Hey all,
So I'm debating what to do for my HTPC/Server Mac, and I'm basically going to lay out my thought process here... I'm looking for comment on what's the best way to go, or if my thinking has any fatal flaws.
I've got 4 USB 3.0 ports, a USB 3.0 hub with 7 ports, and an always-on Mac that serves up iTunes media to an Apple TV, MacBook Pro, an iPad, and 2 iPhones locally. Over the Internet, I use Plex to share that same media when away from home. The Mac also acts as the family's encoding station for our slowly shrinking collection of unconverted DVDs, along with the central hub all of our photos and videos taken with all the iOS devices.
Right now, I've got a variety of 6 USB 2 and 3 external HDDs attached in various sizes totaling about 8TB, with 6TB used. And while the music, photos, and all the Mac HDs and iOS devices are backed up via Time Capsule, NONE of the other media (converted TV/movies from DVD mainly, but also old data from the past 10 years that is non-critical and Steam games I no longer play) is. Some of the HDDs are getting long-in-the-tooth (4+ years), and I realize the folly of not having all my hard work in converting media backed up (we no longer have DVD players for the TVs, and the idea of having to reconvert everything is a nightmare). I'm also growing tired of the "have everything slowly sprawl over several disks as I add them." iTunes no longer automatically manages my Library as I've had to move pieces of it across the HDDs. To consolidate the library would require a 5TB HDD, which doesn't exist...
So my conundrum: I would love to a) have all my media (and I suppose the old documents and Steam games) backed up, b) have all of the media redundant so a drive failure doesn't take part or most of my iTunes library offline (which a backup would do in my case rather quickly, just unplug the bad disk and rename the backup to the original and iTunes is good to go), and c) if possible have the entire iTunes library back on one disk so iTunes can manage it automatically.
I realize RAID ≠ backup, but it fulfills b) and c). And products like a DIY NAS with ZFS, Synology, or Drobo would allow me to grow the HDDs over time without much effort. But they cost so much, that I wonder if it might not be easier to just buy external 3TB or 4TB USB3 HDDs to use. If I add 2 USB3 4TB HDDs for ~$440, I've reached a) and b). If I add 3 USB3 4TB HDDs for ~$700 and use Disk Utility to create 2 concatenated sets (7TB and 8TB, respectively), then I've done a), b), and c) while only slightly increasing my risk of data loss overall. And I retain the ability to upgrade my HDDs via mix-and-match speeds/makers/capacities later fairly easily, either by adding to the concatenated sets (and further increasing my risk of data loss in each set, but what are the odds of both sets failing at the same time?), or by replacing a drive out of the concatenated set/using the new one stand-alone. And I'm not locked into any one vendor's enclosure for all time (or until I want to reformat all my working HDDs and recopy all my data to boot).
So what are the downsides, beyond not having everything nice and tidy inside a separate box?
I'm thinking long-term with this, and am unsure if any of the NAS/DAS solutions are safe investments for a prosumer-budget in the long term (3-5 years, same as the life of a HDD). If the enclosure/computer fails, I'm out several hundred bucks, may lose all my data too, and if out-of-warranty then I have to spend several hundred more dollars buying the same vendor's stuff (or the time troubleshooting and remaking my DIY box) to try and get my data back. If a single 3TB or 4TB HDD fails, I'm out ~$220 tops and likely less as $/GB historically decreases for HDDs (recent flood in Thailand not withstanding).
So I'm debating what to do for my HTPC/Server Mac, and I'm basically going to lay out my thought process here... I'm looking for comment on what's the best way to go, or if my thinking has any fatal flaws.
I've got 4 USB 3.0 ports, a USB 3.0 hub with 7 ports, and an always-on Mac that serves up iTunes media to an Apple TV, MacBook Pro, an iPad, and 2 iPhones locally. Over the Internet, I use Plex to share that same media when away from home. The Mac also acts as the family's encoding station for our slowly shrinking collection of unconverted DVDs, along with the central hub all of our photos and videos taken with all the iOS devices.
Right now, I've got a variety of 6 USB 2 and 3 external HDDs attached in various sizes totaling about 8TB, with 6TB used. And while the music, photos, and all the Mac HDs and iOS devices are backed up via Time Capsule, NONE of the other media (converted TV/movies from DVD mainly, but also old data from the past 10 years that is non-critical and Steam games I no longer play) is. Some of the HDDs are getting long-in-the-tooth (4+ years), and I realize the folly of not having all my hard work in converting media backed up (we no longer have DVD players for the TVs, and the idea of having to reconvert everything is a nightmare). I'm also growing tired of the "have everything slowly sprawl over several disks as I add them." iTunes no longer automatically manages my Library as I've had to move pieces of it across the HDDs. To consolidate the library would require a 5TB HDD, which doesn't exist...
So my conundrum: I would love to a) have all my media (and I suppose the old documents and Steam games) backed up, b) have all of the media redundant so a drive failure doesn't take part or most of my iTunes library offline (which a backup would do in my case rather quickly, just unplug the bad disk and rename the backup to the original and iTunes is good to go), and c) if possible have the entire iTunes library back on one disk so iTunes can manage it automatically.
I realize RAID ≠ backup, but it fulfills b) and c). And products like a DIY NAS with ZFS, Synology, or Drobo would allow me to grow the HDDs over time without much effort. But they cost so much, that I wonder if it might not be easier to just buy external 3TB or 4TB USB3 HDDs to use. If I add 2 USB3 4TB HDDs for ~$440, I've reached a) and b). If I add 3 USB3 4TB HDDs for ~$700 and use Disk Utility to create 2 concatenated sets (7TB and 8TB, respectively), then I've done a), b), and c) while only slightly increasing my risk of data loss overall. And I retain the ability to upgrade my HDDs via mix-and-match speeds/makers/capacities later fairly easily, either by adding to the concatenated sets (and further increasing my risk of data loss in each set, but what are the odds of both sets failing at the same time?), or by replacing a drive out of the concatenated set/using the new one stand-alone. And I'm not locked into any one vendor's enclosure for all time (or until I want to reformat all my working HDDs and recopy all my data to boot).
So what are the downsides, beyond not having everything nice and tidy inside a separate box?
I'm thinking long-term with this, and am unsure if any of the NAS/DAS solutions are safe investments for a prosumer-budget in the long term (3-5 years, same as the life of a HDD). If the enclosure/computer fails, I'm out several hundred bucks, may lose all my data too, and if out-of-warranty then I have to spend several hundred more dollars buying the same vendor's stuff (or the time troubleshooting and remaking my DIY box) to try and get my data back. If a single 3TB or 4TB HDD fails, I'm out ~$220 tops and likely less as $/GB historically decreases for HDDs (recent flood in Thailand not withstanding).