Storage Upgrade: RAID 5?

CaptainPrivate · Apr 7, 2015

Evening, gentlemen!

I've got a bit of upgrading going on, mostly due to my no longer trusting a 1TB 2.5" laptop drive to act as my primary data storage.

I have a budget of ~$250 for storage right now; I have a 256GB 840EVO for an OS/Boot drive which works just fine, but I've filled my little old 1TB drive, and have some data which I absolutely cannot lose at this point. I'll be actively using this drive array, which rules an external solution out as far as I know, and I'd rather not do a weekly backup if at all possible.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA5AD2NA9155

My plan right now is to purchase three of those particular Hitachi drives and run them in RAID-5; BackBlaze released a report on their HDD failure rates, and HGST appears to be one of the most reliable, for what it's worth. I was also considering an array of new(er) WD Purple drives, but those Hitachi 2TB's seem to be a good deal, if not a slightly older drive.

What would you do if you were given $250 to replace what I'm currently working with, looking for reliability over all else? I'm looking at 2TB minimum storage space... I'll probably fill that up pretty quickly, too. Motherboard is an ASRock C226-WS if that helps - a nice platform to work with. I don't work with storage much, so any opinions are appreciated!

Solandri · Apr 7, 2015

CaptainPrivate :

RAID is not a backup. RAID is for redundancy. That is, a drive can fail and your file server will keep chugging along as if nothing had happened. If you need 99.999% uptime, you want RAID.

If you have irreplaceable data, you want a backup (or multiple backups), not RAID. RAID sucks as a backup because a single errant delete command will simultaneously erase both your data and the parity info for it which is acting as the "backup copy" in RAID 5. In RAID 1, the single delete command will simultaneously erase both copies.

The only true way to use RAID as a backup is if your filesystem supports snapshots. Then you can set it to snapshot every day (or every hour). And if you accidentally delete the wrong file, you can simply go back to the last snapshot where the file still existed and recover it. I'd still recommend an external offline backup (in case something like a lightning strike fries all your drives simultaneously). Otherwise, the only reason to use RAID in your case is if you intend to create volumes which are bigger than the largest capacity HDD you're willing to buy.

Share2Care · Apr 7, 2015

Solandri :

I agree with the majority, but any file that I have deleted whilst using RAID IS recoverable via the recycle bin or using the 'Previous Versions' in the file properties advanced section.

I have been running RAID for a long, long time and have (touching wood...) never deleted a file I could not restore and many have been deleted by accident.

CaptainPrivate · Apr 7, 2015

I don't think my problem is going to be accidental deletion... I've been having a disgustingly high failure rate when it comes to PC equipment recently, without going into details. I'll be honest - right now, I'm a computer engineering student, and I'm not sure I can muster the money and space for both an external backup unit (of decent quality - not an external USB HDD which will die in two weeks) and a replacement for my poor little 2.5" drive that probably shouldn't have been used in the first place. Not saying it's a bad idea - in the future, I'll probably have a server rack somewhere with a pair of 2U ProLiants just for that purpose, but for now I need to keep what I have running in the first place... a bad sector recently appeared near the end of my 1TB of drive space, and so it's time to do something pretty quickly.

I guess I should rephrase a few things in my original post, as I do have "absolutely vital" data backed up on archival gold discs and stored away... I'm looking more for a solution to keep my desktop from suddenly dumping out on me again, and storage right now seems to be my most common point of failure. Just thought I'd throw that back out there for discussion. So, disregarding offline backups, what would be the most reasonable option here?

Share2Care · Apr 7, 2015

CaptainPrivate :

I don't think my problem is going to be accidental deletion... I've been having a disgustingly high failure rate when it comes to PC equipment recently, without going into details. I'll be honest - right now, I'm a computer engineering student, and I'm not sure I can muster the money and space for both an external backup unit (of decent quality - not an external USB HDD which will die in two weeks) and a replacement for my poor little 2.5" drive that probably shouldn't have been used in the first place. Not saying it's a bad idea - in the future, I'll probably have a server rack somewhere with a pair of 2U ProLiants just for that purpose, but for now I need to keep what I have running in the first place... a bad sector recently appeared near the end of my 1TB of drive space, and so it's time to do something pretty quickly.

I guess I should rephrase a few things in my original post, as I do have "absolutely vital" data backed up on archival gold discs and stored away... I'm looking more for a solution to keep my desktop from suddenly dumping out on me again, and storage right now seems to be my most common point of failure. Just thought I'd throw that back out there for discussion. So, disregarding offline backups, what would be the most reasonable option here?

How much space do you require if you were to do say a basic mirror RAID 1 configuration? My thoughts here are it may be better you invest in the quality of the drives, rather than quantity....

CaptainPrivate · Apr 7, 2015

I'd have to say 2TB minimum, 3TB+ would be a welcomed upgrade, though. It took me a while to accumulate what I have right now, and I could probably clear out a reasonable chunk of that. I know a reasonable amount about WD's lineup, essentially going from blue through purple with XE, RE, and SE in the enterprise segment, but I'm not too familiar with Seagate or HGST anymore... last Seagate drive I owned was a Barracuda from 2003 which still runs great, but I've heard their reliability has really gone downhill since then, which would be a shame since I've even got an ST-277R RLL drive that runs like a champ on an Intel 486 after 25 years. </off-topic>

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Storage Upgrade: RAID 5?

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