If hasn't appeared yet, it is either a) it has already been done or b) you need try the 3rd set of settings. It may pop up after the drive has been set to Reduced Security under Recovery Mode.
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Ventura/Sonoma and Drobo?
- Thread starter mkummer
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I'm confused, why would a NAS need Thunderbolt 4? Or why would a Thunderbolt-attached storage need networking? Are the two connections used in parallel? Or one vs the other?
It's really for convenience. Not all drives ever can have RAID and Thunderbolt combined and this is just a very clever way to approach the issue of having access to data faster, especially if say you are someone who needs to access amounts of large files quickly like a video editor, musician or photographer.
I just installed Ventura Public beta and My Drobo 5D works fine. Even Drobo Dashboard is working. My all-knowing Mac friend says its because the kext was installed in a previous OS version and gets "white-listed".
I know what you're saying here but it doesn't make a difference. Drobo themselves have already said there will be issues going ahead with Ventura because they are unable to create a (stable) working driver (they issued the statements themselves recently). Sure white-listing I know also works for Nvidia GTX drivers on say Mojave, but it can only go so far. When the underlying required system files are not there you will run into problems eventually.
Does anyone know if it's possible to run Drobo Dashboard in an older macOS version in a Virtual Machine using Parallels? That way if I need to make any configuration changes to the Drobo after upgrading to Ventura I could just launch a Catalina VM or whatever in Parallels and make the changes with Drobio Dashboard installed there.
Nothing so far apart from Drobo's recent statement about Ventura driver issues (that they don't work in Ventura).
I have not tried that, but I might try it in a Mac OS VM once I switch to Ventura later.
However, I do have a 2013 MacBook Air that I can still use to run Drobo Dashboard for my 5N with 5x 8TB drives, as well as a gaming PC running Drobo Dashboard; So my Primary MacBook Pro isn't my only machine that I use to access the Drobo settings.
I'm not sure how a direct attached Drobo would behave if using Dashboard on another machine (or VM) though, like I would be with my 5N.
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Good idea! I'll just create a small partition with Monterey installed on it for this purpose.
Couldn't risk it so I installed the Dashboard on a MBP M1 with Ventura GM. I had to weaken the startup security but then everything worked fine (plugged in a 5D3).
Hopefully, Drobo will release soon their compatibility testing results.
I abandoned my Drobo quite some time ago, mostly because they abandoned the model I had. I bought (used I think) the Drobo mini and it was a good idea, at least for a little while but because its using laptop hard drives the writing was on the wall for its longevity.
I started having OS compatibility issues long before Ventura or Monterey and I couldn't trust my data on it any longer
I started having OS compatibility issues long before Ventura or Monterey and I couldn't trust my data on it any longer
Experiences vary: I have 5 of them and except an horrible problem on a 8D (saved by DiskWarrior kindly provided by Drobo Tech Support). I'm migrating to a custom 48 disks unix machine but I'll miss the friendliness of all this. I would still recommend them for normal people if one could still buy them. There isn't really competition, sadly.
No question, the DAS market is an Anachronism in 2022. With large USB-C/TB disk drives available, inexpensive cloud storage or the use of home NAS units, was simply too much for DAS. They were the ones to draw the short straw.
Thanks - of course that was earlier in this thread. I was overriding this security item with the installation of Monterey too, so seamingly nothing changed that much with Ventura? A statement by Drobo would be nice, since the support is still active, at least via Twitter.
I can happily report that my Drobo 5N2 and Drobo Dashboard are happy working on my primary Mac that I upgraded to Ventura. I really didn’t do anything special like shut it down or disconnect it or any other external drives. I just opened up System Preferences and Software Update and let ‘er rip!
As a precaution, I did install Drobo Dashboard on an older MacBook Pro running Monterey and made sure that everything was working fine there as Administrator as well just in case.
So far I have noticed absolutely no difference in my Drobo’s performance or functionality in the last few day since the macOS upgrade. I use my Drobo for Time Machine backups of three different Macs as well as storage of media for a huge Plex Library.
As a precaution, I did install Drobo Dashboard on an older MacBook Pro running Monterey and made sure that everything was working fine there as Administrator as well just in case.
So far I have noticed absolutely no difference in my Drobo’s performance or functionality in the last few day since the macOS upgrade. I use my Drobo for Time Machine backups of three different Macs as well as storage of media for a huge Plex Library.
I do not specifically recall a pop-up dialog about Venture support for the Drobo kext after the reboot. But everything went by so quickly that it's possible that I missed it or ignored it. I probably should have bee paying more attention. But the Drobo is still working just fine. There have been multiple Time Machine backups made and I have added a ton of new content to my Plex library and successful streaming tests (local network) of each new movie added.
Good news again! One last thing I would like to know: is your primary Mac a M1 machine? I am using a Mac Studio and don’t have a second Mac - that is why I am very cautious and appreciate your experiences very much.
I agree Your Ventura mac will see the network attached Drobo it just won't be able to do any disk management. We will all need to set up an older Mac computer as a Drobo server until the Drobo team catches up. As it is now we can connect with lots of different servers remotely. My company has had 3 running for years and they have been good. Also only my work station has the Drobo Dashboard and Drobo Kext. The others just see it as a network drive. Not sure what will happen to direct connect devices!
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