mitchell Posted February 23, 2007 Share #1 Posted February 23, 2007 Advertisement (gone after registration) I would like advice on which backup HD to get, and also what your overall backup system is. I'm getting all my disorganized files sorted and many tossed with Lightroom although I'm hoping Aperture will support the M8 before my trial with LR runs out so I can compare. Thanks for any comments, Mitchell Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted February 23, 2007 Posted February 23, 2007 Hi mitchell, Take a look here Which External Hard Drive Backup?. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
dugby Posted February 23, 2007 Share #2 Posted February 23, 2007 I've just completed my due diligence on this issue and am about to deploy a D-Link SOHO NAS device DNS-323 (US$500 for about 2x 400gb) and Tivoli Continuous Data Protection. which is US$36.00 http://www.dlink.com/products/?sec=0&pid=509 http://www-306.ibm.com/software/tivoli/products/continuous-data-protection/ regards Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill vann Posted February 23, 2007 Share #3 Posted February 23, 2007 I actually just use 2 independant drives for redundant back up, a maxtor 360 and a WD 500 gig. got the 500 gig cause my images are just over 320 gig so i'm crowding the small one, will likely get another WD 500 for images. both running fine. I'll use the 360 for applications and data need to review lightroom carefully about backups though, LR has made it easy for me to begin serious archiving but i need to see how they handle multiple drives, etc. bill Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
darkness30 Posted February 23, 2007 Share #4 Posted February 23, 2007 Why don't you try external raid 0 configuration or yet raid 0+1 for performance and safety? there are enclosures where you can add many drives in raid configurations? I am going to go that way. HDD brands are very close to each other in terms of reliability and performance so brand is not that important. Regards, Mehmet Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wparsonsgisnet Posted February 23, 2007 Share #5 Posted February 23, 2007 Mitchell, I use several LaCie dard drives, and I now always buy them reconditioned. I do my own mirroring, using Second Copy, and keep 3 copies of my diginegs, one offsite. I keep them powered down when not in use. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
okram Posted February 23, 2007 Share #6 Posted February 23, 2007 This i have. WD My Book Pro Edition II 1 TB Triple Interface Hard Drives ( WDG2TP10000 ) Seems good. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
LJL Posted February 23, 2007 Share #7 Posted February 23, 2007 Advertisement (gone after registration) Why don't you try external raid 0 configuration or yet raid 0+1 for performance and safety? there are enclosures where you can add many drives in raid configurations? I am going to go that way. HDD brands are very close to each other in terms of reliability and performance so brand is not that important. Regards, Mehmet Some words of caution on various uses of RAID. The RAID 0 configuration is striping of data across several drives, and is used for increased throughput. This is not redundancy or bak-up with this configuraiton. If one drive fails, you loose all the data. RAID 1 is mirroring, which essentially is writing the same information to two drives at once, but they are synchronized for changes. Here you get a back-up, but it takes twice as much space. RAID 5 is sort of a combintation of the two. Data is spanned across several drives at once for speed, while the data is also rendered into a somewhat redundant form so that if one drive in the RAID array fails, you can replace it and recover the data. All RAID configurations create a dependency on the drives used, so you might want to check on what happens if you break the RAID array. This mainly applies to mirroring RAID. The price on large capacity HDs has really fallen. I jsut saw 500GB SATA drives going for $130. That is really cheap. If you have any tinkering skills, it may be worth buying bare drives and installing them into external cases to connect yourself. I prefer Firewire cases, as the throughput are consitently higher than USB2, and you can "daisychain" them instead of having to add more USB2 hubs for more drives. Presently, I have several NAS (network attached storage) devices at 2TB each running RAID 5 configuraitons. I also have another 4-5TB of external storage as single drives that I back-up to other drives for redundancy and off-site storage. All can be connected to the computer and seen by any app such as LR, Aperture, Bridge, etc., so all of the data is accessible and can be run through the various archiving methods. It is worth noting that ALL HDs will fail at some point, so make sure you have at least one other copy of data. Two is better, with one being stored off-site for safety. HDs are about the cheapest way to store stuff right now, but be sure you are buying quality drives and also be sure to run them, rather than letting them sit idle. Drive failure will happen sooner than later, in most cases. There was a recent report put out by Google about their massive storage systems. They found that keeping drives running was better, and that they lasted longer than powering them on and off. Drive failures showed up early, and they were able to weed the bad ones out of their system quickly. They use off-the-shelf drives and technology, and any "enterprise level" HD seems to work quite well. Just some food for thought. It really is worth getting control over storage sooner than later and growing it yourself, so careful planning helps there. LJ P.S. My storage primarily uses Hitachi 500GB SATA, and Maxtor Maxline Pro 500GB SATA HDs in various cases. The RAID 5 units are ReadyNAS and RocketRAID X4 boxes. One hooked up to my gigabit network, the other connected and shared through my G5. All the external drive cases can be plugged into any of my computers, or shared through the gigabit network. Lots of storage, but all of it is working and very accessible. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
gepetto Posted February 23, 2007 Share #8 Posted February 23, 2007 Mitchell Also take a look at external Serial ATA enclosures. There are many different brands producing them. I have used Firmtek with success. There are many advantages to using external SATA enclosures. The speeds are the same as internal storage. The drive trays make it easy to swop out drives for offsite storage. You can use them with Laptops as well. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
cbretteville Posted February 23, 2007 Share #9 Posted February 23, 2007 I use a Thecus N2050 box with two Samsung spinpoint 250GB drives that are mirrored. Its called "direct attached storage". The Samsung drives are my favouriotes at this point in time and I recommend them regardless of the box you use. They're fast, silent and produce little heat. They have also been very reliable. The Thecus is an external box that runs of an external serial ata interface on my main machine. But it also has an USB2 interface so I can connect it to another machine or take it along with my laptop. It dosen't require any special drivers to work. The mirroring (or striping) is invisible to the OS. Thecus Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wilfredo Posted February 23, 2007 Share #10 Posted February 23, 2007 I recently bought a Maxtor 360, with a rebate. It only cost $129.99. After I bought it I realized I needed a 2.0 USB port so I had to upgrade that on my computer. It works really fast now, before the USB upgrade it was dead slow. I'm not a pro but I shoot RAW both with the M8 and 5D. This HD is really working out for me. Cheers, Wilfredo+ Benitez-Rivera Photography Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wparsonsgisnet Posted February 23, 2007 Share #11 Posted February 23, 2007 Presently, I have several NAS (network attached storage) devices at 2TB each running RAID 5 configuraitons. I also have another 4-5TB of external storage as single drives that I back-up to other drives for redundancy and off-site storage. LJ, I am using several firewire and usb dirves attached directly to my cpu. I also have one network drive. The thruput to the attached drives is several times higher than that for the nw drive. Is this true for you? I believe I am running 100mb along the "backbone" from the wired/wireless hub attached to my DSL hub, but the fire and usb wires are several times faster than that. I agree about 3 copies, one offsite. I started with 2 copies, but when one of those drives died I couldn't sleep while waiting for a new drive. Now, I use 3. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
LJL Posted February 23, 2007 Share #12 Posted February 23, 2007 LJ, I am using several firewire and usb dirves attached directly to my cpu. I also have one network drive. The thruput to the attached drives is several times higher than that for the nw drive. Is this true for you? I believe I am running 100mb along the "backbone" from the wired/wireless hub attached to my DSL hub, but the fire and usb wires are several times faster than that. I agree about 3 copies, one offsite. I started with 2 copies, but when one of those drives died I couldn't sleep while waiting for a new drive. Now, I use 3. Bill, I run things on Macs (G5, MacBook Pro and PowerBook), and they all have gigabit (1000mbps) throughput built-in. So, I have at least one NAS on a gigabit network that connects all the computers and throughput is very fast (10x what normal network speeds are). The other drives are connected to the G5 and the speeds there are also much faster than any regular network. In the end, running fast drives on machines that are connected on a gigabit network means very fast performance. However, it all becomes slow where it has to go back to the 100mbps router for online connection. My inside network screams, and I scream at the outside connection Does that make sense? LJ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wparsonsgisnet Posted February 23, 2007 Share #13 Posted February 23, 2007 Bill,I run things on Macs (G5, MacBook Pro and PowerBook), and they all have gigabit ... Does that make sense?LJ Yup, perfect sense. Thanks from Windoze Willy. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
billh Posted February 24, 2007 Share #14 Posted February 24, 2007 I have a question for you guys. The number 3 HD in a 1.6 TB LaCie RAID (5) failed, and I bought a replacement fro B & H. it is a LaCie drive in the correct housing, and when i install it the green light comes on - however, it continues to beep and the message says the number three drive has failed. I called LaCie tech line and they said the HD was a different brand, and that is why it does not work - according to them you have to buy an extra drive when you buy the RAID system. Of course that begs the question of what happens when the replacement drive is used? They said to send the bad drive in and they would fix it. so I did. it has not returned yet. Does the fact the 400 MB LaCie replacement drive I bought will not work make any sense to you? http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=6929&A=details&Q=&sku=366544&is=REG&addedTroughType=categoryNavigation LaCie Spare 400GB Hard Drive for 1.6TB Biggest FireWire 800 Array Mfr# 301003 • B&H# LABD400 $ 339.95 The Spare 400GB Hard Drive for 1.6TB Biggest FireWire 800 Array is a necessary accessory for your Biggest FireWire 800 array from LaCie. The array features blazing fast RAID disk access, and having a spare on hand in the event of a drive failure will minimize downtime and allow you to recover your data with quickness and ease. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
LJL Posted February 24, 2007 Share #15 Posted February 24, 2007 Bill, Not sure I can answer your question, but there are some things to consider. First, it is important to make sure the drive size and type match for many RAID arrays. So while your 1.6TB unit holds 4x400GB drives (matching the size of 400GB is important), you also need to match the type (ATA or SATA). I did not see the 1.6TB unit on the B&H site, but it may have been loaded with SATA drives, and the replacement may have been ATA, so it would not work in the unit. Second problem sometimes comes in that the replacement drive needs to be properly formatted first before the RAID array will notice it. You have to look carefully at the manual to see how the configuration is carried out. Some units will do a quick format on the drive before bringing it into the array, while others may try to set up a completely new array, and you do not want to do that, as it will erase everything else on the other drives. I keep a couple of indentical drives for my RAID arrays. They are already formatted and ready to install should one fail. I hate having a large, blank HD sitting there doing nothing, but I know that if one fails, I have a spare that will work and is properly sized and formatted. Part of the cost of using larger RAID arrays. Not sure if these are you problems or not, but these are some of the most common things that folks run into. LJ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
billh Posted February 24, 2007 Share #16 Posted February 24, 2007 Hi LJ, B & H clearly sells the replacement drive for the 1.6 TB unit. It comes with a 2 year warrenty from LaCie,a nd is a LaCie drive and housing with their stickers all over it. It is odd that it would be something that wouldn’t work. What will you do if you have to use your spare drive? Can you get a replacement? I have been trying to get all the photos together that a publisher wanted for a book. Some were in the HDs in my old G4, which died when I transferred the main drive contents into the new Intel Mac, so i had to buy a housing, take the drives out and access them that way. Then the 1.6 TB RAID lost disk 3, so I spend many hours downloading everything in it into the the four internal 500 GB drives in the new Mac. And then one of the 500GB archive drives would not mount. LaCie told me the software to buy, and I did, and was able to pull everything off of it. Amazing actually. So I have been dodging the bullet recently. The RAID worked, but if a drive fails and you can’t buy a replacement drive that will work, it limits the usefulness of it. I bought a Western Digital 1TB two drive RAID, but to configure it to RAID 1 I had to install software, which required restarting the computer. I was running the recovery software on the failed 500GB drive, so I didn’t want to risk shutting the computer down. i ended up copying things to the 1TB drive in 0. This storage problem is going to get worse as file sizes increase and the quantity of the digital images pile up. Is there a RAID housing available we can buy, fill with HDs set to RAID 1 (which is best?), then when it is full store the two HDs separately, and if the images are needed, just put one of the drives into a Firewire 800 housing so the files can be accessed? Bill Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
4season Posted February 24, 2007 Share #17 Posted February 24, 2007 Is there a RAID housing available we can buy, fill with HDs set to RAID 1 (which is best?), then when it is full store the two HDs separately, and if the images are needed, just put one of the drives into a Firewire 800 housing so the files can be accessed? Can't you do that already? The drives aren't proprietary, just the sleds they're bolted into. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
billh Posted February 26, 2007 Share #18 Posted February 26, 2007 What about these? http://www.dpreview.com/news/0702/07022601sandiskwriteonceflash.asp http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,2098505,00.asp Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
LJL Posted February 27, 2007 Share #19 Posted February 27, 2007 Can't you do that already? The drives aren't proprietary, just the sleds they're bolted into. And if you do not want to bother with the sleds and enclosures, this may be an alternative option to consider. (It is USB2, but hey, it will work for finding that file.) http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Newer%20Technology/U2NVSPATA/ LJ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
LJL Posted February 27, 2007 Share #20 Posted February 27, 2007 What about these? SanDisk to deliver write-once flash: Digital Photography Review SanDisk to Launch Digital Film Replacement - News and Analysis by PC Magazine Well, I am not sure when these will become available and at what cost. Of course, this is really only useful if you are shooting JPEGs and not looking to do any retouching or anything else, as the minute you start to work on a file that you have copied from one of these devices (be it RAW or JPEG), you will have to store that adjusted files someplace. An option might be to use regular SD/CF cards to capture your images, do the work on the files as you want, and then save them to one of these new cards for "permanent" storage. Just get ready to start buying a lot of them, and then have some system to figure out what is stored on each card. All of this is much, much easier with HDs, I think. LJ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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