# Drobo, Worlds First Storage Robot.



## John Calhoun (Oct 5, 2003)

Drobo, the world's first storage robot!

Other than the price tag what are the pitfalls of a system like this. I can't think of any.

jc


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## John Clay (Jun 25, 2006)

Well, once you figure out how it works....

It takes about half of each drive's capacity and uses it for the 'protected' data, so you're losing half of your available storage space.


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## Droboguy (May 11, 2007)

*You don't lose 50%*

I will start by saying I am the Director of Marketing at Data Robotics :heybaby: 

You do not lose half your storage actually. If you are at all familiar with RAID, it's a good starting point.

RAID forces you to use all the same size disks - then takes the capacity of 1 disk to protect your data.

So... 4x 100GB drives = 300GB protected storage

Drobo fits into that mold but with a bonus. Drobo takes the capacity of your largest disk to protect your data.

So... 4x 100GB drives = 300GB protected storage.

BUT, lets change the scenario a bit.

Lets say you have 100GB, 200GB, 300GB and 400GB drives (for easy math).

RAID can only see disks as the smallest common demoninator - so in this scenario all disks are really just 100GB to RAID

So 4x100GB = 300GB capacity

Drobo uses capacity = to the largest drive for protection, and gives you the rest.

So 100 + 200+ 300 = 600GB on Drobo, we keep the 400GB for ourselves.

THAT is how Drobo works, hope that offered a bit of clarity to the scenario.

- Jim Schaff


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## jamesB (Jan 28, 2007)

Kind of irrelevant anyhow,
I emailed Drobo for information only to be told they do not ship to Canada, and as of yet, have no outlets in Canada.

jb.


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## Droboguy (May 11, 2007)

*Canada*

That is true, we do not currently ship to Canada - but expect that to change very early in June. We are currently in pre-release mode, Drobo is officially generally available (ie, through the channel - people like MacMall,etc) until June 5th. We expect to have our technology export legal stuff all finalized by that time - which would allow us to ship to the north.

It's not that we don't want to sell to Canada - it's that the government(s) (both Canada and US) want to be sure a Drobo crossing the border will not cause a meltdown of any nearby nuclear power plants, or cause tv and radio interference on a grand scale.

So it's coming, but sadly not until June.


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## dibenga (Oct 30, 2001)

is [drobo] this [drobo] a [drobo] spam [drobo] thread? ....








[drobo]


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## BlueMax (Aug 8, 2005)

Cool, but costly. This device is for major file-shufflers, not us small-timers who can contentedly get by with one or two drives. 

Also, wouldn't firewire be significantly faster? (But then, what PC users have firewire except a very few?)

Still, very cool device!


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## RicktheChemist (Jul 18, 2001)

.


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## John Calhoun (Oct 5, 2003)

dibenga said:


> is [drobo] this [drobo] a [drobo] spam [drobo] thread? ....
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Dibenga, what do you mean a spam thread? jc


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## dona83 (Jun 26, 2005)

When I saw storage robots I was expecting to see some kind of thing with arms and grips and a see through thing shuffling discs all about at high speed.

I think part of the cost is the software.


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## MacDaddy (Jul 16, 2001)

John Calhoun said:


> Other than the price tag what are the pitfalls of a system like this. I can't think of any.


Biggest pitfall = No FireWire or FireWire 800 ports on the machine. USB2 does not transfer data like FireWire does (Know of any digital cameras using USB2 over firewire for capturing? There's a reason for that...)

Also, they give no mention of read/write speeds and show no real product shots other than the front. As somebody who works in TV, something like this would be useful, but without FireWire, we wouldn't look at it, and without knowing read/write speeds, whats the point!

People who need this kind of expandible storage require fast data transfers and fast read/write speeds.


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## jmlachance (Nov 6, 2005)

Checking out the Drobo possibly as a way to help me store and work with all the home movies (20 years worth=60 tapes) I'm transferring from VHS to DV format.
Anyhow, I'm wondering about the final disks and the data (or movies in my case) on them. Will I be able to stick one of these disks in a computer or an external hard drive and work with what's on it or will I need to have the Drobo to work with that disk? 
Some of the reviews on Amazon don't give it a very rating. Anyone here own one for any period of time? How do you like it?
Thinking of what it cost,,for a few hundred dollars more you can get a good used Power Mac G5 that,although not a RAID server,(as far as I understand the concept) would be a good set-up for keeping a bunch of data or other stuff on large size hard drives. My goal is to get away from multiple external hard drive enclosures and have FW 800 plus have secure copies of my movies


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## Izzy (Apr 14, 2008)

I've had a Drobo for a while now. I use it for my iTunes library and I like it. There is a bit of lag when initially accessing data as it takes a while for the drives to spin up. The drives are only useful inside the Drobo. You can't pull them out and use them in another enclosure due to the way the data is distributed across the drives.


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## macintosh doctor (Mar 23, 2009)

John Calhoun said:


> Drobo, the world's first storage robot!
> 
> Other than the price tag what are the pitfalls of a system like this. I can't think of any.
> 
> jc


if you want a TRUE RAID solution without the complexity of DROBO.
I would suggest LaCie..
they are cheaper, faster and have Canadian Warranty.

LaCie - RAID drives

also you do not loose soo much space to achieve Raid as you would with Drobo, also no lag time to access files.. eSATA, FW 800-400, USB 2.0 - 3 year warranty

very simple to use no extra software to install. it is all Hardware based and controlled.
PC and MAC compatible.

one of my clients has the Lacie NAS RAID 2.5 TB - made his itunes+iphone lib. networkable.

if you are interested or have any questions let me know
happy to answer and help.


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

I use an external 1TB HD for storage. Far superior to Drobo as it requires no software, has firewire 400 and 800 and USB and works flawlessly for what I want. Bottom line: KISS.

And FWIW, the thread does border on semi SPAM.


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## corey111 (Jul 9, 2007)

I'm happy with my 2nd Gen Drobo, I'm even able to do some video editing off of it.


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## genexxa (Jun 10, 2006)

SINC said:


> I use an external 1TB HD for storage. Far superior to Drobo as it requires no software, has firewire 400 and 800 and USB and works flawlessly for what I want. Bottom line: KISS.
> 
> And FWIW, the thread does border on semi SPAM.


I don't think you can compare an external HD to Drobo... Drobo is way more secure with Raid configuration...

and btw guys the new Drobo is available with FW800, FW400 and USB2.

and tell me if I am wrong but I don't think you need a software to use Drobo...

BUT I have to admit that the price is a little scary!!


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## milhaus (Jun 1, 2004)

SINC said:


> I use an external 1TB HD for storage. Far superior to Drobo as it requires no software, has firewire 400 and 800 and USB and works flawlessly for what I want. Bottom line: KISS.
> 
> And FWIW, the thread does border on semi SPAM.


Simplicity won't help you when your hard drive fails, stupid . . . (following up your KISS comment) Geez, I can't believe how many of the people here don't understand what Drobo is. Drobo is not complex: it is simpler than a RAID configuration, can use whatever drives, can hot swap drives and will rebuild itself, etc.


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## macintosh doctor (Mar 23, 2009)

milhaus said:


> Simplicity won't help you when your hard drive fails, stupid . . . (following up your KISS comment) Geez, I can't believe how many of the people here don't understand what Drobo is. Drobo is not complex: it is simpler than a RAID configuration, can use whatever drives, can hot swap drives and will rebuild itself, etc.


Drobo is great but not for the real world of AV or Pre Press.
It is slower than actual RAID 0 or 5, it may offer security of RAID 5 but its long term costs is more expensive:

Mfg#: DR04DD10 
SKU#: 4344330 
Drobo 4-Bay FireWire800 & USB2.0 Storage Array $699.98
cost of HD
Mfg#: ST31000340AS 
SKU#: 4408872 
Barracuda 7200.11 SATA 3Gb/s 1-TB Hard Drive - 1 TB - Internal - 3.5 - Serial ATA-300 - 7200 Rpm - 32 MB - 8.5 Ms - 3 Years Warranty $170

total cost $1379

LaCie 4 TB SATA, FW800, FW400, USB 2.0/USB • RAID 0/1/3/5 3 Years 301359U $1,449

$70 more buys you a true faster hardware RAID that will do 4 LEVELS OF RAID
True Canadian Warranty from Toronto, not having to deal with Seagate or Drobo in the USA - then have to deal with shipping costs and tech support calls from two places.

LaCie - One phone call - local, king and dufferin.. one place, one warranty..

now the other facts:
Drobo 4 TB =2.7 TB usable space
FireWire 800: ( 35MB/s write, Read 50MB/s ) taken from their website.

Lacie 4 TB = 3.7 TB ( Depending on RAID level, usually 10 % set up loss)
lacie
eSATA 3Gbits: up to 3Gbits/s (300MB/s)
FireWire 800: up to 800Mbits/s (100MB/s)
FireWire 400: up to 400Mbits/s (50MB/s)
Hi-Speed USB 2.0: up to 480Mbits/s (60MB/s)

but at the end of the day... you buy what ever makes you happy.. but know the facts first and costs of ownership. 


if you run out of space with the La Cie you can daisy chain the box with more externals or another RAID TOWER, then combine the data or have two icons on your desktop.

Drobo, keep buying more drives as you fill them, which you will fill sooner because of higher data overhead; then you will have a bunch of HDs- that you filled, I guess you can buy another Drobo and start over with the extra HDs that you will have


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## MannyP Design (Jun 8, 2000)

I've been interested in Drobo when I first heard about it several months ago... this thread has been very informative!


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## Fastcoder (Apr 22, 2005)

So for $100 more I get a real RAID 5 solution instead of DROBO proprietary majik?

Kiss it is not.

RAID is used everywhere for a reason and is not going anywhere.


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## IllusionX (Mar 10, 2009)

hey, thx for the info about the daisy chain.

but, only if lacie offers the enclosure without drives... the only downside i find on true raid, that we must use the same size drive for the raid. obviously, this results in better performance, especially in an identical drive configuration.

Right now, i'm running a 5 drives Raid5 in a linux box. I'm stuck, because i cannot add more storage without transfering everything out, and swap 5 drives, rebuild the raid and put all my files back in.

What i find interesting in a drobo is the 4 drives configuration that you maintain and keep swapping drives as storage need grows.


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## macintosh doctor (Mar 23, 2009)

IllusionX said:


> hey, thx for the info about the daisy chain.
> 
> but, only if lacie offers the enclosure without drives... the only downside i find on true raid, that we must use the same size drive for the raid. obviously, this results in better performance, especially in an identical drive configuration.
> 
> ...


i have clients with apple x RAID.. when they first bought it.. it was 250 GB drives.. now the warranty replacements are 500 GB.. if you have a true RAID the raid will only be as big as the smallest drive you have.. until you replace them with the larger drives...

so if you had RAID 5 or RAID 1 - only way it will work..

example RAID 5

3 X 250GB = 750 GB THEN YOU REPLACE ONE WITH 1 X 250GB, 2 X 500 GB = YOU STILL GET 750 UNTIL YOU REPLACE ALL OF THEM EVENTUALLY WITH 500s.. with out the need to back up and reformat.

make sense?


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

milhaus said:


> Simplicity won't help you when your hard drive fails, stupid . . . (following up your KISS comment) Geez, I can't believe how many of the people here don't understand what Drobo is. Drobo is not complex: it is simpler than a RAID configuration, can use whatever drives, can hot swap drives and will rebuild itself, etc.


Nice touch there with the name calling. How juvenile. 

My external simply backs up my HD in case of failure. Nothing is more effective and simple than that.


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## IllusionX (Mar 10, 2009)

macintosh doctor said:


> i have clients with apple x RAID.. when they first bought it.. it was 250 GB drives.. now the warranty replacements are 500 GB.. if you have a true RAID the raid will only be as big as the smallest drive you have.. until you replace them with the larger drives...
> 
> so if you had RAID 5 or RAID 1 - only way it will work..
> 
> ...



not quite clear... I recall apple don't sell their X-Raid anymore? And the current promise VTrack with 8x SATA drives go for 15000$... I'm not sure we are talking about the same thing anymore..


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## macintosh doctor (Mar 23, 2009)

IllusionX said:


> not quite clear... I recall apple don't sell their X-Raid anymore? And the current promise VTrack with 8x SATA drives go for 15000$... I'm not sure we are talking about the same thing anymore..


okay - i was just trying to respond to a question earlier.. about RAID AND DRIVE SIZES
used the apple as an example...
if you are still confused let me know..

what I was saying was if you started with 250s and started replacing failed drives with 500s your RAID 1 or 5 will see the drive as 250, until the RAID has been populated with 500s... make sense now?


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## IllusionX (Mar 10, 2009)

make sense? no..

standard raid 1 or 5 will not allow you to grow your raid, by replacing smaller drives with bigger ones (even one at a time and letting it time to rebuild itself).

if you say it is possible, then you should tell me, because this is really something i didn't know about.

i've only heard it possible with RaidX (Infrant/Netgear's ReadyNAS+) and the Drobo...


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## viffer (Aug 29, 2007)

macintosh doctor said:


> Drobo is great but not for the real world of AV or Pre Press.
> It is slower than actual RAID 0 or 5, it may offer security of RAID 5 but its long term costs is more expensive:
> 
> Mfg#: DR04DD10
> ...


I believe there is an error with your calcs for the Lacie. If its running RAID 5, which would provide the same level of protection as the Drobo, one drive is used for parity - so there is only 3TB available for useful storage - basically the same as the Drobo.

The transfer rates quoted above for the Lacie are THEORETICAL, not actual.


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## macintosh doctor (Mar 23, 2009)

viffer said:


> I believe there is an error with your calcs for the Lacie. If its running RAID 5, which would provide the same level of protection as the Drobo, one drive is used for parity - so there is only 3TB available for useful storage - basically the same as the Drobo.
> 
> The transfer rates quoted above for the Lacie are THEORETICAL, not actual.


with RAID 5 you can use all 4 bays for usage..
have a hot spare - ready for swapping incase of failure.
so you are incorrect.
Parity in RAID 5 is written across all drives. so my original numbers are true ( about 10% loss only ) Block-level striping with distributed parity.

RAID 4 may be what you are thinking about.
RAID 5 distributes the parity data across the disks, while RAID 4 centralizes it on one disk, but the amount of parity data is the same). In case that the drives vary in capacity, the smallest of them sets the bar.


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## IllusionX (Mar 10, 2009)

macintosh doctor said:


> with RAID 5 you can use all 4 bays for usage..
> have a hot spare - ready for swapping incase of failure.
> so you are incorrect.
> Parity in RAID 5 is written across all drives. so my original numbers are true ( about 10% loss only ) Block-level striping with distributed parity.


you lose the whole drive for parity.

5x500gb (468gb formatted) = 2.5TB or 2.3TB formatted.

Tell me why i only get 1.79TB ? shouldn't I have at least 2TB formatted if your ~10% loss is right ?


edit: raid 5 do distribute the parity across the drives, but you still get the size of the smallest drive * (number of drives -1) of capacity. this is fact, don't try to save yourself.


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## jmlachance (Nov 6, 2005)

What's with the KISS? Is it an acronym?
Anyhow, I bought a Drobo to try it out as a means of storing my video and get away from external hard drives and it seems to work ok,although I had to spend 1 hour with tech support to get it to reognize my 2 1tb Seagate hard drives. Turns out it needed a reset. Anyhow, I believe I'll be returning it because I don't like the idea that I can only access the information on the drives if I'm using a Drobo. I would have preferred being able to stick those drives in a PowerMac,or external drive, anywhere or anytime, if the Drobo was to fail,and still work with what's on them. As it is,if the Drobo fails, I have to get another Drobo...


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## IllusionX (Mar 10, 2009)

jmlachance said:


> What's with the KISS? Is it an acronym?
> Anyhow, I bought a Drobo to try it out as a means of storing my video and get away from external hard drives and it seems to work ok,although I had to spend 1 hour with tech support to get it to reognize my 2 1tb Seagate hard drives. Turns out it needed a reset. Anyhow, I believe I'll be returning it because I don't like the idea that I can only access the information on the drives if I'm using a Drobo. I would have preferred being able to stick those drives in a PowerMac,or external drive, anywhere or anytime, if the Drobo was to fail,and still work with what's on them. As it is,if the Drobo fails, I have to get another Drobo...


Just as if you used your drives in any other hardware raid5 configuration. Using your HD in single drives configuration is like trading data security vs the easy to read the drives across all your computers if any hardware failure occurs.

Then, if you have just 2x 1TB, you can always mirror them. But for those who need to have a larger single volume, mirroring your drives is not the way to go.


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## matriculated (Jan 2, 2008)

jmlachance said:


> What's with the KISS? Is it an acronym?


Yes, it means Keep It Simple Stupid. 

I love the idea of the Drobo but it's just too expensive. There's a Linux distribution that does the same thing but of course that means you need a PC and you have to setup everything up, etc. I wish Apple would make an expandable Time Capsule.


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## Grazer5 (Jul 19, 2005)

Drobo's are mainly intended for archiving. Leo Laporte and his gang use several of them for backing up their shows.


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