Mac Mini with external hd server

[Toltepeceno]

to add to all this:

1. thunderbolt is still way too expensive IMHO to justify ANY purchase unless youre some SUPER User/early adopter

Really the only thunderbolt option I could possibly consider is this one at under 160.00.

http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-GoFle...sr=1-2&keywords=thunderbolt+freeagent+adapter

That being said I would definitely go firewire over usb and that's probably hat I would do. I am really liking the raid firewire box from owc. Thank you for the post.

tbayrgs It looks good, I am leaning toward owc I think they may be the way to go. Thanks.

 

[mmomega]

I am running a 2011 Mac Mini, upgraded to 8GB RAM and Mountain Lion Server.

I have
1 WD MyBook 4TB Thunderbolt
1 WD MyBook Studio 2TB FW800
1 Seagate GoFlex 3TB FW800
1 WD MyBook 1TB USB2

all connected running as an iTunes server for Music, Movies and TV Shows
Hosting an iPhoto library for the network
Hosting a website
Calendar server
Mail server
Contacts server

I have 2 iPads, 2 iPhones, 2 aTV's, 2 MacBook, 2 iMacs all on the network daily and I haven't had a hiccup yet when serving content.
The most I've had at one time streeaming was both aTV's and 1 iPad playing 720p movies and an iPhone Airplaying music through the stereo.

I have it connected by CAT6 to my Time Capsule and it performs very very well for such a tiny form factor and to be so quiet, and another CAT6 running to a 5th gen AEBS in the living room to extend WiFi and the Xbox, DirecTV and aTV are hardwired into that router.

I love it.

 

[Toltepeceno]

Thanks for posting it, looks like a very nice setup.

 

[marvin4653]

Perhaps things have changed since you originally asked, but it does appear to support it now.

"JBOD", properly used (in my opinion), refers to an enclosure that will present the drives to the OS as separate drives. So, for example, connecting a 4-bay JBOD enclosure with 3 x 1TB drives will result in three external hard drives appearing in the OS.

Non-RAID or "spanning," however, is different. Those terms refer to an enclosure that combines the four drives and presents them as a single drive to the OS. So, for example, connecting a 4-bay N-RAID enclosure containing 3 x 1TB drives would appear in the OS as a single 3TB drive.

I think bearcatrp is looking for JBOD as I defined above, not N-RAID or spanning.

Here's a 4-bay JBOD enclosure that I'm considering. Only problem is that it's USB 3.0, not FW (Apple, update your Mini already):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816111193

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Also, can anyone using one of these multi-drive enclosures comment on the transfer speed between drives within the enclosure? So, for example, if you have a 2-bay enclosure holding 2 x 1TB drives, and you move a large file from one of the 1TB drives to the other (an intra-enclosure transfer, if you will), how is the transfer speed?

 

[x86isslow]

Couldn't you take a 'spanned' enclosure with 3x 1TB and create 3 volumes in Disk Utility to the same end?

"JBOD", properly used (in my opinion), refers to an enclosure that will present the drives to the OS as separate drives. So, for example, connecting a 4-bay JBOD enclosure with 3 x 1TB drives will result in three external hard drives appearing in the OS.

Non-RAID or "spanning," however, is different. Those terms refer to an enclosure that combines the four drives and presents them as a single drive to the OS. So, for example, connecting a 4-bay N-RAID enclosure containing 3 x 1TB drives would appear in the OS as a single 3TB drive.

I think bearcatrp is looking for JBOD as I defined above, not N-RAID or spanning.

Here's a 4-bay JBOD enclosure that I'm considering. Only problem is that it's USB 3.0, not FW (Apple, update your Mini already):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816111193

----------

Also, can anyone using one of these multi-drive enclosures comment on the transfer speed between drives within the enclosure? So, for example, if you have a 2-bay enclosure holding 2 x 1TB drives, and you move a large file from one of the 1TB drives to the other (an intra-enclosure transfer, if you will), how is the transfer speed?

 

[marvin4653]

Couldn't you take a 'spanned' enclosure with 3x 1TB and create 3 volumes in Disk Utility to the same end?

For me, anyway, the "end" is to have separate physical disks so that I can use them in pairs: one for primary storage, one as a cloned backup of the primary storage drive. I doubt that partitioning a spanned drive in Disk Utility even into partitions that match the sizes of the physical drives will match each partition to a physical drive. The result could be, for me, that I would clone one drive to the other, but end up with both copies of some chunks of data on the same physical drive.

And for anyone looking to plug in drives with existing data into multi-bay enclosure, spanning obviously wouldn't work. Whether spanning will suffice for a particular user comes down to the usage scenario.

 

[Cinephi1e]

I have been using the Mercury Elite Pro Qx2 from OWC for over 3 years now in RAID 5 configuration attached to a Mac Mini. I cannot say enough good things about it. The FW800 connection is fast, it quiet and provides enough storage for even the largest iTunes libraries.

 

[Primejimbo]

I have the set up you are Talking about and I use FW800 between the 2TB hard drive and my Mini and never had an issue. I figured since I have FW800, might as well use it. Too bad the Mini's didn't have USB 3.0 yet, or do they??

 

[Toltepeceno]

Thanks Guys.