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RAID + hot-swappable

B

bobbydaz

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jan 24, 2009
194
67
UK
Our design studio has a Mac Pro used as a file server which stores copies of all our finished jobs. We are looking at the best way of storing an off-site copy of this data (about 2TB and rising). Currently we burn copies to disc and store off-site but this is proving too time consuming plus if any changes are made to files on the server these aren't updated on the off-site disc copies.

One solution I am considering is attaching an external RAID drive to the Mac Pro and backing up to that. If this RAID had hot-swappable drives I am assuming I could keep an extra set of drives off-site and rotate them every week or so. Does anyone have an experience or advice on using a similar set-up?
 
bobbydaz said:
Our design studio has a Mac Pro used as a file server which stores copies of all our finished jobs. We are looking at the best way of storing an off-site copy of this data (about 2TB and rising). Currently we burn copies to disc and store off-site but this is proving too time consuming plus if any changes are made to files on the server these aren't updated on the off-site disc copies.

One solution I am considering is attaching an external RAID drive to the Mac Pro and backing up to that. If this RAID had hot-swappable drives I am assuming I could keep an extra set of drives off-site and rotate them every week or so. Does anyone have an experience or advice on using a similar set-up?
Click to expand...

not sure how much changes or your bandwidth to the internet ?

but offline is one way to go and keep things synched ? the downside the initial upload of everything is a pain ! the upside is if you have the bandwidth then its available anywhere anytime ?
and you can do it daily over night ?
if you are changing like 500 gigs a day though ? that most likely wont work :)

I would really look into this more :) but again I think most are to slow for large volume design work ?
our current work is on our own servers ?

the external solution ? I might say two externals one lives in the safe place the other attached and bu like normal and just bring the one to the safe place leave it grab the other bring back and BU rotate them ?
doing the synch with raid and rebuild etc.. is a big pain
with HDD so cheap ? even the 3 tb segate external are $199 these days ? not to bad
 
Honumaui said:
not sure how much changes or your bandwidth to the internet ?

but offline is one way to go and keep things synched ? the downside the initial upload of everything is a pain ! the upside is if you have the bandwidth then its available anywhere anytime ?
and you can do it daily over night ?
if you are changing like 500 gigs a day though ? that most likely wont work :)

I would really look into this more :) but again I think most are to slow for large volume design work ?
our current work is on our own servers ?

the external solution ? I might say two externals one lives in the safe place the other attached and bu like normal and just bring the one to the safe place leave it grab the other bring back and BU rotate them ?
doing the synch with raid and rebuild etc.. is a big pain
with HDD so cheap ? even the 3 tb segate external are $199 these days ? not to bad
Click to expand...

I did consider an online backup, but I think shifting large volumes of data would be a problem.

I guess using multiple external HDs would be an alternative option to hot-swappable RAID. I'm not that bothered about using RAID capabilities, it was more about the hot-swappable feature, plus the larger capacity of a RAID drive. I have looked at the G-Tech G-SPEED Q which houses 4x 2TB drives so has room to grow into.
 
My solution is an internal RAID array in the file server (to reduce the chances of needing that backup) plus a custom-built external drive with two removable drive trays plus two spare drive trays.

I have the server setup to back up data to the requisite disk in the external drive each night (I use one disk for archive material, the other for current stuff). Then each morning I swap out both drives - therefore I have a day-old backup offsite every night. Simple, relatively inexpensive and it works.
 
tersono said:
My solution is an internal RAID array in the file server (to reduce the chances of needing that backup) plus a custom-built external drive with two removable drive trays plus two spare drive trays.

I have the server setup to back up data to the requisite disk in the external drive each night (I use one disk for archive material, the other for current stuff). Then each morning I swap out both drives - therefore I have a day-old backup offsite every night. Simple, relatively inexpensive and it works.
Click to expand...

sounds like a good solution. How do I go about finding a custom built drive enclosure? The G-Tech RAID has 4 removable drives which would work for me, but I don't really need the RAID features so probably a bit overkill for my needs.
 
not sure if newegg ships to UK ?
but Sansdigital has lots of cases to choose from ?

head to newegg and check out sansdigital in the search :) see what you like then post up for some feeback if ya want :)
 
nanofrog said:
Unfortunately, they only ship to the US and Canada. :(

But there are sites that do, such as provantage.com, and I'd think there's a UK site or two as well (span.com for example; no Sans Digital from what I can tell, but they specialize in RAID hardware).
Click to expand...

both those sites have good stuff :) span always has lots of nice raid toys :)
 
I'm now getting confused as to the best option. As it stands my Mac server has 2x 2TB drives that both need to be backed-up with an extra copy stored off-site. Options I think are:

- Purchase 4x 2TB external drives and rotate these so 2 drives (1 set) are stored off-site at any one time.

- Purchase an enclosure that has 2 trays + 4x 2TB HDs and rotate by hot-swapping.

- Another option I have found is the Newertech Q dock. This only holds one drive at a time, but would probably be the cheapest option for backups.

http://www.newertech.com/products/voyagerq.php
 
just random thoughts :)

SATA drives are rated to be inserted so many times ? forgot how many ? but not all the time so the docks are cool but not for a routing BU IMHO ? why chance it ? the backplane bays would be the same thing so the kind of tray the device used may or may not matter ? its just good info to know :)

I would still think for rotating in and out some kind of self contained case that runs off FW and or eSATA etc.. is going to be the least hassle ?
 
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