Western Digital Mybook Studio II
I have recently replaced all the external drives on my file server. Previously I was using four Lacie 1TB jobbies (each of which was really four 250GB disks internally), but wanted to replace them because they're noisy and draw a lot of power. So I ended up with two Western Digital Mybook Studio II 2TB devices, which I've been using for 3 months (one of them) and one and a half months (the other).
I've got the same amount of storage as before, but it's now pretty much silent, drawing a lot less power. They were easy to install - as is expected these days with a modern operating system they're "plug n' play". They even came out of the box pre-formatted with HFS+ instead of something retarded but PC-compatible, although if you are lumbered with a legacy Windows machine reformatting them should be trivial. Speed is ... not something I care much about, as all my access to them is over a nyetwork that is slower than the bus connecting the disks to the host machine, but they're not noticeably slow.
I chose those disks because they were the ony ones I could find that were the right capacity and had both USB 2 and Firewire 400 ports. I need FW400 because the machine hosting them is old enough to have that and to have Ye Olde Slowe USBe. I want USB 2 for future compatibility. Turns out that they also have FW800 (which I'll probably never use) and eSATA, which may be useful one day.
They're also upgradable. The old Lacies I had aren't - they're sealed units. With these WD units, you're supposed to be able to lift the lid and replace the disks. And there's the only small niggle I have with 'em. On both the drives, the lid feels really cheap and plasticky, and wouldn't open properly. Yes, I did read the manual. I ended up levering them open with a screwdriver, and now they won't close properly.
But that's a small gripe. I might care if I had to carry them around with me, but I don't. I might care if I was the sort of shallow fool who cares what his disks look like, but I'm not. I reckon they're damned good value for money.