Best 2TB drives for a backup RAID NAS ?

[ungovernable]

I just bought a ReadyNAS Duo to store all my movies used on my HTPC, the objective is to have a live backup of everything in case the disk fail

i already have two western digital green 2TB disk, but now im reading everywhere that those hard disk arent recommended for RAID, and a lot of people are complainting about failed HDD because of RAID with green disks

So... What kind of 2TB HD should i use for my RAID NAS ?? i dont care about performence, i just want maximum reliability but my budget is limited

thanks!!

 

[Ubrales]

2 TB drives tend to get expensive, and there is not a lot of usage and relaibility history behind them. Since you want 2 TB drives, here are some choices:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136830
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148506 (free burner worth $20)

Good other choices:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136533 (1 TB)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136793 (1.5 TB)

Read some of the feedback and decide. These are all good drives.

 

[cadder]

We needed a 2TB storage drive at work recently. Normally I prefer WD drives but their user feedback on newegg.com was not good so I did more research and bought a Samsung drive instead.

 

[benjaminlove]

Unfortunately, WD will void your warranty if you set up any of their non-RAID Edition drives in a RAID configuration. Not only that, but the firmware on the newer drives have given people loads of issues when it's being installed into a RAID.

Citation: http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/1397/session/L3RpbWUvMTMxNzAxNDE4Ny9zaWQvOUJudmExRms%3D

Hopefully this reaches you before you buy one!

 

[ungovernable]

But can they really tell if a dead disk was used in a raid array or not ??

And what kind of disk could i used without voiding warranty, and without having to buy the very expensive raid drives from WD

 

[Ubrales]

Get the Seagate 1 TB drives. Or try the Seagate 2 TB drives in RAID 1.

 

[benjaminlove]

But can they really tell if a dead disk was used in a raid array or not ??

And what kind of disk could i used without voiding warranty, and without having to buy the very expensive raid drives from WD

I was thinking the same thing, they probably wouldn't be able to tell if you tried to use it in a RAID, however, since they changed the TLER settings in the firmware, it would make the newer Caviar series drives a pain to even set up in a RAID in the first place. If I were you, I'd get three 1TB Seagates and set them up in a RAID 5 config so data redundancy is built into the array and you still have the speed benefits of a RAID 0 array; that is, if your controller allows you to do so. That way, if one of them goes out, you just pop in a replacement and the data is automatically replaced from the other two drives.

 

[ungovernable]

I never understood whats the point of RAID5... i'm still newbie with RAID arrays... The only advantage i can see is that my datas will be instantly backed up on the other HD (well, in RAID1)...

I have read a lot of bad comments on seagate drives, is there any other alternatives ? I heard samsung and hitachi makes good 2tb drives

Right now i'm trying to setup my ReadyNAS to work with two 2TB WD Green HD and i have a lot of troubles, i had to contact tech support.... maybe thats because i'm using Caviar Green drives ???

 

[cadder]

I never understood whats the point of RAID5... i'm still newbie with RAID arrays... The only advantage i can see is that my datas will be instantly backed up on the other HD (well, in RAID1)...

RAID stands for "R"edundant "A"rray..., with the key work being REDUNDANT.

If you use RAID 1 then you have two drives that basically back up each other. So you have to buy 100% more drive capacity than what you use. If you use RAID 5 with say 5 drives, then you only have to buy 25% more drive capacity than what you use. This is the advantage of RAID 5.

Of course a pair of 2TB drives is cheaper than buying 5 500GB drives, but if you need say 8GB of storage then 5 drives of 2TB each would do the trick.

 

[ungovernable]

If you use RAID 5 with say 5 drives, then you only have to buy 25% more drive capacity than what you use

I don't understand how this is technically possible ??? If i want a full backup, all files i have need to be copied at least once, so it doubles the total space i need.... unless theres something i dont understand about RAID5

 

[Ubrales]

If you use RAID 5 with say 5 drives, then you only have to buy 25% more drive capacity than what you use

I don't understand how this is technically possible ??? If i want a full backup, all files i have need to be copied at least once, so it doubles the total space i need.... unless theres something i dont understand about RAID5

Yes, you got it right! Backup would need at least the same amount of hard disk space - external.

 

[cadder]

If you use RAID 5 with say 5 drives, then you only have to buy 25% more drive capacity than what you use

I don't understand how this is technically possible ??? If i want a full backup, all files i have need to be copied at least once, so it doubles the total space i need.... unless theres something i dont understand about RAID5

Forget the word "backup" for a minute. RAID provides for some redundancy. Here is the simplest way to think of it- you have some data to store, and of course all of your data is 1's and 0's. So you store the first bit on drive 1, and you store the second bit on drive 2. Now if the two bits are the same you store a 0 on the third drive, if the two bits are different then you store a 1 on the third drive. You do this for every bit that is in your data. If you had 3 500GB drives then you would have a total usable capacity of 1,000GB. If drive 1 or drive 2 fails, you can recreate the data that is missing by looking at the data that remains and the "parity bit" that was calculated and stored on the third drive. As long as only 1 drive out of 3 fails you still have your data. There is a way to do this with more drives and get a higher percentage of usable space. I believe Wikipedia has a good writeup on different RAID configurations.

 

[Ubrales]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_RAID_levels

Please keep in mind that RAID is not a substitute for frequent backups!