Best solution for growing Aperture library (MAC)

[James71]

I was planning to buy a Drobo but after reading here I am hesitating.

What I like about the Drobo

• Storage grows as you need, no need to fill the device with x equal drives from start.
• Mac compatibility (time machine)
• Ease of use

Because of the price tag of the Drobo FS, I would buy the Drobo (firewire version) and connect it either to Mac direct or via USB to Airport Extreme (depending performance).

Main usage would be to store growing Aperture Library but then I would have to get a good performance to edit photos stored on the external disk.

Currently Drobo promises the following:

• FireWire 800: Up to 52MB/s reads and 34MB/s writes
• USB 2.0: Up to 30MB/s reads and 24MB/s writes

A few questions I have:

• Are there other brands out there that offer the "growth" functionality like Drobo?
• If the disk fails, I just replace the disk. If the controller fails, I have to replace the Drobo. How is this with non proprietry RAID systems? Can you rebuild disk from a failed Synology controller in a device of another brand or do you always have to replace a failed controller by the same brand/type in case disaster strikes?

Network acces is a plus but not a must have. Do you advise a local attached disk (firewire/USB) or NAS for performance issues?

Have had a look at charts here but as there is no data about Drobo or local attached drives I am stuck here. I am looking for the best mac-compatible solution.

Thanks for the advise!

 

[thiggins]

Because of the price tag of the Drobo FS, I would buy the Drobo (firewire version) and connect it either to Mac direct or via USB to Airport Extreme (depending performance).

For best performance connect directly to your machine via Firewire.

Are there other brands out there that offer the "growth" functionality like Drobo?

Many multi-drive NASes provide RAID expansion capability. NETGEAR ReadyNAS is probably the most flexible.
Realize, however, that expansion takes a long time and if something goes wrong during the process, you can lose your array.

Windows Home Server based systems use a non-RAID storage method that allow you to add and remove drives and use different drive sizes. A periodic background task takes care of replicating your data. Latest versions are the HP StorageWorks Data Vault X510, EX490 and EX495

If the disk fails, I just replace the disk. If the controller fails, I have to replace the Drobo. How is this with non proprietry RAID systems? Can you rebuild disk from a failed Synology controller in a device of another brand or do you always have to replace a failed controller by the same brand/type in case disaster strikes?

NASes work the same way. You can't move drives from one brand of NAS to another. You might be able to recover data by mounting the drive in a system that can read the Linux drive format. But doing it successfully with a drive from a RAID 5 array is very iffy. Whatever you do, have a backup on a physically separate system for data you can't afford to lose. Neither RAID, nor Drobo is a substitute for backup.

Network acces is a plus but not a must have. Do you advise a local attached disk (firewire/USB) or NAS for performance issues?

Current generation NASes can provide better over-the-network throughput than an attached USB drive, which will max out ~22 MB/s. I haven't benched Firewire, but I have measured almost 100 MB/s performance from some of the new QNAPs backing up an attached eSATA RAID 0 array.

 

[James71]

Thanks for the explanation Tim
Have done some further reading, apparently using Aperture on a NAS is not recommended, DAS should be the way to go. Guess Drobo will be the betetr choice after all then, right?

 

[teknojnky]

you could use a nas that supports iscsi, which lets you create volumes which appear to be physical drives to your applications.

not sure that all iscsi implenentations will allow expansion, so you may wish to verify that before any purchase.

 

[James71]

you could use a nas that supports iscsi, which lets you create volumes which appear to be physical drives to your applications.

not sure that all iscsi implenentations will allow expansion, so you may wish to verify that before any purchase.

Drobo has also iscsi solutions, but it is costly.
Can anybody recommend Caldigit products?

 

[James71]

Drobo has also iscsi solutions, but it is costly.
Can anybody recommend Caldigit products?

Nobody?

Any idea where I can find speed comparison test for direct attached storage solutions. (Is Lacie a good choice?), as speed is an important factor, I am told to go for DAS solution.

 

[thiggins]

I've only done one DAS review:
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/nas/nas-reviews/30789-iomega-ultramax-pro-desktop-hard-drive-reviewed

For USB, performance will top out in the 20 - 25 MB/s range.
eSATA can produce throughput in the 90+ MB/s range.

Don't know for firewire.

I haven't looked at Caldigit products. SansDigital and others also make attached storage solutions.

 

[jerryk]

I considered a Drobo for my photo editing/management (Lightroom not Aperture) but decided I wanted to be able to access the storage from any of my computers. I just acquired a ReadyNAS NVX and it seems to work well with Lightroom. I selected the ReadyNAS NVX over other NASes based on performance (70 MB/sec) and ease of expansion (you can increase size by just installing larger drive pairs).

 

[James71]

I selected the ReadyNAS NVS over other NASes nased on performance (70 MB/sec) and ease of expansion (you can increase size by just installing larger drive pairs).

Is this based upon personal experience or the advertised speed?
Do you mean NVX? NVS is not on their product page

 

[jerryk]

Is this based upon personal experience or the advertised speed?
Do you mean NVX? NVS is not on their product page

NVX. Sorry no coffee.

The performance is real. This thing is that fast. My results match the file copy figures posted in the NAS charts.

 

[James71]

Current generation NASes can provide better over-the-network throughput than an attached USB drive, which will max out ~22 MB/s. I haven't benched Firewire, but I have measured almost 100 MB/s performance from some of the new QNAPs backing up an attached eSATA RAID 0 array.

After reading these results for the Drobo FS, and reading the final thoughts of the review, decided to have a look at this NAS

It has been labeled "mac friendly" and the speed (on gigabit LAN) should reach about 100 mbt/s

If I go ahead with QNAP, I would only keep an small aperture library local on the internal disk and work with referenced files on the NAS

I am also told that you can start with just one disk (without protection in that case) and gradually grow. Sounds a bit like the Drobo scalability option, right?

 

[thiggins]

Don't give special preference to claims of "Mac friendly" for the QNAP or any other NAS. Look for the features and protocols that you need supported.

Drobo storage expansion works differently than QNAP's RAID expansion. I can't comment on which is better because I have not used a Drobo.

 

[James71]

Drobo storage expansion works differently than QNAP's RAID expansion. I can't comment on which is better because I have not used a Drobo.

Can you, please, comment on the QNAP RAID expansion system?
I understand Drobo is the non-techie way, but I do not mind to do some configuration the few times the disks array is cahnged (not something you do every day)

 

[thiggins]

http://qnap.com/pro_features_RLM.asp

 

[James71]

Have done some more researching (a lot to read here )

What I want (need)

• 5 bay enclosure
• AFP
• Gigabit LAN
• iTunes server

This results in the following candidates (fastest on top)

• Synology Disk Station (DS1010+)
• Thecus NAS Server w/ Dual DOM (N5500)
• Qnap Turbo NAS 559 (TS-559 Pro)

The Qnap seems to be the most MAC friendly. After sales support is also of importance to me (am located in Europe)

Something to keep in mind:

you could use a nas that supports iscsi, which lets you create volumes which appear to be physical drives to your applications.

not sure that all iscsi implenentations will allow expansion, so you may wish to verify that before any purchase.

Not sure if they all support iSCSI

Which one do you recommend for Apple usage?

 

[teknojnky]

unfortunately I don't own any macs, so I can't speak any experience there.

I do own some readynas's and can easily recommend those, but they can run a bit more expensive than other solutions.