Being a geek, I always wanted to keep my data safe, because I went through equipment failure quite a few times. I used to backup everything to CDs and then later to DVDs, but that isn’t practical anymore with the amount of data we generate nowadays. So I moved to external hard-drives, weekly backing up the “important stuff”.
When Apple introduced Time-Machine, things got a lot easier. Just plug an external hard-drive, and Time Machine takes care of the rest. However, the way time-machine works, it saves multiple versions of the same file (that’s good, in case you need an older version) but it takes much more space than a regular backup. Therefore, I was forced to migrate to two external hard-drives: one for my time-machine backups, and one other hard-disk for keeping the rest of the data that did not fit (or I didn’t want to keep) in my machine’s disk.
My configuration so far was an 750GB hard-disk (via USB2) for Time-machine backups , and one 1TB hard-disk (via Firewire 800) for large media files. 750GB for my documents/data backup was sufficient — it kept my data for 6 months. I also backup important stuff (coursework, source code, etc.) on Dropbox, so I always have those synced on the web and on multiple machines around the globe (US, UK and in 2 locations in Cyprus).
However, I am unable to backup twice photos and videos I took, because of the size. My iPhoto library weights approximately 40GB, as it contains hi-def videos and RAW picture files from my DSLR. Finally, backup up my laptop was inconvenient, since the time-machine volume was physically connected to my iMac, therefore I barely backed it up.
So I decided to move to a NAS solution to keep my data safe, have the ability to access it from the network. I looked at a few solutions, from building my own little machine to multiple NAS offerings. Finally, I settled with a Drobo FS from Data Robotics. While the initial price-tag was quite high, approx. £500, the overall functionality well worths its money.
It offers 5 SATA bays, where you can install any brand/size SATA sard-disk you want. Mix & match. Then, the Drobo using the so-called “BeyondRAID” technology manages the storage. It aggregates the hard-disks together offering a bigger volume, with some space reserved to withstand 1 HD failure, or two with the optional setting. Its dead simple: just put the hard-disks in. Setting this thing up took me 10 minutes. Drobo provides visual indicators on its chassis regarding the current disk health (Green for OK, Red for bad next to each slot) and how full the NAS appliance is.
It is connected to my home network via Gigabit ethernet, and the user can manage it via the Drobo Dashboard. The application automatically detects any drobo connected in the same network, no fuss no settings to configure. You can create volumes, shares and adjust user/group permissions using the Dashboard application as well as manage more advanced settings such as notifications if something goes wrong. Excellent!
Regarding performance: to be absolutely honest I was expecting this thing to perform a little bit better. I am getting approx. 25-30 MB/sec write speed and 30-35MB/sec read speeds. Given that thing uses something similar to the RAID technology and a modern hard-disk can spit up to 100MB/sec of throughput I was expecting that this thing can saturate a Gigabit link (approx. 128MB/sec without calculating TCP/IP overhead) or worst case scenario half of it.
Finally, the thing I liked the most: DroboApps. Drobo gives you access on the machine via SSH, and you have the option to install applications on the NAS device. This comes really handy: Torrent application, Firefly (Firefly serves digital music residing on the Drobo FS to the Roku Soundbridge and iTunes), FUPPES (FUPPES is a free, multiplatform UPnP A/V Media Server with DLNA support. — serves media to my PS3). I also cross-compiled PHP CLI interpreter for it so I could run some home-automation scripts on it. Neat.
This gadget perhaps its one the best appliances that are not Apple-made, given its beautiful design and ease of configuration. I am glad I finally got it — it saved me from a huge stack of external hard-disk drives.
August 6th, 2010 at 5:23 pm
Would it be possible to use truecrypt to encrypt the whole partition that you are using?
August 6th, 2010 at 5:24 pm
(or is it generally possible to encrypt somehow the data that you backup?)
August 6th, 2010 at 7:11 pm
What I usually do is create a DMG file in Mac using AES encryption, and store that DMG on the Drobo FS. For what DMG see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Disk_Image
August 10th, 2010 at 10:08 pm
Excellent stuff!!
August 22nd, 2010 at 5:24 pm
I have a couple of questions regarding the drobo-fs:
1. What about fun noise of the five hard-drives? If you place it in a home network 24/7 is it annoying?
2. What about cooling? While operating, does it need to be constantly in an air-conditioning room? I worried because; here in Cyprus on summer the temperature can reach 40 °C.
3. I also notice an on/off switch at the back. If you chose to turn it on every time you want to use it, would that limit the life-time of the hard drives?
August 25th, 2010 at 10:38 am
Hello Ioanni,
The fun noise is barely audible. Mine is on 24/7, and because I have it to switch off the hard-drives during the night its really silent. When its fully operational, the noise doesn’t exceed that of a desktop PC.
I am not sure about cooling, but here it does not get that hot. Since hard-drives can operate in Cyprus, the drobo will be also OK, I guess, if you keep it in the shade.
I don’t think it affects the HDs. There is also a setting for automated HD spin-off, so you might use that for more convenience!
April 22nd, 2011 at 2:04 pm
Please contact me to help me figure out how to get the PS3 to see and access the FS with Fuppes… I can’t find any help anywhere on the net. I used to think I was a geek, but I’m finding myself in deep water here.
Thanks in advance.
June 12th, 2011 at 10:44 am
Hi Andreas, i’ve just also bought a Drobo FS and am struggling to work out how to move my Iphoto library on to it in order to create more space on my iMac hard drive. There are also iMove and iTunes to move but iPhoo is by far the biggest. Some people on other threads have suggested “Create a Disk Image formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and put the Library onto this and store this on the NAS” – is this how you did it or another way? I actualy am not sure how to do this as the drives 2 x 2TB all appears as Drobo, does it mean using disk utility to partition and format? Would appreciate any help you have