Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

What external HD are nMP owners using...

violst

violst

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jun 14, 2012
339
161
Now that the nMP has been out for a few months, I was just wondering what external thunderbolt drive people are using for their main working storage.

My nMP should be arriving in a couple of days and I'm still on the fence about which external storage solution to get. Any feedback would be great.

Thanks.
 
Last edited:
Promise Pegasus r6 12tb for main work storage in raid 5,

Drobo 5d 5TB as an archive.
Some USB 3 drives for movies and time machine.
 
I will use like this:

- Caldigit T3 (thunderbolt) - 2TB Raid0 + 512SSD for work (audio and video mainly)
- IcyBox 4x HDD USB 3.0 JBOD
- Audio Virtual Instruments Samples
- Audio Lib
- iTunes / Media
- MISC

- Quad HDD dock USB 3.0 - daily back up of Caldigit T3
 
Internal 256SSD for Mavericks.

I got the Rugged Lacie 256SSD for Bootcamp Win8.1.

I ordered the Raid box from Macsales.com with 2x2TB drives. I will run it as a 4tb raid drive when it gets here in a few weeks. This will be the main storage drive for photoshop and general stuff.
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/Thunderbolt/External-Drive/OWC/Elite-Dual-RAID

I am using an older 1tb USB3 drive in that spot for now. I have a new (smaller) 1tb USB3 drive for TimeMachine.

I will be backing up the bigger drive to the home Synology NAS. (hmm, it probably needs another drive or 2) I am also considering Carbonite this go round too.

The Raid box will go next to the nMP (marble tile on top of the carpet)

The Bootcamp and TM external drives will go onto the cable shelf in my desk, with the USB3 hub.
 
I am using CalDigit T3 3TB.

It is fast.

IT IS LOUD!

It uses Toshiba 1GB hard drives. I have considered changing the hard drives to Seagate SATA 3, 7200 rpm to see if it will not be as noisy. I think the all metal enclosure actually causes more noise. The drives have no isolation from the case slots.

I will continue to use, but I'm not sure I could recommend.
 
I'm also using the Promise Pegasus2 R4. I got the diskless version and filled it with 3 TB drives, so I'm getting 12TB of storage total.
 
My 8C 1TB D700 December 20 order when it arrives this is my plan...(all ready to go except the Dual enclosure)

OWC Qx2 via USB with 4 3TB 7200 Toshiba spinners at Raid 5 for time machine.

OWC Elite Pro Dual with a pair of 3TB 7200 Toshiba spinners at Raid 0 via TB.
OWC is back-ordered on these till about April 1

2 portable LaCie Ruggeds that I changed out the drives to Samsung 840 EVO's 1 TB that I will use when in the USA connected to my nMP and when traveling connected to my Mid 2012 MBP thru a Caldigit Hub.

Storage is like sex or money....you can never seem to get or have enough!:D
 
I had a few 1 TB disks I wanted to re-purpose, so I picked up this enclosure from DAT Optic when it was on sale a couple weeks ago. I'm only using it in JBOD mode, but it does have RAID support in hardware for a bunch of different RAID levels. It's not quite as quiet as the Mac Pro when the disks are being hit, but it's also not a bunch louder.
 
BlueWaterVA said:
I am using CalDigit T3 3TB.

It is fast.

IT IS LOUD!

It uses Toshiba 1GB hard drives. I have considered changing the hard drives to Seagate SATA 3, 7200 rpm to see if it will not be as noisy. I think the all metal enclosure actually causes more noise. The drives have no isolation from the case slots.

I will continue to use, but I'm not sure I could recommend.
Click to expand...

I cannot say it's LOUD, it's like every box I had before. The big problem for me, is the HUM/Resonance that makes because in on the table, 1 meter from my ears.
When my nMacPro arrive i will put below the table to see if diminish the fan.

If not I'll try to open and disable the Fan.

I've test it with only a SSD HD and the sound is the same.
The sound we ear is from the FAN, not from the HDD's.
 
I ordered a Caldigit T3.
I was hoping it would be a silent solution... More silent than other enclosures?
 
klukkluk said:
I ordered a Caldigit T3.
I was hoping it would be a silent solution... More silent than other enclosures?
Click to expand...

klukkluk It's not a silent solution. The fan's in here are always on, but i think the manual says that they only be on when need it. weird...

Other thing This was from tech support about warranty:

There're couple issues:

Q: Can I use my own SSD inside Caldigit T3, will I lose warranty?

1. If you remove the drive from the drive tray, it will VOID the caldigit warranty on that drive module, not the entire enclosure
- that drive will still have the manufacture warranty covered.

2. Your drive has not been test with our enclosure, so we cannot guarantee its compatibility or performance.


3. Your SSD may not fix inside the tray
- our tray is for the 3.5" desktop drive, you may need a bracket for it.
 
Last edited:
I was thinking about the LaCie 2big thunderbolt 6TB, but the Caldigit T3 thunderbolt 6TB is looking pretty good.

Any advice/experience between the two.

Thanks.
 
unfragile said:
klukkluk It's not a silent solution. The fan's in here are always on, but i think the manual says that they only be on when need it. weird...

Other thing This was from tech support about warranty:

There're couple issues:

Q: Can I use my own SSD inside Caldigit T3?

1. If you remove the drive from the drive tray, it will VOID the caldigit warranty on that drive module, not the entire enclosure
- that drive will still have the manufacture warranty covered.

2. Your drive has not been test with our enclosure, so we cannot guarantee its compatibility or performance.


3. Your SSD may not fix inside the tray
- our tray is for the 3.5" desktop drive, you may need a bracket for it.
Click to expand...

As if you're not smart enough to know you will need an adapter for the SSD, Duh! I am still in the 30 day warranty period and I would return mine if it were not for the restocking fee. As I said before it is fast!
 

Attachments

  • DiskSpeedTest.png
    DiskSpeedTest.png
    741 KB · Views: 107
BlueWaterVA said:
As if you're not smart enough to know you will need an adapter for the SSD, Duh! I am still in the 30 day warranty period and I would return mine if it were not for the restocking fee. As I said before it is fast!
Click to expand...

Hi BlueWaterVA,

If your smart enough you can see that I didn't question that, the support team thought that I would known.

"Can I use my own SSD inside Caldigit T3, will I lose warranty?"

;)

----------
BlueWaterVA said:
As if you're not smart enough to know you will need an adapter for the SSD, Duh! I am still in the 30 day warranty period and I would return mine if it were not for the restocking fee. As I said before it is fast!
Click to expand...

I just open my Caldigit T3 and disable the fan.

The loud noise you are experience is from the FAN, maybe we can replace it for a better one.

None of screws were protect to void the warranty. I was very careful not to damage any screw.

The temperature seems normal, lets see in a couple of hours of work. And the noise is way lower than before (obvious).
 
Last edited:
unfragile said:
Hi BlueWaterVA,

If your smart enough you can see that I didn't question that, the support team thought that I would known.

"Can I use my own SSD inside Caldigit T3, will I lose warranty?"

;)

----------



I just open my Caldigit T3 and disable the fan.

The loud noise you are experience is from the FAN, maybe we can replace it for a better one.

None of screws were protect to void the warranty. I was very careful not to damage any screw.

The temperature seems normal, lets see in a couple of hours of work. And the noise is way lower than before (obvious).
Click to expand...
So you did change out one of the drives and it is working ok? I am considering it but wanted to know somebody else's experience first. Did you only install and sad or did you also install a different hdd? I noticed too that none of the screws seemed to have a "Warranty Void If Removed" sticker on them.
 
danny_w said:
So you did change out one of the drives and it is working ok? I am considering it but wanted to know somebody else's experience first. Did you only install and sad or did you also install a different hdd? I noticed too that none of the screws seemed to have a "Warranty Void If Removed" sticker on them.
Click to expand...

I've change all the internal HDDs.

The Caldigit T3 come with 3x 1TB HDDs, I've changed to 2 x HDD 7200rpm 2TB each, and 1 x SSD 512GB (JBOD mode, no raid for now).

After a few hours with the Fan disable the Caldigit as a light warm touch, nothing to worry.
 
unfragile said:
I've change all the internal HDDs.

The Caldigit T3 come with 3x 1TB HDDs, I've changed to 2 x HDD 7200rpm 2TB each, and 1 x SSD 512GB (JBOD mode, no raid for now).

After a few hours with the Fan disable the Caldigit as a light warm touch, nothing to worry.
Click to expand...
Which HDDs did you use? The default Toshiba DT drives?
 
danny_w said:
Which HDDs did you use? The default Toshiba DT drives?
Click to expand...

I remove the default ones (Toshiba), I'm with 2x Seagate 2TB now.

The 3x Toshiba's I'm using in a four docking USB 3.0 in JBOD too. I remove the raid0 that comes by default.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back