Large Storage. What do i want?

[fpsrome]

Ok i am in need of some advice. Right now i have 9 WD RE4 WD2003FYYS Drives running on my comp. but im running out of room. i store a large amount of data. i need more space but im out of room in my case. I dont mind external storage but i need fast transfer rates and i would like it to read like a hard drive. i dont know what i want NAS or something can someone please Point me in the right direction?

 

[canadian69]

You are gonna suffer throughput decreases with any external solution.
USB 3.0, Firewire 3200 or eSATA being the fastest.
Gigabit ethernet NAS will drop you down even further

Enterprise class storage solutions will run in the 10's of thousands of dollars. I would say add another computer and split the storage load across them. get a KVM switch to go back and forth. maybe some hot swapable drives to quickly change data locations. Just spit balling some ideas.

 

[fpsrome]

hmm is there any way to use an external Enclosure in the way i want?

 

[canadian69]

You can get enormous external storage solutions. The trade off is speed.
If you describe what it is you are doing and the capacity storage you need, I'm sure someone can point out a good solution.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

http://www.granitedigital.com/esatahot-swap8drivelcdtowerenclosure.aspx

 

[fpsrome]

Well im storing Video/Lossess Music/Mis. Data. @jack something like that would work but im low on cash but i have 9 more of the same drive. i dont have to use them all. something like this http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816111051 would work but would i need anything extra? and would this kind of thing be simple to set uP?

 

[canadian69]

Fairly easy to setup. Looks like it would work ok for you. You could populate this with 2 Raid arrays of 4 drives each.

 

[fpsrome]

ok thank you verry much

 

[Arbie]

I like the external USB hard drive "toaster" docks, such as made by Kingwin for USB2 or Sharkoon for USB3. You can just lift drives up to 2TB in and out of these things.

Bear in mind that USB2 isn't fast (about 20MB/sec) and USB3 is still new. There are potential issues, so do some research. But nothing beats these for price and capacity.

 

[fpsrome]

yes thats good for tiny storage but i need 10TB+ and in raid arrays

 

[canadian69]

You will also want to consider the type(level) of RAID you are going to use very carefully. While RAID 5 will reduce your overall capacity (say 70% of the drives together) at least it is somewhat fault tolerant.

If you just intend to make a couple large volume under RAID 0 be aware that the more drives you use that greater the chance of failure. If one drive goes, your toast. Essentially take the MTBF value and divide by the number of drives you are using. I would think that statistically you should have at least one drive failure within a year. The drives have a 5 year warranty, but thats not against data loss.

Of course no RAID solution protects you from software issues, so backup your important data anyway.

 

[fpsrome]

well i can get a 8 bay and use raid 5. also am i using the right type of drives for this or would i want sas? there going to be on 24/7