[Hidden-tech] external hard drive system

[Rich@OTN]

See below

On 2/24/2020 4:17 PM, explodingbee . via Hidden-discuss wrote:
> Hi Rich,
>
> Thank you for your response.
>
> First off, the instructions for hidden-tech say to edit the subject 
> line when responding so that it is descriptive of what I am going to 
> write.  But I don't know how to do that after I click reply; unless I 
> start a new thread.  Actually, as I am typing now I don't even see the 
> subject line.  If someone wants to explain how to do that I will do so 
> in the future.
It looks like you are tripping over options on gmail reader (guessing 
from your email) -- not something I use, and looks a bit tricky.
Any one else on this ? I'll post on HT web site as advice.

AND even if you can't change the subject -you can trim unrelated posts 
from the digest - please.

> Rich, I looked at the Drobo website and they do have a unit for $350.  
> I am trying to keep costs down but am willing to pay what I have to 
> within reason to get this done properly.  The QNAP unit I included a 
> link to sells for $164.  As I started reading on the drobo website it 
> just seems like there is a whole world of external drive systems with 
> many concepts that I am not familiar with. I do understand what you 
> are saying when you say that it might be better to use more smaller 
> drives rather than fewer larger drives.  I had not previously thought 
> about that.  (Maybe I should get a four or five bay unit instead of a 
> two bay unit, and get four 5tb drives or five 4tb drives instead of 
> two 10tb drives.  On the other hand, though, I would think that the 
> more drives one has the more likely that one will go bad on any given 
> day.)  They are out of stock of the Drobo 5c on the manufacturer's 
> website but I do see some similar models on ebay.
Actually have more smaller drives are less likely to fail -- AND the 
added trick is to buy drives over a time so each from different batches.
And added approach, I have not tried, is a mix of manufacturers.

as for the unit you mention, and many of the RAID units, all drives must 
be of the same size -- I'm not sure how this applies to all drive units.
There is plenty online about doing that -- RAID6 seems to have part of 
the answer.

And yes, you're better with 4x5tb then 2x10 -- and BTW, 4x drives lose a 
smaller amount in the RAID system (the basic technology we are talking 
about) -- Rather then mirror (called RAID1) - RAID5/6 -- sorry but I 
can't give percentages, the easy one is that mirroring gives you the 
size of one of the drives - the other raids use less for redundancy.
Here is some of what I'm saying to be more visual, however knowing 
helps, for practical use you don't need to know the details:
https://www.thegeekstuff.com/2010/08/raid-levels-tutorial/ 
<https://www.thegeekstuff.com/2010/08/raid-levels-tutorial/>
>
> (You say you have 42 tb of data?  Wow.  I thought I had a lot of 
> data.  Not compared to you.  What are you doing with all that data?)
Aside from normal backups and years of images, and other projects -- I 
get a bit heavy on saving videos from my tivo.
>
> Bottom line:  I am not sure what type of unit to get.

Direct connect or Network is a choice that depends on how you use it and 
that's more of a personal choice.

Also, as was just pointed out to me, that effects Drobo - evidently 
Drobo directly shipps units from China and are being effected by the 
Coronavirus -- no idea who else or for how long this will be an issue -- 
personally I'd pick the best unit for my needs and wait a bit.

>
> Thanks for your thoughts on this.
>
> Vincent
>
>
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