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Purchased a Drobo FS #36104
08/21/11 01:33 PM
08/21/11 01:33 PM
Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
James Morrissey Offline OP
I
James Morrissey  Offline OP
I
Carpal Tunnel

Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
Hey Everyone,

After months of teeth gnashing, I have decided to pick up a Drobo FS. They are 100 off, and I was able to get it from B&H for 499 (after rebate, which I will need to mail in). I picked up 5 (3 TB) hard drives from New Egg (7200). Total cost is about $1100.

I will definitely be writing a review about the set-up and functioning after it comes in.

James

Re: Purchased a Drobo FS [Re: James Morrissey] #36108
08/21/11 05:25 PM
08/21/11 05:25 PM
Joined: Feb 2005
Montana
Tony Bynum Offline
Pooh-Bah
Tony Bynum  Offline
Pooh-Bah

Joined: Feb 2005
Montana
cool . . . mine's been running great for over a year with 5 2tb drives . . . 3tb drives were not even an option when i set up my drobo. I'v got it wired to my pc via the esata . . . I use the drobo for easy access though lightroom. . . sounds like you may have over done it with the 15TB unless you have a need for that much storage, you'll be leaving at least one, and maybe two drives doing nothing . . . the nice thing about drobo is that it's plug and play so you can start with 4 drives, and when you need more space, just add a drive. . . Like i said, 3tb drives were not even available when i got my drobo and now they are the same price as I paid for the 2tb . . . just buy the storage you need and add more later when the drives have more capacity and are cheaper . . . make sure to back up the drobo! I back mine up to external drives . . .

Re: Purchased a Drobo FS [Re: Tony Bynum] #36109
08/21/11 10:10 PM
08/21/11 10:10 PM
Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
James Morrissey Offline OP
I
James Morrissey  Offline OP
I
Carpal Tunnel

Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
Hey Tony,

Do you have your Drobo set for Single or Double redundancy? I got 15 TBs because (a) the drives were cheap (I got a goooood deal), (2) I have almost 10 years of weddings and 5 years of pet portraits that I would like to have backed up properly. While my file sizes have only gotten unwieldly in the last 3 years, I literally have tons - and tons - of data.

James

Re: Purchased a Drobo FS - Update [Re: James Morrissey] #36175
08/28/11 12:15 AM
08/28/11 12:15 AM
Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
James Morrissey Offline OP
I
James Morrissey  Offline OP
I
Carpal Tunnel

Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
Well - I installed the Drobo today because I had some spare time. The Drobo packaging makes it look so easy that I asked Chanthee to please let me do this on my own (for anyone who knows, I am the tech-idiot in the home). To make a long story short, the Drobo process survived me. smile

I will write a review later for folks who may be interested.

Cheers
James

Re: Purchased a Drobo FS - Update [Re: James Morrissey] #36176
08/28/11 01:30 AM
08/28/11 01:30 AM
Joined: Sep 2005
Portland Oregon
RomanJohnston Offline
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RomanJohnston  Offline
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Joined: Sep 2005
Portland Oregon
James, just a warning, If a drive goes "Toes Up" on ya, be VERY careful to follow their directions. It will all work properly, but don't just think you can just grab the drive and replace it. There are procedures.

Re: Purchased a Drobo FS - Update [Re: RomanJohnston] #36183
08/29/11 08:05 AM
08/29/11 08:05 AM
Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
James Morrissey Offline OP
I
James Morrissey  Offline OP
I
Carpal Tunnel

Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
Thanks, Roman. Do you recall how long the process initially took for all of the information to copy over to the Drobo? I am starting with 3 TB of data - not including the DVD archives that I want to copy over. It has been running for about a day and a half and as knocked off about 2/3 of it. That seems slow to me. The material are all coming off of (admittedly slow) external HD enclosures.

James

Re: Purchased a Drobo FS - Update [Re: James Morrissey] #36208
08/30/11 09:31 AM
08/30/11 09:31 AM
Joined: Feb 2005
Montana
Tony Bynum Offline
Pooh-Bah
Tony Bynum  Offline
Pooh-Bah

Joined: Feb 2005
Montana
james, also note that the drobo is not really a backup system at all, it's a storage system that allows you to story your data together and in the event of a drive failure your not going to loose data. you must back up the drobo or you're really only using an expensive system with a lot of capacity to store stuff . . . transfer speeds depend on many things, drive speeds (the good deal drives you put in it may not be such good deals) the speed and type of connection, the operating system youre using, the capacity of your computer and file sizes. If youre moving all that data at once is will transfer at a much slower rate than if you were transferring smaller packets . . . that said, you have to be there to copy and past all the time . . . I think it took me about 10 hrs to load my drobo . . . you saw my set up, win 7 pro, esata, PC with 64 bit quad core, 24 gigs of ram, solid state c drive, and the drobo as the fastest drives made at the time i put them in, about a year ago now . . . I paid a little more for them but i wanted speed . . . as for getting drives cheep you cant get them cheep enough to buy more space than you need . . . drive prices drop in half in a year and size doubles . . . I think it's best to grow the drobo with new drives - today i can add a 3tb drive that's faster than my 2tb for less than i paid for the two TB drives one year ago . . .

Re: Purchased a Drobo FS - Update [Re: Tony Bynum] #36213
08/30/11 03:57 PM
08/30/11 03:57 PM
Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
James Morrissey Offline OP
I
James Morrissey  Offline OP
I
Carpal Tunnel

Joined: Feb 2005
Manhattan, New York, New York
Hey Tony,

That is an interesting distinction. I am definitely using their storage system as a back up to my own hard drives (which I have no intention of eliminating). What prompted this for me was that I was using several external enclosures to back each other up - something I found dreadfully painful - particularly as space is a premium on my desk. :P

Now, I am keeping the same number of external hard drives - but now as the primary source of data. The Drobo, with its hard drive redundancy system - is the back up of my current hard drive system. Prior to this, I was backing everything up an additional time by burning DVDs - which is a horrible way of doing business.

It is my hope that this will hold me over until I can realistically start uploading files to an off site server.

James


Originally Posted By: FinalShot
james, also note that the drobo is not really a backup system at all, it's a storage system that allows you to story your data together and in the event of a drive failure your not going to loose data. you must back up the drobo or you're really only using an expensive system with a lot of capacity to store stuff . . . transfer speeds depend on many things, drive speeds (the good deal drives you put in it may not be such good deals) the speed and type of connection, the operating system youre using, the capacity of your computer and file sizes. If youre moving all that data at once is will transfer at a much slower rate than if you were transferring smaller packets . . . that said, you have to be there to copy and past all the time . . . I think it took me about 10 hrs to load my drobo . . . you saw my set up, win 7 pro, esata, PC with 64 bit quad core, 24 gigs of ram, solid state c drive, and the drobo as the fastest drives made at the time i put them in, about a year ago now . . . I paid a little more for them but i wanted speed . . . as for getting drives cheep you cant get them cheep enough to buy more space than you need . . . drive prices drop in half in a year and size doubles . . . I think it's best to grow the drobo with new drives - today i can add a 3tb drive that's faster than my 2tb for less than i paid for the two TB drives one year ago . . .

Re: Purchased a Drobo FS - Update [Re: James Morrissey] #36214
08/30/11 10:54 PM
08/30/11 10:54 PM
Joined: Feb 2005
Montana
Tony Bynum Offline
Pooh-Bah
Tony Bynum  Offline
Pooh-Bah

Joined: Feb 2005
Montana
james, youre essentially doing the same thing as i described. I use the drobo as my data storage device so it's one unit containing all my data and should I lose one drive I will not lose my data - assuming the drobo does not die . . . I use external drives to back up my drobo and no longer use dvd's at all. I even deliver images to clients on portable drives or upload them to servers. . . when i import images to the drobo i always make a second copy to my onboard internal drive (drive d) lets call it. I do my editing and culling then back that folder that's on the drobo up to an external drive (about once a week) along with my lightroom catalog. Once i've done that i clear out the copy i made to the on board HD (2 TB partitioned into 4 sectors). The drobo allows me to have easy and quick access to all my files at once so i'm not using a bunch of usb externals - which slows things down. . .


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