ucar.edu, Web: http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cms/pjr Phone: 303-497-1368, FAX: 303-497-1324