I only use my externals for backup purposes. So they are not connected for very long. I keep them packed up when not in use. Except a couple months ago I accidentally knocked one over whilst in use .. guess what lol. I should use them in proper stands I guess. But for the short periods I use them didn't bother. At least 'some' of the data already on the drive was backed up elsewhere same or different generation backup. I've always used Lacie. I believe they use various brands of actual drives.

Edit: I connect them using Firewire 800 on the intel Mac, Firewire 400 on the G4's. So transfer is reasonably fast. Firewire 400 is little faster than USB2 (in practice about 50% faster), & FW800 twice as fast as FW400.
The new Firewire looks good, even faster than the new USB3. Now called Thunderbolt. Quote from Apple Website: "Thunderbolt pipeline is more than 12 times faster than FireWire 800 and up to 20 times faster than USB 2.0"