Suggestions for a new drive enclosure for JBOD?

[kat.hayes]

I have a OWC Thunderbay 4 being used in JBOD mode with the Studio V1. Something happened and the Thunderbay no longer turns on. I am going to try a few things to get it working, though if it does not turn on I will need to replace it. Does anyone have any suggestions for which enclosure I might want to look at to use 4 drives in JBOD mode? Is the Thunderbay 4 the best option or is there something else out there?

Thanks

 

[Shazaam!]

Contact OWC about a repair. The Thunderbay 4 is my recommended choice.

 

[Night_Sailor]

I have a Thunderbay 8. I forget what it is called. One drive sled set up with four m.2 drives. I was disappointed in the speed. It is not as fast as the internal drive on my Max Studio.

For a M1,2,3 machine, I recommend buying the maximum memory possible (some is used for video, and more is better for multiple monitors and virtual environments) and max storage (if you want max speed). In thought I'd save money with external drives. Lots of space for less money, but not as fast.

I also have a 10G fiber and Cat8 network backbone. Each computer has 10G connection for fast back ups. I can back up multiple systems, as well and support many video cameras. The cameras help me keep on eye on the dogs (I'm a dog breeder). 10G is marvelous.

I run a mac mini using screen sharing and it makes it easy to use my monitors more effectively, I can close that window after setting it to tasks.

 

[InquiringMac]

Any 6-8 bay Thunderbolt™ 4-Enabled DAS on the horizon, please?

 

[MRxROBOT]

I have a OWC Thunderbay 4 being used in JBOD mode with the Studio V1. Something happened and the Thunderbay no longer turns on. I am going to try a few things to get it working, though if it does not turn on I will need to replace it. Does anyone have any suggestions for which enclosure I might want to look at to use 4 drives in JBOD mode? Is the Thunderbay 4 the best option or is there something else out there?

Thanks

Although the Thunderbay 4 uses a thunderbolt connection, its throughput is not much higher than USB 3.2 speeds (15 Gbps). My recommendation is to go with a USB 3.2 DAS from a reliable brand like Sabrent. The DS-SC5B is my recommendation, it's also a lot cheaper.

SABRENT USB 3.2 5 Bay 3.5" SATA Hard Drive Tray Less Docking Station (DS-SC5B)

The Sabrent USB 3.2 5-Bay 3.5" SATA Hard Drive Tray-less Docking Station (DS-SC5B) is the PERFECT solution for all you docking needs! FEATURES • USB 3.2 Type-C port with up to 10Gbps transfer speed. • 5 x SATA 6Gbit/s 3.5” hard drive bays. • High-quality aluminum for optimal heat dissipation and ...

www.amazon.com

 

[dimme]

Although the Thunderbay 4 uses a thunderbolt connection, its throughput is not much higher than USB 3.2 speeds (15 Gbps). My recommendation is to go with a USB 3.2 DAS from a reliable brand like Sabrent. The DS-SC5B is my recommendation, it's also a lot cheaper.

SABRENT USB 3.2 5 Bay 3.5" SATA Hard Drive Tray Less Docking Station (DS-SC5B)

The Sabrent USB 3.2 5-Bay 3.5" SATA Hard Drive Tray-less Docking Station (DS-SC5B) is the PERFECT solution for all you docking needs! FEATURES • USB 3.2 Type-C port with up to 10Gbps transfer speed. • 5 x SATA 6Gbit/s 3.5” hard drive bays. • High-quality aluminum for optimal heat dissipation and ...

www.amazon.com

Have you used the Sabrent with the Mac Studio. I have had a unit from Orico and had to return it because the disk would unmount on their own. I do have two Thunder Bay 4 units and they have been rock solid.

 

[MRxROBOT]

Have you used the Sabrent with the Mac Studio. I have had a unit from Orico and had to return it because the disk would unmount on their own. I do have two Thunder Bay 4 units and they have been rock solid.

Yes with a M2 Max MacBook Pro.

 

[kat.hayes]

Although the Thunderbay 4 uses a thunderbolt connection, its throughput is not much higher than USB 3.2 speeds (15 Gbps). My recommendation is to go with a USB 3.2 DAS from a reliable brand like Sabrent. The DS-SC5B is my recommendation, it's also a lot cheaper.

SABRENT USB 3.2 5 Bay 3.5" SATA Hard Drive Tray Less Docking Station (DS-SC5B)

The Sabrent USB 3.2 5-Bay 3.5" SATA Hard Drive Tray-less Docking Station (DS-SC5B) is the PERFECT solution for all you docking needs! FEATURES • USB 3.2 Type-C port with up to 10Gbps transfer speed. • 5 x SATA 6Gbit/s 3.5” hard drive bays. • High-quality aluminum for optimal heat dissipation and ...

www.amazon.com

Why do you recommend this model? Is it based just on price? If it is USB 3.2 then it will have about the same throughput?

Thanks

 

[pi6xjdskfa]

Hi, I am looking at 80-100tb JBOD for Macbook 14" 2024 with Caldigit T4 dock. How is the Sabrent DS-SC5B performance/reliability compared to OWC Thunderbay? Which are best drives for the dock? Sabrent markets the dock for Windows on amazon so was wondering if there will be some incompatibilities.

I was looking at OWC but don't like their Softraid limitations for usage on one computer. I mainly have 2 backups of all my data for each year and want to have the Sabrent/OWC as a quick way to access all my files at once. I will then keep the 1 backup at an offsite location.

 

[maverick100]

Hi, I am looking at 80-100tb JBOD for Macbook 14" 2024 with Caldigit T4 dock. How is the Sabrent DS-SC5B performance/reliability compared to OWC Thunderbay? Which are best drives for the dock? Sabrent markets the dock for Windows on amazon so was wondering if there will be some incompatibilities.

I was looking at OWC but don't like their Softraid limitations for usage on one computer. I mainly have 2 backups of all my data for each year and want to have the Sabrent/OWC as a quick way to access all my files at once. I will then keep the 1 backup at an offsite location.

just help me understand. If you are do JBOD why would you use Softraid?

 

[pi6xjdskfa]

just help me understand. If you are do JBOD why would you use Softraid

I want to have the ability to access the contents of the 10 drives in the sabrent but i think each drive is a separate volume. is there any program that can basically consolidate all the drives as one volume without using raid?

 

[maverick100]

I want to have the ability to access the contents of the 10 drives in the sabrent but i think each drive is a separate volume. is there any program that can basically consolidate all the drives as one volume without using raid?

Unfortunately I do not know.

 

[ColdCase]

The MacOS disk utility does this:

Concatenated disk set (JBOD)​

A concatenated disk set, also called “Just a Bunch of Disks” (JBOD), combines several smaller disks into a single large disk.

A concatenated disk set is helpful if you have a file, such as a database, that’s larger than any of your disks. You can use Disk Utility to add more disks to a concatenated disk set to increase its size.

 

[dimme]

I want to have the ability to access the contents of the 10 drives in the sabrent but i think each drive is a separate volume. is there any program that can basically consolidate all the drives as one volume without using raid?

Just be aware if you do this with 10 drive you have a 10x chance of data loss. If you lose one drive everything is gone. You will need a good backup plan.

 

[MRxROBOT]

Just be aware if you do this with 10 drive you have a 10x chance of data loss. If you lose one drive everything is gone. You will need a good backup plan.

That’s not how JBOD works.

 

[dimme]

That’s not how JBOD works.

I was referring to having the JBOD as one volume as the OP was asking about. Yes if the drives are formatted and mounted individually there is not a problem if one drive fails, you only lose one drive. If they are formatted as a concatenated disk set then if one drive fails you can lose everything. Some JBOD enclosures also have a setting called span which is very similar.

 

[Chuckeee]

The MacOS disk utility does this:

Concatenated disk set (JBOD)​

A concatenated disk set, also called “Just a Bunch of Disks” (JBOD), combines several smaller disks into a single large disk.

A concatenated disk set is helpful if you have a file, such as a database, that’s larger than any of your disks. You can use Disk Utility to add more disks to a concatenated disk set to increase its size.

Is that the same as Raid 0? Or JBOD for any assortment of disks and Raid level 0 requires all the smaller disks to be the same?

 

[ColdCase]

Raid 0 is striped, data is split and recorded on alternate drives. Disks should be the same size for efficiency. Concatenated or Spanned disks are different. Data is written in sequence, no splitting. It just virtually adds one disk to the end of another and the volume is the sum of the disk sizes. A 1TB drive plus a 4TB drive looks like a 5TB drive. Later add a 3TB drive, you now have a 8TB virtual drive.

If all the disks in the set are about the same size, consider using a striped RAID set, which lets you access your data more quickly.

Both concatenated and RAID0 have little protection from disk error, so an effective backup scheme should be used.

Folks with several disks of varying sizes laying around often piece together drives to make two concatenated drive sets and then mirror the sets. It will look like one drive to the OS but with half the sum of the individual disk capacities.

 

[MRxROBOT]

I was referring to having the JBOD as one volume as the OP was asking about. Yes if the drives are formatted and mounted individually there is not a problem if one drive fails, you only lose one drive. If they are formatted as a concatenated disk set then if one drive fails you can lose everything. Some JBOD enclosures also have a setting called span which is very similar.

Again that’s not how JBOD works. If one disk out of 10 fails, the remaining 9 are fine. What you’re talking about is RAID 0. However, it’s not as simple as mounting a member of the JBOD RAID set and accessing it with the Mac's Finder. You might need to repair the drive and use a disk recovery application, but the data on the remaining drives will be there.

 

[pi6xjdskfa]

The reason I like separate drives is that a power spike, virus, or some other incident can destroy a RAID. I buy two drives every year and backup data to both drives using Chronosnyc. However, I would like to add a third drive(the JBOD) so I can have access to all files from last 5-10 years on those drives as a third backup. I would just like to be able to access al data at once though.

 

[TzunamiOSX]

I’m using a Raidon case on my Mac Studio for about 1 month all working without problem

GR3660-BA31::Mobile

RAIDON is a professional data backup (data storage solution) provider focusing on designing and manufacturing RAID data backup storage products.

www.raidon.com.tw

Shortcoming: hot-swappable drives are not really hot swappable, beacause all drives will be shorty ejected when remove or insert a drive.