4-Drive External Enclosure

[MikeF]

Already have the drives in 4 separate external cases (4TB, 4TB, 2TB, 2TB) with their associated connecting cables and power brick cords (two of the older enclosures are fairly large). Just looking to clean up the area a bit. Don't really need any RAID capability currently, just less footprint...

[jdc]

I'm of the same mind so I'm going all 2.5" bus powered. One cable.

Not sure of your storage needs or budget.

Saw a 3TB portable for $100 just a day or so ago. A couple hundred for 6 TB of small silent storage.

[Spock]

onthedownlow wrote:
Drobo?

Bought a 4 drive Drobo in Jan 2009. Swapped the drives once to increase capacity to 12TB (9TB usable) and it has been rock solid the whole time. Would I buy another another one? Hell YES.

[ka jowct]

Paul F bought one of the Mobius boxes a couple of years ago. Maybe he can chime in here and tell us how it has worked out.

[testcase]

What scares me about Drobo is that, when the enclosure fails (eventually they all fail), you MUST get another Drobo. Apparently, Drobo has a proprietary format / encryption so, you can NOT just put your disks into another enclosure and recover your data. Only a Drobo system can access disks from another Drobo.

[mattkime]

its probably not convincing but i'll mention it anyway - when i got rid of my RAID i got a couple of large drives (one for storage, one for backup) - depends upon what you're storing, etc.

[clay]

onthedownlow wrote:
[quote=Lew Zealand]
Mediasonic ProBox, $99. Low end USB3/eSATAp 4 drive box. With 4 drives in it RAIDed using Disk Utility I get 220MB/sec Read and 225MB/sec Write. Internal connections are apparently SATA-II in this older enclosure as my 5TB Seagates individually get about 180 MB/sec R&W using the USB connection but my recent SSD only got about 120 MB/sec R&W (it doesn't negotiate the SATAII properly so dumbs all the way down to SATA-I).

There is a newer version which states SATA-III compatibility, I suppose that should mean a higher top throughput but who knows. I have 3 of the older ProBoxes, BTW. Hardware redundancy!

Oh yea, that is a great recommendation (especially for the price-conscious).

I would even go so far as to say spend ~$50 more and get the ProRAID model though. I suppose it all depends on what you want to do with the drives and interact with them.
I have one of the non-RAID versions of this box. Worked great. My needs have changed recently, so I'm getting rid of it, after under a year of trouble-free use. Let me know if you're interested. I may even get around to posting on the For-sale forum soon as well.

[Robert M]

Testcase,

I've had a 2nd generation Drobo with Firewire and USB 2.0 for years. With the exception of a minor issue in the very beginning, it's been rock solid. I'd definitely consider another one. If not a Drobo, I'd get a Netgear Readynas. The Netgear boxes offer similar functionality.

One thing I like about the Drobo is that I am not limited to a specifc drive. I swap out drives as necessary. Capacity and brand aren't an issue, though I wouldn't swap a drive out with a model that has a smaller capacity. But, it's nice knowing I don't have to search for the same make and model. Just grab a drive and install it.

My issue with a standard raid box is what happens when the enclosure goes. Is it easy to just move the drives into another box, connect it and use it? Does the data remain intact? If a drive goes, does all the data go with it?

Robert

[RAMd®d]

I have three Drobos, one Gen 2, and two Gen 3s, all 4-bay drives.

They two have been rock solid for me.

But as great as they are at what they do and how they do it, they are s-l-o-w. The Gen 3s are noticeably faster (USB3) than the Gen 2 (FW800) and they're still slow.

Most importantly, given the OP's post, or the OP, they don't do JBOD.

I've got some JBOD box but it's soooooo cheap and flimsy, I've yet to try it.

What I'd like is a quality JBOD enclosure like something from LaCie or Cal Digit (both cast aluminum) that do four 2.5" drives. And one for for 3.5" HDs as well.

[RAMd®d]

ka, I missed your KIS one-line post.

The Mobius looks nice but this puzzles me:

NOTE: We recommend using only Enterprise or NAS drives. We do NOT recommend the use of consumer-level drives such as WD Green, Blue, Black and Seagate Barracuda. Use of these drives may inhibit performance and limit technical support.

Enterprise/NAS drives are more expensive that the consumer grade Hitachi and WD Green drives I use.