# Storage freaks clubhouse



## Mussels (Apr 10, 2009)

So this ones kinda obvious. A post i made in the anime nation thread made me realise my storage needs go above and beyond the average user, so that means a clubhouse is in order!



Mussels said:


> i have 6320GB at my disposal, my first housemate has 7540GB and my second housemate has 720GB for a combined total of 14,580GB in my house. Its a rather nerdy house.
> (thats drives in use, theres another 850GB in unused drives lying around, such as the raptor i'm trying to sell)





Mussels said:


> DVD's are too small and slow. it would take 3,256 DVD's to back up all the data in my house. at 20 minutes each thats 65,120 minutes, 1085 hours or 45 days of non stop burning.
> (dual layer would be half as many disks, but as most DL disks are 4x vs the normal disks 16x, that would end up slower)






as far as clubhouses go this one aint too serious... i just want to hear of other people with as many hard drives as i do, and help out people thinking of following this path


----------



## Psychoholic (Apr 10, 2009)

Well i only have 640gb in my main machine ant 1.5tb in my fileserver, But i do support enterprise SANs up to 950TB for a living


----------



## Mussels (Apr 10, 2009)

Psychoholic said:


> 950TB



Drool.


----------



## DrPepper (Apr 10, 2009)

While I don't have as many HDD's as you I have a complicated network of storage.

There is my stuff and my friend mike's 
Each of us have 1tb worth of HDD space making 2TB 
I have two internal 500gb's and he has 1 internal and 1 external both 500gb

His external holds important stuff that is irreplaceable and one of my drives holds all our games ripped into .iso with the serial code in a text document. We pretty much share hardware and software so pretty much mines is his and vice versa. All my music is stored seperately on my phone and ipod both 8gb and I have lots of CD's with windows xp to windows 7 both x32 and x64.

We did find a way to transfer stuff over hamachi but one of my HDD's got messed up and I lost everything.


----------



## h3llb3nd4 (Apr 10, 2009)

I'm poor so I dont have lots of space only 494Gb on my pc, 140Gb on my sister's and 120Gb on my dad's
in total: 754Gb
but the amount of DVDs is huge approx 4Tbs of stuff I think...


----------



## Mussels (Apr 10, 2009)

my e-sata cage solves most of my problems. even if my PC goes down, i know my datas safe in another box, and unlike NAS its totally safe cause its off 99% of the time - virus and mechanical failure cant hit a drive thats off 

h3llb3nd4: thats a lot of DVD's... a LOT. You ran into the issues with them degrading over time? i've had CD's die after 2-3 years in storage.


----------



## DrPepper (Apr 10, 2009)

I want an e-sata cage like yours.


----------



## h3llb3nd4 (Apr 10, 2009)

I'm trying to get my hands on another pc I might use it as a data backup machine


----------



## Mussels (Apr 10, 2009)

h3llb3nd4 said:


> I'm trying to get my hands on another pc I might use it as a data backup machine



I did that for a while. I never found a good OS to use it on - XP lacked any good search features, and vista has the audio bug (play audio and you cant transfer files past 15MB/s) which screwed me over, as i used it as a media PC as well. Never tried linux, 7, or windows home server.

DR pepper: key is "port multiplier" i can get a 8 bay these days for $500 au.


----------



## alucasa (Apr 10, 2009)

Can I join this club ?

I have this 4U chassis, 
	

	
	
		
		

		
			





*though it's empty now*.

At the moment, I am trying to move everything to my new NAS unit, NAS-Apathy (Linked in my signature). The NAS has only one 1TB disk at the moment. 

My the other rig, E5410-Mammoth, has 4 storage HDDs consisted of one 1TB, two 500GB, and one 320GB.

Once I add more 1TB drives to NAS-Apathy, I will relocate stuff on Mammoth to there.


----------



## Mussels (Apr 11, 2009)

alucasa said:


> Can I join this club ?
> 
> I have this 4U chassis, http://img49.imageshack.us/img49/1903/img1019mc4.jpg
> 
> *though it's empty now*.



How about you just give it to me.... it looks tasty


----------



## ShadowFold (Apr 11, 2009)

I have rig with..
AMD Semperon 1.6ghz
Biostar 740G
2gb DDR2-533
4x Western Digital 500gb 7200RPM
Some crazy NIC
Antec 500w Earthwatts
all in a cheap rosewill case


----------



## Mussels (Apr 11, 2009)

shadow is a junior storage freak. One day his data will grow up big and strong!


----------



## BroBQ (Apr 11, 2009)

My main Rig only has a 160GB, 320GB and a 640GB

My Media center only has a 320GB and my file server has 2x1TB with another 320gb for the OS and extra storage.

The 640GB and the 2x1TB area completely full with my movie collection.


----------



## eggyhustles (Apr 11, 2009)

jesus christ guys lol

i have a 120gb and a 640gb in my main rig..


----------



## Mussels (Apr 11, 2009)

eggyhustles said:


> jesus christ guys lol
> 
> i have a 120gb and a 640gb in my main rig..



a heretic! catch him!


----------



## freaksavior (Apr 11, 2009)

i have the following.
320gb media - desktop
750gb more media - desktop
500gb os - desktop
32ssd - desktop
32ssd - desktop
320 macbook - internal
200 macbook - external

500gb - dads 
320 - moms lappy
160 - backup for moms in server
10gb - server os
(soon to be 1tb for server)
250gb xbox (has movies)

making a grand total of 3394gb


----------



## alucasa (Apr 11, 2009)

Mussels said:


> How about you just give it to me.... it looks tasty



No way for me to ship this thing at any cheap rate. Its size of twice of a mid tower and weights 60 lbs when everything is empty inside.

UPS once gave me an estimate, 120 dollars for standard shipping.


----------



## freaksavior (Apr 12, 2009)

alucasa said:


> No way for me to ship this thing at any cheap rate. Its size of twice of a mid tower and weights 60 lbs when everything is empty inside.
> 
> UPS once gave me an estimate, 120 dollars for standard shipping.



i'll trade you





and


----------



## Mussels (Apr 12, 2009)

freaksavior said:


> i'll trade you
> 
> http://bettercancersolutions.com/detoxification/liver_diagram.gif
> and
> http://www.gregschwartz.net/gallery2/d/44578-4/left+arm+flexed.JPG



armpit hair has value now?


----------



## freaksavior (Apr 12, 2009)

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2098/1660674656_78faab3044.jpg

ok how about that one then?


----------



## morpha (Apr 12, 2009)

3.5tb reporting in.


----------



## ComradeSader (Apr 13, 2009)

2.2TB in main.
400GB in laptop.
250GB external.
2.85TB... I need more :shadedshu


----------



## freaksavior (Apr 19, 2009)

updating 

1.5tb in popcorn hour
2 x 750's + 2 x 32gb ssd
320 mbp 200 external for mbp
320 moms
500 dads
500+320+250+160 in server
250 in xbox 
200gb on dishnetwork receiver
320 on other disnetwork receiver


total  6.4tb


----------



## Bot (Apr 19, 2009)

here is pretty outdated pic
http://www.codisha.com/images/pc pics/SNV12031.JPG
inside:
2x 36Gb - WD Raptor
4x 750Gb - Samsung F1
1x 1000Gb - Samsung F1
1x 1500Gb - Seagate
2x 250Gb - Maxtor MaxLine III

6Tb total just here


----------



## oli_ramsay (Apr 19, 2009)

Only 1.1TB here in the form of

1x 750GB F1
1 x 320GB Baracuda
1 x 37GB Raptor

Hope to get a TB drive in the near future though.


----------



## DaveK (Apr 19, 2009)

I don't have much, 1TB, 160GB and 80GB totaling 1,240GB  I'll be getting rid of the 80GB and will probably keep the 160GB as backup.

My 1TB Samsung already has 407GB used with 523GB free and I haven't even started ripping my DVDs to ISO


----------



## morpha (Apr 19, 2009)

Mussels! put a top 5 storage freaks in the OP post.


----------



## Luke (Apr 19, 2009)

I have in my main rig I have
3 x 500GB
1 x 250GB 
1 x 750GB 
1 x 250GB external

In laptop I have a 250gb drive

My server IBM X206 has
2 x 36.6Gb Ultra 320 SCSI 10K
1 x 146.8GB Ultra 320 SCSI 10K
1 x 160GB IDE Drive

total 3380GB

and that is not counting the drives in my other pc's and servers


----------



## DaveK (Apr 19, 2009)

morpha said:


> Mussels! put a top 5 storage freaks in the OP post.



Make it a top 10  I'm going through all my DVDRs and copying data back to my 1TB, I can see it filling up fast lol.


----------



## wiak (Apr 19, 2009)

1x WD Raptor 74GB NCQ (R.I.P, RMAed)
1x Samsung Spinpoint T166 500GB 
2x Samsung Spinpoint F1 1TB
2x Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 320GB
3x Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB (fixed firmware)
1x WD Caviar SE 250GB IDE (USB enclosure)

Total ~5TB (4964GB)


----------



## HellasVagabond (Apr 19, 2009)

*Primary Rig *

2x 500GB WD SATA2 Internal
2x 250GB WD SATA2 Internal
1x 120GB WS SATA Internal

WD MyBook 500GB Ext
Seagate FreeAgent 500GB Ext
1TB Black Caviar + Icy Box Ext Enclosure
1TB Seagate 7200.12 + Icy Box Ext Enclosure
500GB WD Blue + Vizo Ext Enclosure



*Secondary Rig*

2x 500GB WD SATA2 Internal
2x 320GB WD SATA2 Internal

250GB WD + Vizo Ext Enclosure



*Third Rig*

160GB WD SATA2 Internal



*Fourth Rig*

160GB WD SATA 2 Internal



TOTAL : 6830GB


Not many like the ones i heard above, still plenty so far.


----------



## morpha (Apr 19, 2009)

DaveK said:


> Make it a top 10  I'm going through all my DVDRs and copying data back to my 1TB, I can see it filling up fast lol.



I find it amusing that your doing that in order to get on the list...


----------



## DaveK (Apr 19, 2009)

morpha said:


> I find it amusing that your doing that in order to get on the list...



Ok then make it 5 then, I don't really care I was just saying 10 because you would see more more people, I don't care if I'm on it or not.


----------



## CyberDruid (Apr 19, 2009)

Let's see...Got the 2TB (4 x 750GB) RAID5 with 1TB BU drive and 128GB SSD on the SkullTrail where I hope to preserve all of the important files

Then the Media PC has 150GB (RaptorX) 750GB and 1TB almost full of DVDs...I'll be expanding that soon.

Then there's my Benching rig with another 150GB RaptorX and there's my Salvage rig with a pair of 150GB V-raps and my son's rig with a 300GB V-rap.

I have 3 1 TB drives pulled from some rigs I just sold that I'll be installing in various rigs soon...at least one in my Daughter's rig and probably the other two in the Media PC.

so there's 8,778,000


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

its been a bit quiet in here... buuump!


----------



## Tau (May 8, 2009)

morpha said:


> Mussels! put a top 5 storage freaks in the OP post.



Seconded.

Across my main PC's (not counting server)  I probobly have somewere in the 6TB range, all of wich is full at the moment, Just waiting for parts on a new & large fileserver to roll in, then I will be expanding with 15TB usable in that thing as soon as all the parts finish getting here 

Since I havent heard of any talk about it what do you all do for a backup solution?  Since all i see are live storage pools...


----------



## JATownes (May 8, 2009)

I'm in.  I got 2x320Gb external, 2x500Gb & 1x1Tb internal.  Already almost out of space.  DAMNIT.


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Tau said:


> Seconded.
> 
> Across my main PC's (not counting server)  I probobly have somewere in the 6TB range, all of wich is full at the moment, Just waiting for parts on a new & large fileserver to roll in, then I will be expanding with 15TB usable in that thing as soon as all the parts finish getting here
> 
> Since I havent heard of any talk about it what do you all do for a backup solution?  Since all i see are live storage pools...



i cant be stuffed with a storage list, cause its far, far too easy for someone to come along and say "ooh i have 12TB" - its so easy to fake its not worth keeping it up to date.

My backup solution is to keep the drives turned OFF. if they're off, nothing bad happens to them


----------



## Tau (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> i cant be stuffed with a storage list, cause its far, far too easy for someone to come along and say "ooh i have 12TB" - its so easy to fake its not worth keeping it up to date.
> 
> My backup solution is to keep the drives turned OFF. if they're off, nothing bad happens to them



So you dont have a second copy of your data anywere?  And are they Jboded?


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Tau said:


> So you dont have a second copy of your data anywere?  And are they Jboded?



independant. i find any RAID would actually increase the risk of data loss, not to mention lock it to compatible RAID controllers only.

If i wanted to back it up, i'd need another 6TB worth of HDD's.... (i have just shy of 5TB in the storage cage, a single port e-sata 1TB drive, the two in the main PC, and the 320GB in the media PC... far too much to back up cheaply)


----------



## Wile E (May 8, 2009)

Lets see. In this rig, I have 2x1TB JBOD + a 2x320GB RAID0 for 2.64TB. My secondary rig has a 500GB hard drive, the G5 has an 80 and a 250. The iMac has a 500GB. The lappy a 320GB. I have 2x250GB externals, a 500GB external and 3 80GB externals. I also have 2 200GB IDE hard drives that are sitting unused at the moment, as well as a 300GB IDE.

Grand total of 5.53TB in use currently, with another 700GB available. I'm thinking about snagging another 1TB F1 as well. Need to get a server going, and consolidate all this data. lol.

So, am I in?


----------



## thebeephaha (May 8, 2009)

Woot, totally joining this.

Mussels has seen my rig.



Mussels said:


> one of the few people with more storage than me



For the rest check here: http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?p=1363699

To sum it up real fast, I have 22 HDDs @ 10,250GB pre-format in a 4U rackmount case.


----------



## Tau (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> independant. i find any RAID would actually increase the risk of data loss, not to mention lock it to compatible RAID controllers only.
> 
> If i wanted to back it up, i'd need another 6TB worth of HDD's.... (i have just shy of 5TB in the storage cage, a single port e-sata 1TB drive, the two in the main PC, and the 320GB in the media PC... far too much to back up cheaply)



It's going to be a sad day when you lose one of those drives


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Tau said:


> It's going to be a sad day when you lose one of those drives



the only drives i've had fail on me, are new ones that died within 48 hours of owning them.

If they last filling their capacity up, format, do it again, and 5 hot plug cycles i deem them stable, and i've never had one fail that passed this routing.


----------



## h3llb3nd4 (May 8, 2009)

When we need new drives, we will ask for your advice mussels


----------



## crtecha (May 8, 2009)

atm

2 seagate 320's
2 seagate 250's
1 seagate 160
1 seagate 80
1 western digital 60gig sata laptop drive

1440gigs total.

I'm actually planning on running my main rig from one 500 as I've been far to lazy to transfer data around to install a OS.  As of right now I have one 80 in my rig and I have about 2gigs left :X


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

h3llb3nd4 said:


> When we need new drives, we will ask for your advice mussels



abuse them within 24 hours of getting them! if they survive, they're a keeper (and  by abuse i dont mean anything physical, like throwing them out windows)


----------



## Tau (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> abuse them within 24 hours of getting them! if they survive, they're a keeper (and  by abuse i dont mean anything physical, like throwing them out windows)



I run Barts on all my new drives for 48 hours, this seems to pick all the flaky drives out fairly quickly.

Though drive failure is random.  Like when I have 7 500GB WD's all fail within 2 days of each other....  mind you that was a bad batch...  but still.

You just must not value your data like I do


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Tau said:


> I run Barts on all my new drives for 48 hours, this seems to pick all the flaky drives out fairly quickly.
> 
> Though drive failure is random.  Like when I have 7 500GB WD's all fail within 2 days of each other....  mind you that was a bad batch...  but still.
> 
> You just must not value your data like I do



i just dont have many drive failures.
These drives are on maybe 4 hours a week, at most. Theres simply no time for anything to go wrong.


----------



## Tau (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> i just dont have many drive failures.
> These drives are on maybe 4 hours a week, at most. Theres simply no time for anything to go wrong.



4 hours a week 

Lol thats not much up time at all, i guess that changes things a bit, though there is still the chance of random failure.

All of mine are on 24/7


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Tau said:


> 4 hours a week
> 
> Lol thats not much up time at all, i guess that changes things a bit, though there is still the chance of random failure.
> 
> All of mine are on 24/7



all mine are external. If i want data off them, i duplicate it locally before turning the externals off again. They get as little use as possible, in order to prolong the life of the drive as much as possible.


----------



## morpha (May 8, 2009)

Samsung drives  =  Superior. = less chance of failure and faster read/write speeds.

External cage means less uptime and less chance for things to go wrong.


----------



## Darknova (May 8, 2009)

Wow, and I thought I had a lot of storage....

Main Rig

2x 320GB Samsung F1s in RAID 0
250GB Samsung Spinpoint
500GB Samsung F1
750GB Samsung F1

File Server

2x 250GB Samsung F1
2x 500GB Samsung F1
Soon to be added is another 250GB Samsung Spinpoint

(Anybody noticed I love Sammy drives? ^_^)

Oh, and planning on grabbing a 1TB Samsung F1


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Darknova said:


> Oh, and planning on grabbing a 1TB Samsung F1



i've got 5 of those  i love sammy more


----------



## Darknova (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> i've got 5 of those  i love sammy more



If I had the money I'd overhaul my network with full Gigabit stuff (switches, etc.) and grab a couple 2nd hand servers capable of holding up to 10 drives.

10TB + full backup server


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Darknova said:


> If I had the money I'd overhaul my network with full Gigabit stuff (switches, etc.) and grab a couple 2nd hand servers capable of holding up to 10 drives.
> 
> 10TB + full backup server



my network consists of:

AIO wireless router
8 port gigabit
5 port gigabit
16 port 100Mb
8 port 100Mb
wireless AP
Smoothwall (traffic monitoring/bandwidth shaping/P2P blocking)

with 15TB of data shared between me and my housemates, 1Gb isnt enough speed


----------



## Tau (May 8, 2009)

Darknova said:


> If I had the money I'd overhaul my network with full Gigabit stuff (switches, etc.) and grab a couple 2nd hand servers capable of holding up to 10 drives.
> 
> 10TB + full backup server



Gigabit is cheap now... you can roll out a decent gigabit system across a few computers for under $300.



Mussels said:


> my network consists of:
> 
> AIO wireless router
> 8 port gigabit
> ...



Why so many switches Mussels?  Are they all nested?  And I assume the Smoothwall is the gateway?

Gigabit is not fast enough?  80-100MB/s is to slow for you?


----------



## Darknova (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> my network consists of:
> 
> AIO wireless router
> 8 port gigabit
> ...



Lol.

At the moment we've got:

Edimax Router
Netgear 8 port Switch 100Mb
2 Edimax 4 port Switches 100Mb
Edimax Wireless "n" Access point

The File Server is shared between all, the Main rig is all mine (MINE I TELL YOU! Muahaha)


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Tau said:


> Gigabit is cheap now... you can roll out a decent gigabit system across a few computers for under $300.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



House is set up for lans  i dont NEED that many ports... but they get lonely if i pack them away. (P.S, its cool looking at the blinking lights at night)
Router->Smoothwall->8 port giga -> rest
Router is still the gateway, the smoothy is transparent.

Do the math, see how long it takes to move 1TB at 80MB/s.
its not instant, i want faster 



Darknova said:


> Lol.
> 
> At the moment we've got:
> 
> ...


multiple 100Mb's is  at least make sure you arent choking the uplinks, and keep systems that regularly move data on the same switch


----------



## morpha (May 8, 2009)

Ive been meaning to upgrade to gigabit aswell.. But I really dont mind the wait transferring data at 100mb/s since its generally only a few gig at a time. (Download box -> gaming Pc) I dont have a file server. I plan on eventually getting an external box that I can move between computers. 

But I want to upgrade my monitors first... Just that I dont like anything on the market right now


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

morpha said:


> But I want to upgrade my monitors first... Just that mussels bought the one i was looking at, and i need to one up him



Fixed


----------



## Darknova (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> multiple 100Mb's is  at least make sure you arent choking the uplinks, and keep systems that regularly move data on the same switch



I know 

That's why my dad and I are planning upgrading the entire system.

The Fileserver sits in the garage on one of the Edimax switches which is connected to the Netgear Switch. 
The Netgear switches is connected to my dad's and my brother's PC, as well as the switch in my room. 
That switch connects my Media PC (Dead ), my PC, and the Wireless Access Point.

I really need to lose the switch in my room, but routing cables is a PITA in our house.


----------



## morpha (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> Fixed



dont be a tool. I have good reason for wanting bigger than 23.5".


----------



## crtecha (May 8, 2009)

How reliable would you say those green 1tb drives that WD makes are?

I'm thinking about getting two of these

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136284


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

crtecha said:


> How reliable would you say those green 1tb drives that WD makes are?
> 
> I'm thinking about getting two of these
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136284



personally, i've ditched WD entirely. had 3 drives die brand new, within 24 hours of owning each of them. Housemates and friends have had speed issues with several as well.


----------



## crtecha (May 8, 2009)

Do you have any recommendation?

I looking to gain about 2tb's it can be 4 500gigs I dont mind.  I actually dont really feel too comfortable being able to store 1tb's worth of data on one drive.  I couldnt imagine losing that much.  

I dont need a high performance drive im just looking to store all my dvd back ups and all that junk.


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

crtecha said:


> Do you have any recommendation?
> 
> I looking to gain about 2tb's it can be 4 500gigs I dont mind.  I actually dont really feel too comfortable being able to store 1tb's worth of data on one drive.  I couldnt imagine losing that much.
> 
> I dont need a high performance drive im just looking to store all my dvd back ups and all that junk.



samsungs. if you really want the data to be safe, get an E-sata enclosure with an off switch at the back. As i said earlier, if its off, you lose a lot of the risk.


----------



## crtecha (May 8, 2009)

Yeah I have just a standard sata enclosure that I use for my drives and my optical drive.  The transfer is a little slow but it beats having all that crammed in my case.  I'm gonna hit the egg and see what kinda enclosures I can find and price some of those sammies.


Thanks Mussels


----------



## Tau (May 8, 2009)

crtecha said:


> How reliable would you say those green 1tb drives that WD makes are?
> 
> I'm thinking about getting two of these
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136284



IMO i wounder touch em + their 5400RPM



Mussels said:


> personally, i've ditched WD entirely. had 3 drives die brand new, within 24 hours of owning each of them. Housemates and friends have had speed issues with several as well.



+1 Iv had more WD's fail on me than any other drive.



Mussels said:


> samsungs. if you really want the data to be safe, get an E-sata enclosure with an off switch at the back. As i said earlier, if its off, you lose a lot of the risk.



If you want the data to be safe keep a backup.  be it on dvd/tape/cold hdd.  

Live storage is NOT a backup.  regardless if it has an 'off' switch


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Tau said:


> Live storage is NOT a backup.  regardless if it has an 'off' switch



This is true. But that doesnt negate the fact its still safer than a 24/7 drive.


----------



## Ahhzz (May 8, 2009)

morpha said:


> dont be a tool. I have good reason for wanting bigger than 23.5".



Anyone say penis envy?


----------



## Tau (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> This is true. But that doesnt negate the fact its still safer than a 24/7 drive.



I would say thats debatable as power on cycles are usually what kill drives.

But to each his own.


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

Tau said:


> I would say thats debatable as power on cycles are usually what kill drives.
> 
> But to each his own.



Fair point. If these drives were used more often that would be a concern. If i was accessing them several times a day, i'd be leaning towards a RAID5 solution.


----------



## CyberDruid (May 8, 2009)

I just had a Samsung 1TB turn into a Samsung 32mb HDD...not sure why. But it's really fast


----------



## Mussels (May 8, 2009)

CyberDruid said:


> I just had a Samsung 1TB turn into a Samsung 32mb HDD...not sure why. But it's really fast



i read that thread. weirdest issue ever.
Did you run any benchmarks on it?


----------



## Tau (May 8, 2009)

Mussels said:


> i read that thread. weirdest issue ever.
> Did you run any benchmarks on it?



Your avatar keeps getting more asian every time i see it


----------



## Wile E (May 9, 2009)

Mussels said:


> i just dont have many drive failures.
> These drives are on maybe 4 hours a week, at most. Theres simply no time for anything to go wrong.



It's actually been said that turning them off and on is harder on them than just leaving them running. 

I've also seen a few cases where a drive has been running fine 24/7 for years in a server, but when they finally did shut it down for maintenance or some other reason, some of the drives never turned back on.

Moral of the story? Hard drives are completely unpredictable. You need redundancy in your setup. That can be either in the form of RAID, or multiple backups. Choice is yours. My most important data gets archived on DVDs, put back on a spool, and stored in a cool, dark and dry place.

If I had the time and money to throw together a file server, you could bet your ass it would be RAID5 or 6.


----------



## DrPepper (May 9, 2009)

Wile E said:


> It's actually been said that turning them off and on is harder on them than just leaving them running.
> 
> I've also seen a few cases where a drive has been running fine 24/7 for years in a server, but when they finally did shut it down for maintenance or some other reason, some of the drives never turned back on.
> 
> ...



+1 on the unpredictability of them. Some I've seen go for years without being turned off and then when they are there dead. Also my main rig has two HDD's and its always on and off for overclocking and it takes its toll on them.


----------



## Wile E (May 9, 2009)

Darknova said:


> I know
> 
> That's why my dad and I are planning upgrading the entire system.
> 
> ...



I know the feeling. I have a 100+yr old home. Most of the walls are still plaster and lathe. Downstairs is fairly easy to wire, but the upstairs is a total bitch, as there's no good place for any drops.


----------



## morpha (May 9, 2009)

me agrees.

Mussels doesnt like the idea of using DVD's as backup because they are slow and do degrade over time. Ive yet to see wether its a waste of time yet. But ive been burning off all my anime onto dvd's. Thus far I have 300 DVD's in a sorted DVD filing cabinet.

Frankly most of my data is just pirated media and games. Both are easily replaceable if A HDD died (my games drive died just recently)... It really doesnt stress me at all. 
If My personal documents or my music collection were lost id be pissed, But since they dont take up much space I just made an archive an another hdd and a burnt backup.


----------



## Wile E (May 9, 2009)

morpha said:


> me agrees.
> 
> Mussels doesnt like the idea of using DVD's as backup because they are slow and do degrade over time. Ive yet to see wether its a waste of time yet. But ive been burning off all my anime onto dvd's. Thus far I have 300 DVD's in a sorted DVD filing cabinet.
> 
> ...



I have dvds here that are over 5yrs old, and still work perfectly. The trick is to keep them cool, dry, and completely out of the light. DVDs hold up a hell of a lot better than CDs.

I have a couple hundred DVDs worth of anime as well. lol. It's just about time to pick up another spool, and do another archiving run.


----------



## morpha (May 9, 2009)

even if a dvd begins to corrupt and 1 or 2 episodes/files are unreadable its better to only have to download 1 or 2 than a whole series.


----------



## newtekie1 (May 9, 2009)

Can I join?

Currently I have:

3x1.5TB=4.5TB (3GB usable in RAID5, in my main rig)
1x500GB(OS Drive in my main rig)
2x300GB(One used a data backup for most important data, other in my PS3 filled with PS2 ISO images)
1x250GB(In my server)
1x80GB(In Girlfriend's machine)
1x500GB(In ASUS EeePC)
1x80GB(Removed from EeePC and now in PS3)
1x60GB(Removed from PS3, sitting here doing nothing)
1x160GB(In external enclosure doing nothing)
1x80GB(In another external enclosure doing nothing)

Total Space=6.81TB Before RAID and formatting


----------



## Tau (May 9, 2009)

I gave up on dvd backups a few years ago when i passed 3TB of data....  its just not feasable for me to spend 41 days burning dvds.... let alone the 100's of dvds i would need.

Now backups consist of a mirroed copy of all the data onto HDDs that are then stored, reallt important data gets put onto dvds and stored in the safe as well.

I have actually been thinking of picking up a LTO-3 or something for backups...  since the data capacity on them is much better (3-400GB tapes)


----------



## morpha (May 9, 2009)

I have 3.5tb... 

basically after I watch a show I burn it off... amount to about 30minutes a week of burning...


----------



## Wile E (May 9, 2009)

morpha said:


> I have 3.5tb...
> 
> basically after I watch a show I burn it off... amount to about 30minutes a week of burning...



Yeah, I burn in batches. I try to do it in 10-15 DVD groups at a time. 10-15 doesn't take too awful long to burn.


----------



## Tau (May 9, 2009)

morpha said:


> I have 3.5tb...
> 
> basically after I watch a show I burn it off... amount to about 30minutes a week of burning...



I doubt i could burn it as fast as the data is created... lol  so not really an option for me.


----------



## Luke (May 9, 2009)

Tau said:


> I have actually been thinking of picking up a LTO-3 or something for backups...  since the data capacity on them is much better (3-400GB tapes)



I use LTO-4 Tape backups at work they hold 1.6TB per tape compressed or 800GB normally only problem with them is that they are between $2000 and $5000 AU.

No idea how much a LTO-3 is worth.


----------



## Tau (May 9, 2009)

Luke said:


> I use LTO-4 Tape backups at work they hold 1.6TB per tape compressed or 800GB normally only problem with them is that they are between $2000 and $5000 AU.
> 
> No idea how much a LTO-3 is worth.



I have used the LTO-4's before their pretty nice with 800GB a tape, the LTO-3's are only 400GB a tape and can be had for ~$1000 for the drive, then around $40 a tape.  So when i finally decide its worth the money i might pick one up.


----------



## yogurt_21 (May 14, 2009)

Wile E said:


> Yeah, I burn in batches. I try to do it in 10-15 DVD groups at a time. 10-15 doesn't take too awful long to burn.



running a proper raid in a nas/server will prevent any single (or up to 4 depending on how many drive sin the raid and the type) drive from ruining the setup. Simply pull and replace. dvd's are unreliable, a pain to burn, and don't store enough on each for many videos/applications. 

There is nothing more reliable for data than a functioning nas/server. But even then you could simply backup your config onto other hot swappable drives or flash drives (apparently theres a 2tb sd card coming out) and store them in that cool, dry area. 

At work we have our servers and nas setups and then we store our backups on hard disks in hot swappable enclosures. if a drive fails we can replace it easily and then create a nother hotswappable with the same information with the backup hot swappable. so 80tb of video is stored in 3 places at once.  on a smaller scale it wouldn't be too expensive to do the same. especially if you're only talking 6tb or so.


----------



## newtekie1 (May 14, 2009)

RAID is definitely the way to go, everything irreplaceable is stored on my RAID5 arrary.  Though it doesn't need to be on a NAS or Server, it can just be in any machine really.

The only important things that are not stored on the RAID5 are my documents and pictures, and those stored on two different drives in two different machines, auto-synced every night.


----------



## Wile E (May 15, 2009)

Yeah, but RAID5 on on board wouldn't be optimal. A standalone card would be much better, as it can be migrated easier if the need arises. 

I'll build a proper server someday, but for the amount of data I have, it's not something I can justify yet.


----------



## Tau (May 15, 2009)

newtekie1 said:


> RAID is definitely the way to go, everything irreplaceable is stored on my RAID5 arrary.  Though it doesn't need to be on a NAS or Server, it can just be in any machine really.
> 
> The only important things that are not stored on the RAID5 are my documents and pictures, and those stored on two different drives in two different machines, auto-synced every night.





Wile E said:


> Yeah, but RAID5 on on board wouldn't be optimal. A standalone card would be much better, as it can be migrated easier if the need arises.
> 
> I'll build a proper server someday, but for the amount of data I have, it's not something I can justify yet.





Raid is NOT a form of backup.

Raid is simply redundancy for higher availability of data.

Personally I dont trust Raid5 anymore either... As I have seen to many arrays lose another drive on a rebuild and render all the data worthless.


----------

