Storage question

[zema]

I am wanting to buy an external drive enclosure, with four 3 terabyte drives in a raid 5 configuration. I am trying to get some second opinions. I want to make sure doing this configuration would not cause any issues in terms or running games with launch box, or issues with windows in general. It would suck to spend about  500$ and have something not work. Also recommendations for enclosures or drives would be welcome.

[neil9000]

@DOS76??

[DOS76]

I use these (I have 4 of them) but they don't support Raid although the company does have a different model that does do Raid

https://www.amazon.com/Mediasonic-ProBox-HF2-SU3S2-SATA-Enclosure/dp/B003X26VV4

[zema]

Thanks very much! I want to specifically do raid 5 in case a drive fails. Once i get everything setup i don't really want to do it over.

[DOS76]

I use a software solution called StableBit Drivepool that makes a virtual drive that shows all your drives as one and has options for file duplication at different levels although I only use 2 copies. The program leaves all drives in NTFS allowing you to use them in any computer and if one dies you just pop in a new drive and it will check the pool for duplication and recreate all the missing files on the new disk it also features read stripping and a bunch of other stuff.  I'm terrified of Raid myself and fear if something happened and you lose your whole array.

[zema]

Well in raid 5 if you loose 2 drives at the same time, yup. It's all gone. Thanks for the recommendation, i may look into that instead.

[DOS76]

Just to add that the pool only creates a single folder on each drive and anything outside of that folder isn't in the pool so you can also use the drive like a regular drive as well part of the pool.

[DOS76]

Forgot to add it isn't freeware either but does have a free 30 day trial I believe.

[zema]

I figured. However i think you sold me on your solution. To implement everything at once would be expensive. If i do it your way i can use the software for backup, and still be able to expand everything as i need to. At the end of this i still really don't know how much storage i need in total. Thanks for your input i really appreciate it.

[neil9000]

Just bear in mind the box that @DOS76 recommended is USB3 only, it's not a "proper" NAS as such. So it will need to be connected to a powered on PC at all times in order to have access to it.  

[DOS76]

yeah but he said he was looking for an external drive enclosure not a NAS system.

[neil9000]

Just now, DOS76 said:

yeah but he said he was looking for an external drive enclosure not a NAS system.

Yeah i know, was just making sure, and that by saying external he didn't actually mean a NAS.

[zema]

I was thinking about a NAS but i think that would be a bit overkill for what launch box does. I just wanted to make sure i can have some redundancy, and if i had to reinstall windows or move the device to another PC it will still read everything without a problem.  

[Styphelus]

On 10/20/2018 at 12:06 PM, DOS76 said:

I use these (I have 4 of them) but they don't support Raid although the company does have a different model that does do Raid

https://www.amazon.com/Mediasonic-ProBox-HF2-SU3S2-SATA-Enclosure/dp/B003X26VV4

For those out of the loop like me, what's the advantage of this? I use my good old hard drive dock and have a bunch of hard drives for backup but every time I need to use one, I need to get it out of the box and pop it into the dock. Is this just more for convenience accessing all drives at the same time? Is this just like a giant dock that supports 4 drives at a time?

[neil9000]

14 minutes ago, Styphelus said:

Is this just like a giant dock that supports 4 drives at a time?

Pretty much.

[DOS76]

I have mine connected to a always on server it has 24 drives connected to it at all times.

[zema]

So i just wanted to throw this out there. I am having issues with this enclosure. It randomly disconnects and reconnects in usb 2.0 and 3.0. I just spent the day updating my BIOS, drivers for my chipset, USB 3.0 drivers, and various other fixes on the web with the issue persisting. It is giving me migration issues. I ordered a esata card to see if that works. At this point i may just build a 2nd PC. Looking online i can't find a good 4 bay enclosure without a number of bad reviews. 

 

Not trying to sound like a i complaining. I just want other people to know if they look at this enclosure they may have issues.

[DOS76]

Depending on the model there is a firmware update also have you tried going into device manager and making sure that your USB hubs and ports are set to not power down devices you can also go into the individual drives themselves and set the power management to the same.

[zema]

I have the HF2-SU3S2 i attempted to look for drivers, any kind of software. I saw nothing on the website. I did make the power management adjustments. I disabled legacy support in bios. Actually i missed one.. Nope, i also double checked the website, i see no software for download.

[DOS76]

yeah I had to get them to send me the firmware update through support. I kind of forgot all about that issue since it was in 2013 or 2014 when I got the firmware from them. They do have a newer model than the one I linked that supports up to 12TB drives. You can try to contact support and get the firmware from them. This might help.

http://forum.mediasonic.ca/viewtopic.php?f=109&t=1477