I have two 8 slot 2nd Gen Drobo's and use them for backup purposes.
I have found both units to be similarly slow - far slower than a normal firewire external drive, be it 400 or 800. This is the case whether the Drobo is connected via firewire or via ethernet cable.
It takes 2 or 3 times as long to back up to Drobo as compared to any other drive.
Also booting of the drobo (when connected via firewire) is slow and the mac is unbearably slow.
Perhaps I'm doing something wrong... - I'd be happy to hear it if so..
That said, for backup (incremental with super duper) it's not a problem and the unit works just fine for this purpose.
Cheers.
Discussion about
Speed
No, I have four of the 2nd Gen and one of the 1st gen and they are just slow on the read write speed. As for data protection and expandability, I do not think there is anything else out there that is better for backing up data. But you could not actually run programs from the Drobo without a loss of speed.
They way the Drobo protects your data is probably the reason for the slower speed. For me that is what I want it for, as an aperture Vault and where I store all my media. But as for a workable drive I work off internal disks on my Mac Pro then move the project back to the Drobo's when I am done.
The official specs from Data Robotics quote the transfer speeds as follows:
* FireWire 800: Up to 52MB/s reads and 34MB/s writes
* USB 2.0: Up to 30MB/s reads and 24MB/s writes
Here is a post from the ArsTechnica forum
episteme.arstechnica.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/246097...
They way the Drobo protects your data is probably the reason for the slower speed. For me that is what I want it for, as an aperture Vault and where I store all my media. But as for a workable drive I work off internal disks on my Mac Pro then move the project back to the Drobo's when I am done.
The official specs from Data Robotics quote the transfer speeds as follows:
* FireWire 800: Up to 52MB/s reads and 34MB/s writes
* USB 2.0: Up to 30MB/s reads and 24MB/s writes
Here is a post from the ArsTechnica forum
episteme.arstechnica.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/246097...
Yes of course.. my bad it is an 'iSCSI' port on the drobo pro but it connects to ethernet on the Mac side so whatever.. Anyway my comments are unchanged the drobo pro units, whether connected via firewire, usb or iSCSI are far slower than a simple firewire external drive. I can only assume that it's related to the redundant disks / raid management business going on inside the unit. In theory the 52mb/s (say 3gb/minute) is good but in practice it is simply nowhere close to being achieved. On the other hand macs in my network (gigabit ethernet) can and do achieve transfer rates up to 3gb/minute.
cheers.
cheers.
OK. Just checked again from internal to DroboPro and also from network over gb ethernet to droboPro. DroboPro is connected via iSCSI.
For both achieved about 3.5gb/minute - this is good.
The answer to your question is standard supplied software initiator.
Despite this there are times when it runs very slowly I don't know why but it does happen.
I don't know how the machine handles the (dual in my case) redundant disks and when the extra data is written etc but perhaps there is some 'overhead' there that at times causes the slowdown.
If I could get to the bottom of it I would change how I use the DroboPro to have it function as active / online storage rather than backup.. (or perhaps both as I have two of these units.)
For both achieved about 3.5gb/minute - this is good.
The answer to your question is standard supplied software initiator.
Despite this there are times when it runs very slowly I don't know why but it does happen.
I don't know how the machine handles the (dual in my case) redundant disks and when the extra data is written etc but perhaps there is some 'overhead' there that at times causes the slowdown.
If I could get to the bottom of it I would change how I use the DroboPro to have it function as active / online storage rather than backup.. (or perhaps both as I have two of these units.)
We are using 4 of them as part of our data retention strategy so we aren't concerned about consistent through-put, but it would be nice to know what is causing the slowness for you. My first thoughts are Spotlight is scanning if you are running a Mac or an Anti-virus scan on a windows machine.
I'm on mac so could be spotlight... and clearly not AV software as i don't have any.
I will look into it a bit further as I'm considering upgrading one of my mac pro towers to run Snow Leopard Server and then would be good to use the DroboPro as active / online datapool for my little 5 mac network.
will post if I get to the bottom of it.
I will look into it a bit further as I'm considering upgrading one of my mac pro towers to run Snow Leopard Server and then would be good to use the DroboPro as active / online datapool for my little 5 mac network.
will post if I get to the bottom of it.
As long as i can get it to work at full speed (3gb/minute) or thereabouts over firewire 800 which presumably has no issues with 64 bit then that will be just fine.
I've been running my tower in 64 bit mode and have noticed noticed any ill effects thus far.. only positive ones. Fingers crossed as I know some programs do have issues but I haven't run into them so far.
I've been running my tower in 64 bit mode and have noticed noticed any ill effects thus far.. only positive ones. Fingers crossed as I know some programs do have issues but I haven't run into them so far.
Sure, no one said any different. My comment simply meant a 'port' communicating using iSCSI. The relevant part of this discussion of course is the speed or sometimes lack thereof. I doubt anyone cares about the actual type of cable or the shape of the connectors - only about the speed.
Here are the results from my speed.
Dell Precision 690 with 4gig ram running Vista64 fully patched
File Structure Size 10.2 GB stored on local c: drive
Via iSCSI (on board 1gb ethernet adapt)
Write:
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:16:16 0:16:06 0:00:00 0:00:09
Speed : 11366000 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 650.367 MegaBytes/min.
Read:
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:14:26 0:14:17 0:00:00 0:00:08
Speed : 12808647 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 732.916 MegaBytes/min.
Via USB
Write:
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:24:46 0:24:40 0:00:00 0:00:06
Speed : 7423721 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 424.788 MegaBytes/min.
Read:
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:20:28 0:20:13 0:00:00 0:00:15
Speed : 9052546 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 517.990 MegaBytes/min.
Via Internal C Drive to Internal C Drive
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:18:23 0:18:08 0:00:00 0:00:14
Speed : 10090750 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 577.397 MegaBytes/min.
Needless to say we are going with iSCSI.
(sorry the text didn't paste well)
Dell Precision 690 with 4gig ram running Vista64 fully patched
File Structure Size 10.2 GB stored on local c: drive
Via iSCSI (on board 1gb ethernet adapt)
Write:
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:16:16 0:16:06 0:00:00 0:00:09
Speed : 11366000 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 650.367 MegaBytes/min.
Read:
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:14:26 0:14:17 0:00:00 0:00:08
Speed : 12808647 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 732.916 MegaBytes/min.
Via USB
Write:
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:24:46 0:24:40 0:00:00 0:00:06
Speed : 7423721 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 424.788 MegaBytes/min.
Read:
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:20:28 0:20:13 0:00:00 0:00:15
Speed : 9052546 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 517.990 MegaBytes/min.
Via Internal C Drive to Internal C Drive
Total Copied Skipped Mismatch FAILED Extras
Dirs : 2543 2543 0 0 0 0
Files : 29400 29400 0 0 0 0
Bytes : 10.233 g 10.233 g 0 0 0 0
Times : 0:18:23 0:18:08 0:00:00 0:00:14
Speed : 10090750 Bytes/sec.
Speed : 577.397 MegaBytes/min.
Needless to say we are going with iSCSI.
(sorry the text didn't paste well)
Wow!! those numbers all seem very slow.
Between internal drives in my MacPro tower I'm getting 3,582 megabytes/min
(from a two disk striped raid to another two disk striped raid admittedly)
but even from internal on my mac pro to DroboPro via firewire 800 (mac pro is booted in 64 bit mode so not compatible with iSCSI yet) I'm getting 1,240megabytes per minute.
So my slowest is almost twice your fastest???
Between internal drives in my MacPro tower I'm getting 3,582 megabytes/min
(from a two disk striped raid to another two disk striped raid admittedly)
but even from internal on my mac pro to DroboPro via firewire 800 (mac pro is booted in 64 bit mode so not compatible with iSCSI yet) I'm getting 1,240megabytes per minute.
So my slowest is almost twice your fastest???
I use FireWire 800 to connect with my Drobo, it works great, nice and speedy, but when I wanted to capture video I went FireWire into the Drobo's second 800 port, where it passed through to my computer and then back to write to the Drobo and that caused a lot of problems. Otherwise it works well, I use it as my Scratch Disk and video storage location during video editing and I've never had problems with it.
Oh and if you have a mac pro, you should look at getting a big internal 15k or 10k rpm drive as a dedicated scratch disk. Heck you're probably better off with an external firewire 800 drive than using the drobo. If you want to lay-off your renders to the drobo fine. I wouldn't even put captured video on the drobo unless I needed to store it for future use.
