Promise DS4600 Questions

[ethanfink]

Hi All,

I just purchased my first RAID/NAS system. I am looking for a few questions on this drive and RAID systems in general.

1. I have 4 2TB drives, I want to install 2 RAID 1 set-ups on this drive. So bay 1+2, and bay 3+4 are redundant. For some reason the software included is not letting me do this. Is this possible?

2. What I would ultimately like to use this drive for is a working and archiving machine. I want to be able to set up my RAID 1 on 2 drives, and then once projects I am working on are done, those two drives would go into archive mode. I would Take the two drives out and store them at separate locations. Then I would pop 2 new drives in and do the same thing all over again. I would work the drives until they are full, then put them into archive mode.

What is the best way to do this? Are these systems set up to work this way? Or do I need to daisy chain these devices in order to have all this archival data?

 

[GhislainG]

In the specs: RAID 0, 1, 5, 5 with Hot Spare (One volume per DS4600)If you need 2 RAIDs, then you need two DS4600. I would suggest a different solution. Perform regular backups on two external drives (alternate them) that will be stored in different locations. That way, if something happens to your DS4600, you have a very recent backup plus an alternate backup.

 

[njxc500]

Given the equipment you have, just set up the promise with all 4 drives in RAID 5, and simply split the data into folders set up for current vs. old. I can't see what the benefit would be to splitting the hardware, so forgive me if I tell you it doesn't make sense.

 

[GhislainG]

Given the equipment you have, just set up the promise with all 4 drives in RAID 5, and simply split the data into folders set up for current vs. old. I can't see what the benefit would be to splitting the hardware, so forgive me if I tell you it doesn't make sense.

What the OP wants to do makes sense for his requirements. Once a pair of drives is filled, they will be removed for permanent backup. Then two new drives will be installed. When full, they'll also be removed for permanent backup, etc. This can be achieved with external drives or another DS4600 setup in RAID 1.