12 years ago, if somebody asked me which was a must-to-have device for my Mac, I would have answered that it was my magneto-optical drive from SONY. Plug-in disk capacity was only 128 MB. But it was large enough those days, considering that I initially started out with a 30 MB Super Mac external hard disk drive connected to 2MB RAM Mac Plus in 1991.

Things have changed over years. Now, we are talking about hundreds of GB of capacity. Hard disk capacity has increased nearly 1,000 times over the past 10 years.

So we want to discuss how things have changed over years. Let’s see some of the devices we find useful.






No. 1: External DVD Drive






Yes, external DVD drive… Does anybody still use an external DVD drive? Some people may find it surprising that external DVD drives are that useful. But it’s true. There is no device that is more useful than external DVD drive. The one that I have is actually not even FireWire-connected but USB-connected. I purchased this external DVD drive more than 2 and a half years ago for my old dead eMac which didn’t have an internal DVD drive.

The main reason why I find my external DVD drive so useful is that internal DVD drives are never reliable. Our 2.0 GHz iMac has an internal DVR drive from Matsushita. And it often rejects a DVD-R disk. Another problem with this default DVD drive is that it’s very slow in writing when we use cheap DVD-R disks. Well, we do have a lot of data to back up because we run websites. We have compressed more than 300 tutorial and spam documentation videos over just a year. We always use cheap DVD-R discs. We used to wait several minutes or sometimes more than 30 minutes in burning one single-sided DVD disk. Then we found out that this relatively old external DVD drive can burn a disk in less than 4 minutes. What a great discovery, and we are saving a lot of time because of this external DVD drive.

No. 2: Headphones






8 or 9 years ago, a USB speaker system from Ariston Technologies was a must-to-have device for me. Those days, one of my teaching assistant colleagues at graduate school was constantly talking about MP3. It was something new, and I had no idea, at first. There was no iTunes yet. Instead, there was a software program called SoundJam MP from Casady & Greene. I think one license cost about $29.95. Then Napster ignited the MP3 boom. I admit that I often carried my 333 MHz iMac and went to my office around midnight to download free music files. (Shhh!…)

I still listen to music and also watch movies on my Mac. And it’s unthinkable how different my life would be without headphones. My senses are very weak. I can never tell food tastes. And I’m never into audio quality. However, I’m telling you. If you listen to music and watch movies with internal speakers, you really need headphones. Spending just $30 or $40 can improve your life greatly.










No. 3: 5-Button Mouse






Let’s see. I still have a 2-button Mouse from Ariston Technologies that I bought with 333 MHz iMac late 1990s. It is very disappointing that Apple didn’t support 2-button Mouse till fairly recently.

Anyway, every cheap Mouse that I bought lasted for just half a year or so. Inevitably, I was forced to buy something that would last longer. So I bought Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer 3.0 about 5 years ago. I can’t believe I’m still using it. I think it was about $30 to $35. I thought the price was outrageous just for a single Mouse. But the decision was right. It’s durable like a big refrigerator.

If you play online games, a 5-button Mouse is a must-have device. I found this 5-button Mouse very useful when I played Age of Mythology online 3 or 4 years ago. When you play online games, there are several essential keys that you need to have access to quickly. If you play games online a lot and don’t have one yet, I strongly recommend you to get a 5-button Mouse. No, it doesn’t have to be precisely Microsoft IntelliMouse.










No. 4: Hard Disk Case






Umm… A hard disk case is not exactly a must-to-have device. It’s just that I replaced my hard disk drives twice over the past two years. And I didn’t want to throw away old drives.

Hard disk cases are quite cheap nowadays. One that I have with FireWire connection only cost me some $30. I have one USB-connected hard disk case, one FireWire-connected hard disk case and another FireWire-connected external hard disk drive. Just for you to know is that you need a FireWire-connected hard disk case as opposed to USB-connected one if you want to use OS installation disks. Other than that, I don’t have no particular preference for FireWire-connected hard disk cases over USB-connected ones. It has never occurred to me that the file transfer speed is better with a FireWire-connected hard disk case.