Seeking RAID/Backup advice...?

I'm looking for a solution that enables me to take home a backup of the 'work drive' from a 6-Mac design studio. This is not my area of expertise, so I'd appreciate any 'expert' advicve on this subject.
Current set-up:
PowerMac G4 'server' machine with a second HD which serves as our 'work drive' on our LAN. An external Maxtor HD is set-up to duplicate the work drive overnight, but that gives us no security againsy fire ot theft..!
I understand that a RAID system could be configured to give us insurance against drive failure, but is there an option to use a hot-swappable/removeable drive to mirror the data which can then be taken home at the end of each day?
Thanks in advance.
G5 2GHz

You could do this with an Xserve RAID with mirrored disks (although once your 'Work' drive grew beyond the capacity of a single disk, it would get slightly more complicated), but it would be an expensive solution, and is not really what the units were designed for.
You could save yourself a lot of cash by just getting two firewire disks, and setting up two Retrospect 'Backup Server' scripts that would automatically run nightly, to whichever drive happens to be attached.
I understand that a RAID system could be configured
to give us insurance against drive failure, but is
there an option to use a hot-swappable/removeable
drive to mirror the data which can then be taken home
at the end of each day?
MacBook Pro Mac OS X (10.4.6)

Similar Messages

MOVED: P55-GD65 2x raid setup advice (R/W activities pauses time to time)

This topic has been moved to Intel Core-iX boards.
https://forum-en.msi.com/index.php?topic=159695.0

Topic title:
"Re: P55-GD65 2x raid setup advice (R/W activities pauses time to time)"
What you say you have:
"MSI P67A-GD65 B3 iP67, SATA600 RAID, USB3.0
Which one is it you actually have?
Edit: Edited topic title

RAID/Backup Setup General Help/Advice Needed

I've got a PowerMac G5 Dual 1.8 with an internal 80GB (all apps) as well as an internal 300GB SATA Seagate (all files), as well as an external 120GB firewire drive I'm using for backup now.
I'm looking to setup a more professional system for backup since my business is growing rapidly and I need a better system than "dragging and dropping" whenever I think about it, and burning millions of DVDs and hoping I've backed up everything.
My initial thought was to put a couple 300–500GB drives in my G5, put all apps/OS/files on one of those drives, and setup RAID to have the other drive mirror it (i have basic understanding of all this, but not 100% yet).
I'm now looking into the Buffalo Terrastation and other options. I'm not sure a networked backup is right for me. Overall I'm very overwhelmed and I'm trying to narrow this down.
I do mostly print and web design daily, and my print project files can be as large as 10GB per project. I just want a system where I can work daily, and pretty much have the same good speed of work as I always have, and not really have to think about backup too much.
I'm open to all suggestions and sincerely appreciate anyone who takes the time to respond.
Thanks!

RAID 1, like Alan says, immediately writes to another drive, you lose the benefit of time. It's really only good for mission critical uses where a hard drive failure would be devastating, like recording ET or something.
RAID 0 is a high performance option that splits the data path as it flows so writes and reads are greatly increased. But it offers no backup, and if one drive dies it takes all your data on all the RAID 0 drives with it.
There are other forms of RAID involving lots of drives which offer different levels of speed, and redundancy. The two I give above are those offered by Apple's Disk Utility. The others are probably better served by a dedicated hardware controller as not to over tax your processors.
If your heavy into large data storage, video, audio then you'll need to look at a RAID 5 or a RAID 1+0 and something like a Apple X-RAID and a PCI Fiber-channel card.
Do I leave the externals running all the time? Will they mount to the desktop as well?
Well with anything that auto-clones/backups the participating drives must be on and mounted. Unfortunately Apple doesn't offer a "per drive" sleep function, sleeping a boot drive affects performance.
However if your security conscious like I am and keep your other drives disconnected, then you'll have to plug them in and use the software manually.
What sort of backup regiment you use is up to you, I keep most all my data on my RAID 0 as boot, clone occasionally to two other drives and keep them disconnected for maximum security.
You might want to do some sort of combination of both, file drive auto-backed up nightly and clone your boot drive once a week manually.

Need RAID 5 Advice Please...

Had a failed drive this morning.
My config is 3x 1.5Tb drives in RAID 5 config. I understand the process to replace and rebuild the failed drive, my question is can I swap in a 2Tb drive so that I can eventually swap all of the drives and end up with a 3x2Tb array?
I need to get a replacement drive on order, I'd like to order the 2 Tb drives, but if you tell me the RAID will only work same for same in the swap out than that will be what I need in the short term.
thanks in advance for any advice.

I would backup and reload if possible. I don't think you can use the full capacity, but given how sensitive RAID5 is to drive spec and performance (and firmware) buy in sets and buy spares.
A friend was telling me about why RAID6, with more drives of course, would make more sense and offer better redundancy in case of failures.
I assume you are using Apple's, not someone elses. Reload vs rebuild vs what your future needs are...?
Apple has not supported 3TB drives btw, just to make sure you know.
And SoftRAID or any software based can't do RAID5, do you need that? I thought rebuilds were slow and as drives got higher capacity even more so, esp. when doing background build. A 3-drive mirror with theirs might make better sense. Check the features.
http://www.softraid.com/index.html
Drive prices have not gone back to where they were last August and still nearly 1.75x what they were. Enterprise even more so but that is what you want to use.

Just lost 10+years of work...Backup advice now needed

After loosing 10+ years of work from an external hdd crash + a pc hd crash both withing 10day perios, I now have a new iMac and trying to find the best backup solution PLUS syncing solution with my Macbook Pro and iPhone before picking up and with my photography. Believe me, I don't think I'll ever be the same because of this loos.
After much research, it's time for feedback from others. I have a concept diagram that I created and can be found here of what I currently looking at - this is a WIP: http://gallery.me.com/nvert#100232/backupdiagram&bgcolor=black
Any help/advice is appreciated.
Brad (aka nvert)

BIG thanks to each of you for your suggestions and advice and taking the time to help a bro out. Aside from a few glitches in my diagram (to redondant or out of sequence) I have a better grasp on how to approach this thanks to your input. The question I still can't really figure out is the syncing concept - how to keep my iMac and MBP synced? If both are connected to a NAS RAID setup, can it be programed to 'push' the most current file version to the other computer? Since I travel and make changes on the fly with my MBP and then refine/revise on the iMac, I'd like to find a way that does this efficiently. ay or two..
By the way, more info for everyone regarding my attempts to recover my data:
"The Accident": One evening I knocked my external HDD off the PC tower which sits under my desk on carpet. The drive fell less than 18" - all cords attached - and I'm sure that slowed the fall a bit. Either way, the drive was powered on 24/7 and most likely spinning at the time of the fall. Once I put everything back in place, the ext HDD began clicking. Immediately I shut it down and went to the forums as well as tech help from my university. The click was truly the "click of death". Because my university has a contract with DriveSavers, I sent it to them hoping for the best. After 2 levels of analysis by DS, nothing on the 320GB drive recoverable. What few items they were able to pull off the drive, even they were not able to decipher if those files were jpgs or txt files.
nd my job was willing to foot part of the bill since we already have an account with DriveSavers. I was ready to pay 2K for data recovery and work was willing to meet me part way. The sick irony of it all is that I was looking at another backup level 2 months before this happened - I just couldn't decide on what and now I have lost all originals. I have lots of work on the web but as you all know that format is limiting.
I lost great work, family pics, travel pics, SCUBA pics, published work, work to be published, writing, course+teaching materials, financial data...EVERYTHING YOU HAVE! So....
...For all of you thinking about upgrading...follow your gut and do it now before something like this happens to you. Not to be pessimistic...it will happen eventually. I'm just thankful the house didn't burn etc but loosing all that work is a bit debilitating. At least my Canon is right beside me at this moment...been the first time in over 5 weeks and usually it's always "the appendage" my friends tease me about.
Again, thanks for responding so fast to my post. I already have a MobileMe account setup up to sync my contacts, bookmarks, dock, keychains, etc. I also have it setup to keep my work related teaching docs up to date but that is done by me on a manual "when I think of it" basis. Right now, my 1st priority to to get a NAS RAID going but not sure if both the MBP and iMac should use TM or something like both of you proposed such as CarbonCopy or SuperDuper.
Best to all,
Brad Whitney
www.bradleywhitney.com
www.flickr.com/bradleywhitney
http://gallery.me.com/nvert

2 external drives for samples/recording/backup - advice needed

Hi, all!
Recently, I experienced a system drive crash which had taken to nowhere land all my system software, as well as a lot of music applications including Logic Studio, Kontakt 3, plug-ins, etc. However, all my samples and recording projects were residing on a separate external drive and survived.
Now, to prevent such occurrence in the future, I am planning a backup system which includes the following:
G5 Dual 2.5 with 8 GB RAM running OS X 10.5.6
Echo Audio Layla 3G with an interface card installed in one PCI slots
PCI-X SeriTek/1VE2+2 interface card residing in 133 bus slot and connected via eSata ports to:
internally:
drive 1 - VelociRaptor 300GB - system (Logic, Kontakt, etc.)
drive 2 - VelociRaptor 300GB - backup of drive 1 (smart backup with SuperDuper)
externally:
drive 3 - OWC Mercury Elite 750GB (samples and recordings)
drive 4 - OWC mercury Elite 750 GB (backup? RAID 1 with drive 3?)
Drive 4 has just arrived and I would like to get the advice of the most efficient way of using two external OWC drives: RAID 1 configuration, or simply backing up the contents of drive 3 to drive 4 via SuperDuper? Forgive me my ignorant question as it is my first time dealing with various RAID configurations: will my drive 3 be erased if I try to arrange two Mercury drives as RAID 1 through disk utility?
Many thanks in advance for your help.
sercher

I use both methods, for different reasons.
I do use SuperDuper to clone my system drive, but I also use other strategies. The benefit of SuperDuper is that it makes a bootable backup. The drawback is that you have to manually run it, and it is advisable to not use your system while it is running.
For this exact reason, Raid 1 has huge benefits over a manual backup scheme, especially for drives writing new data often, or in great amounts. Whatever you write to disk 1 is simultaneously written to disk 2. No manual intervention necessary. If you use an external drive enclosure with a raid chipset in it, the setup is dead easy. Software raid is a different story although it achieves the same level of security. You would have to erase drive 3 to set up software raid with D.U., and it would be less efficient as it uses your system cpu.
Although I keep a bootable clone on hand as I said above, I use this mainly for testing new software (ie. 10.5.7). I use my laptop for many other purposes as well, so new data is added to the internal drive regularly, so I want constant backups: my strategy looks like this:
System backed up constantly using Time Machine (incremental, constant and transparent).
Bootable clones made weekly with SuperDuper.
All media data written to a hardware raid enclosure (I use a G-Raid mini 2, but there are much less costly alternatives). All photos in my Aperture library are referenced and reside on the raid drive, and all audio captured is also written to this drive.
Don't mean to step on any toes, hope this is useful info.
Jake

APC Power Backup Advice for Small Office

I wasn't sure where to post this but I was hoping someone would not my pointing me to the right forum or offering some advice.
I am trying to put the finishing touches on a conversion to mac and have been looking at buying a Power Backup in part for the power part (no crashes and safe shutdown) but also for surge protection.
I have a MacPro (and a monitor), a Time Machine (for the MBP), 2 - 1TB WD externals, a 500 GB Iomega External (for the MBP), a 3DConnection spaceball device and 2 printers on the "desktop". And then I have a 1 TB Seagate External that I keep plugged in on another table for backing up the MacBookPro now and then.
A. Is there anything else (other than temporary power and surge protection) I should be looking for when purchasing such a piece of hardware?
B. Should I be getting everything on the "desktop" plugged in to a backup device such as this and if so how do I calculate which device to buy?
C. Is it a crime to leave the 1 TB Seagate that is not conveniently located off this backup/surge protection system? I suppose it would be wise to unplug it and only plug it in when I am running a backup?
TIA for any advice. It's been a long haul and I'd love to make sure I am finishing this with some pro level advice/approval.
- Jon

JoeJoe2009 wrote:
Hi Jon,
...C. Is it a crime to leave the 1 TB Seagate that is not conveniently located off this backup/surge protection system? I suppose it would be wise to unplug it and only plug it in when I am running a backup?- external hard drives use very little power, you can keep it plugged in to the power back up or not. Since you're not using it often, the odds of it suffering a surge power problem are rare...
A couple of things to consider in that scenario: first, while it's not necessarily true of all external drives, some, such as LaCie, are noted for the early failure of their power bricks. Since I've been using a LaCie power brick for over ten years without a problem, I suspect that's because it's not connected to a power source except when it's in actually in use. Even when an external drive is not actually spinning, the power source is still live and perpetual cooking is probably not good for its health. I follow that rule with all devices that use power bricks, including Seagate and WD external backup drives and no brick has ever quit.
Second, the Seagate external drives I've used tend to run very hot because of poor or nonexistent ventilation. Indeed, the SMART record of one of them showed a heat failure with a 155 degree F. reading "in the past." Especially if leaving the drive plugged in means the drive is actually on, keeping it unplugged except when it's in use is a good idea.

Mac Pro RAID configuration advice needed to address photography workflow

I am a semi-professional photographer and I am moving off a Windows machine and over to a Mac Pro.
I am waiting for the new Mac Pro to arrive and have purchased (4) 500GB SATA drives to replace the 250GB drive the system will arrive with.
I am considering setting up drive #1 as a stand alone boot drive. The second and third drives would be set up in a RAID 0 config and the 4th drive set up as a RAID 1 drive which would mirror the content on my RAID 0 set of drives to automatically backup the content on drives 2 & 3.
I think it would be beneficial if I describe my image processing workflow briefly so that you can understand why I am considering this RAID configuration (I've never set up a RAID configuration in the past so this is all new to me).
Image Processing Workflow
It isn't uncommon for me to return from a photo shoot with an 8GB Compact Flash card full (approx 750 8mb RAW files).
1) I plan on uploading my card to the boot drive (#1) where I would hold them temporarily.
2) I would sort thru the images and trash 80% immediately in most cases.
3) Next I would open up the "keepers" and do the initial post processing in Adobe RAW and save them to drives 2 & 3 (the RAID 0 set).
4) Further post processing (the heavy lifting and the most taxing operations in Photoshop and associated filters) would take place as I access these files from the RAID 0 set of drives.
5) All of my files would be mirrored to drive 4 as I work them. Once post-processing is complete I would copy the files from drive #4 (RAID 1)to an additional external 500GB drive for archiving purposes and then eventually delete the files from drive #1 and the RAID 0 set.
6) Once drive #4 (and the external drive) is nearly filled I would pull both and archive them and replace both with fresh drives.
Is there anything wrong with taking this approach? Can a single drive be set up in a RAID 1 configuration to mirror a set of drives in a RAID 0 configuration?
Is there anything else I should be considering?
Thanks for any assistance you guys can provide! I appreciate it!!

For the purposes of 500GB drives in RAID, I would go with WD RE2. they format to 465GB and performance falls off @ 65% and beyond anyway.
I even "short-stroke" drives to just 60% and then stay within 1/3 full - if I want to insure the maximum I/O.
Memory: 4GB is pretty much minimum but using more than 8GB isn't efficient. Ideal: 4 x 2GB.
Shame that the Hitachi 1TB drive costs over $399 for now, fast and might be better than 10K Raptor. There are also 750GB drives for $249, but the RE2 isn't quite ready to ship.
Never want to get into using 75% or more usually, though large (8-20 drives) RAIDs can hold sustained I/O for video editing and multiple streams.
One 750GB or 1TB (930GB formatted, 800GB "usable") might make sense.
How about a SATA drive case w/ hot-swap. Think of 1TB "floppy" if you will :-)) Unlimited archiving of projects.
All you want is an inexpensive eSATA 1x 2-channel PM controller and any cases. Two drives that you can use drive trays as needed.
there are also 'spare' drive sleds if you want to have the option of popping a drive out, and use it internally. $29 each or $49 a pair.
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com - link to TransIntl site
Vista 64-bit can or does work quite well now on Mac Pro... if you ever get into a jam and just need to. SP1 by end of the year will even have more support for UEFI 2.0 (Apple uses Intel EFI 1.1).

RAID Backup Schema?

I've a Mac Pro with the default 250GB HDD as the system drive. I also added a RAID 0 with two 400 GB WD HDDs giving me a fairly fast 745GB secondary 'drive' that I use for most of my larger projects.
I realize that I've now doubled the chances of a HDD failure wiping out my data. In fact it was made very obvious to me when I came in to my office one morning to find the RAID drive gone. Disk Utility wouldn't even boot up. I restarted the computer and still had nothing. At this point Disk Utility told me that there was only one of the two physical drives installed. I shut down again, pulled both disks out and reseated them in the same bays. Upon restart, voila, I was back in business and scared to death of it happening again.
I immediately ordered a 750 GB HDD to go in the fourth bay and to be dedicated to backing up the RAID. So here's my question: what would the experts suggest here as the best way to go about ensuring I'm able to keep my data safe?
I believe a RAID 10 requires 4 identical drives. My third drive is nearly twice the size of the individual RAID 0 drives but I don't think it works that way. Should I just use something like Retrospect/Backup/Lacie Silverlining to do a nightly backup or sync of the RAID to the new 750 GB drive?
Any suggestions?
Thanks much in advance.

Basic Backup
My personal recommendations are (order is not significant):
1. Retrospect Desktop (Commercial - not yet universal binary)
2. Synchronize! Pro X (Commercial)
3. Synk (Backup, Standard, or Pro)
4. Deja Vu (Shareware)
5. PsynchX 2.1.1 and RsyncX 2.1 (Freeware)
6. Carbon Copy Cloner (Freeware - 3.0 is a Universal Binary)
7. SuperDuper! (Commercial)
The following utilities can also be used for backup, but cannot create bootable clones:
1. Backup (requires a .Mac account with Apple both to get the software and to use it.)
2. Toast
3. Impression
4. arRSync
Apple's Backup is a full backup tool capable of also backing up across multiple media such as CD/DVD. However, it cannot create bootable backups. It is primarily an "archiving" utility as are the other two.
Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQs on maintenance, optimization, virus protection, and backup and restore. Also read How to Back Up and Restore Your Files.

2x 10.5.2 xServe + raid backup solutions - Suggestions please!

Hello,
I'll give a brief overview of what I'm rolling out. *Limited budget* So keep that in mind
Basically I'm just looking for suggestions on backup solutions for this particular setup. I have been hearing mixed reviews of most backup solutions under 10.5.x... (In 10.4.x server I was relatively confident with Retrospect and had performed restores before).
--2 xServes, One web server, one for local services like mail, OD, AFP, Cal, etc. each has 2x 80gb drive (boot volume + mirror). Advanced server config.
--1x raid configured as raid6 with 4TB useable after formatting and parity. Data (user directory, mail store, calendar, web sites and database, etc) will be on the raid volumes, the 80 gb drives in xserves are only for OS and log files.
--All clients are using MacBook Pro's and most users have minimal data. Most data will be mail and quicktime videos (compressed for web, originals on mini dv tapes).
--MacBook Pro's already live, current server is SBS 2003 and it handles backups via Retrospect.
--Backups will have to be D2D, tape is not an option in this case. This means two external drives for backup (one on site and one off site, cycle on friday). Probably 2TB FW800 for each drive as entire raid isn't being backed up, some of it is scratch storage so 2 TB is plenty for now).
Naturally I want to use time machine but I am hearing of horror stories using time machine to backup advanced server in 10.5. Also seeing issues with cyrus (mail) and time machine (I will be running mail services). In addition, I don't think I could do any sort of cycle with the two external drives using time machine? The lack of configurability in time machine worries me. And finally, I don't know how time machine does with active database' (Ie: sql database for web server, I just don't know if time machine will cause problems when trying to back live database up). If someone has experience with time machine in a similar setup I'd love to hear your thoughts / suggestions.
Alternatively there is retrospect. We already own a license and I am familiar with administering it on 10.4.x. How reliable is it for backing up 10.5.2 clients and 10.5.2 server? Including active databses (Again the web server sql databases, etc? Kind of a pain restoring anything from retrospect (Especially entire server if / when it has to be done) but it was tried and true for me in 10.4.x server installations.
These MacBook pro's will also likely become mobile homes once all is said and done (But currently are not as the xServes are not installed yet). Time machine + mobile home directory seems like a lot of data being backed up that is probably redundant?
To top it all off, until new office is ready (All gigabit when that happens in ~1 year) network is as follows:
Servers have 100 mbit full duplex connection
Clients have 10mbit half duplex (This is where time machine really frightens me with hourly client backup).
Considering above, I can either:
A: Run proactive backup script from retrospect for all clients and then nightly backup for select raid volume contents + server boot volumes.
B: Not backup clients directly via retrospect and only backup contents of the raid volume (Which is where the mobile homes will be stored). Mobile home sync would be set to occur on login / logout only (Considering 10mbit client connections, I don't want active or user initiated sync heh).
Thoughts / suggestions? Thanks in advance, any suggestions are much appreciated. Hardware is set in stone but backup solution is not so most aspects of backup solution can be changed =)

First of all, thanks for your reply!
Well I should clarify in that I wasn't going to operate "network" homes and that they were just going to be the mobile homes with sync only occurring at login / logout. Even then, I think I'd run in to issues with the 10base-T for the client systems. The servers are on 100base-T full duplex. Currently All of the Windows systems do the same and logging in / out isn't too terrible but I couldn't imagine actually running the home directories off the server on 10base-T.
Do you still think mobile homes would be too much with just the login / logout sync? If so, I'll simply avoid this option until we get our new building and gigabit networking all around in the next year.
You're correct in that all clients will be running 10.5.2.
If I am not running mobile homes, I suppose the easiest way then is to in fact backup clients via time machine to the raid volume and then backup the entire raid volume (Hence all of our sites, compressed video files and databases to a large external drive (Maybe I'll get a couple 3 or 4 TB raid drives instead... lol). Naturaly I'd select the scratch disk directories and tell time machine to ignore them. Only issue there being that I may run in to space concerns like you say. If it becomes a huge problem and apple still hasn't made TM more configurable by then, I could use the time machine editor app or modify the intervals myself. I'd rather not and will only do this if it becomes an issue
From what I can gather, time machine is not making complete duplicates of an active database (MS Entourage in this case) and is only backing up the changes. I was worried about how it handled this and whether it would detect a change and just backup the entire database again (Which would be a nightmare if it did this for our web directories as they have active databases running).
Do you know of time machine will wreak havoc with active databases (Like the ones our websites use, a couple small sql databases and one larger one).
I think time machine would work well with the method you suggested. So I can just set it to backup all clients to the raid volume and then setup time machine to backup the raid volume to the external disk? For my off site... I suppose I could just bring in the second identical external drive every Friday and copy the time machine backup database from the on site backup drive on to it and then get it out of there each evening.
As for backing up the servers themselves, they will not be storing much of anything and most everything will be pointed to the raid volume (Hence the 80GB drives). Because of this, the data on the servers themselves will not change THAT much compared to the raid volume which will change drastically every day so full backups of the servers is fine. Perhaps just setting psyncX (assuming it works in 10.5) to backup the 80GB boot volume for each server would be best? I could just set psyncX to backup each server boot volume to the same external drive the raid volume is backing up to and then each friday just copy the data from the on site drive to the external, killing two birds with one stone. (Tape would make this all easier but it isn't gonna happen in this case sigh).
I worry about the cyrus / mail issues I'm reading about on servers running time machine though.

Any reason I shouldn't do it this way? RAID backup question

I'm using three 1TB drives torn out of Western Digital external hard drives (hard to find internal drives in Italy) as a RAID 0 for 3TB internal storage in the three extra internal bays. I'd like to mirror that, or something close to it, for a reasonable price. Is there any reason I shouldn't just buy three more external 1TB drives (around €110 for USB2 each) and combine them into a RAID 0 using Disk Utility? Since I'll be using it as a backup for my internal raid, speed isn't really an issue. I'd like to be able to just use Synchronize Pro or Super Duper to regularly schedule backups.
I'm asking because it seems like the cheapest alternative is 4TB RAID boxes like Jobo, Lacie or WD that run about €1000.
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated...

Hi,
The only draw back that I can see with mounting three more hard disks internally in the Mac Pro is that you may need to remove the DVD, the Mac Pro will run warmer and of course it will be louder. You will need to decide if this is what you want.
I find that the SeriTek/5PM is a better solution.
http://firmtek.stores.yahoo.net/sata5pm2se2.html
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/firmtek/5pm/
The SeriTek/5PM is quiet, provides great HD cooling, and allows the user to easily turn off or remove hard disks that are not currently needed. This reduces energy usage, helps backup disks last longer, keeps the Mac Pro cool and quiet and provides virtually unlimited hard disk capability as hard disks can be hot swapped as needed. It will cost more for this configuration but it provides much more flexibility.
Have fun!

Raid 1 advice needed...

Hi
I am planning on purchasing a new Mac Pro. With the purchase I am also considering of a neat way of cloning the main drive.
Currently I am using Lacie drive and PSynchX do do regular bootable backups on a regular basis.
Going forward I would like to be a little more up-to-date with backup's. So here is what I am considering:
1. Purchase the Mac Pro Raid card and a 2nd internal drive and go for RAID 1 config.
2. Purchase a G-Drive Safe (RAID 1 backup) and then continue to use something like PSynchX but now I am storing the backup on 2 drives. http://www.g-technology.com/Products/G-SAFE.cfm Yes this is not the same as #1 above but better than just backing to a single Lacie drive!
So far this is all I have for ideas. Please provide your recommendations/suggestions as to the #1 and #2 and well as any other solution.
Primary reason is to have a backup plan of action in case the main drive fails. As I have important work on the machine (Images, Code etc etc). Cost is a consideration so I am not looking for a solution that will cost me $1000's
Thanks in advance.
Message was edited by: Max Shafiq

I thought my using a RAID 1 mirror if one of the drives failed then the other would continue as if nothing happened
When all works as it should then yes, you should be able to simply keep on going. You'll get this if you have a straight hardware failure of one drive although it doesn't always work out that way. If directory, or other, damage also occurs during the failure it may also damage the other drive which would bring down the set.
What do you mean by rebuild?
Restoring or adding one or more drives into the RAID 1 set.
I know this may sound stupid but why would someone want to run a RAID config then?
Because RAID 1 should pretect you against what it was intended, a hardware failure in one or more members in the RAID set.
I recently had a client that decided to let their Mac OS X server run off its UPS until the power from the UPS went out during an extended power outage. Well, if it weren't for RAID 1 they would have been royally screwed as not only did the RAID controller kick a drive off the set but there was substantial directory damage to the other drive. If there was a single drive it may not have been recoverable.
By the way, when you use RAID 1 you don't have a "master" drive and then copies. What you have is two or more original drives. It's a subtle but very important distinction. They are ALL the same. So when the RAID controller get told to write data to the drives it send identical commands to all drives so that all drive command are queued at exactly the same time and in exactly the same way. When it reads it should split the reads between the drive to improve performance although Apple software doesn't do that very well (which is beside the point here). This is why it's important to have identical drives in any RAID set to ensure the same performance properties.

Need second Xserve RAID, need advice

We have 1 Xserve RAID with 14 x 400Gb Drives, It is RAID 50
we are rapidly using up the space and need to know the easiest method for adding capacity.
We want the two RAIDs to show up as a single volume, so when we buy the second Xserve RAID will it need to be the same capacity as the first i.e 14 x 400Gb drives?
Also what is the procedure for adding this second RAID, will it involve backing up the data, wiping and rebuilding both RAIDs as RAID 50. or is there a way to do this without wiping data?
Anyone who has been in this position I would be grateful of their advice

First off, ideally the arrays should be the same size. Mixing drive sizes in an array is never a good idea. Usually the RAID controller will base the array on the smallest volume in the set and just use whatever it needs from the others, leaving the rest of the space unused (and inaccessible). e.g. if you try to RAID a 500GB volume and a 750GB volume, the 750GB volume will be treated like a 500GB volume and you lose the extra 250GB.
By far the safest option is to do as you describe - backup the data, rebuild the array and restore the data.
There is one other option, though, that might work, but I'd still backup the data before trying it.
diskutil has an addToRAID option which allows the addition of an extra drive to a RAID set. I've only ever used it on RAID 1 mirrors, never on a RAID 0 stripe, so I don't know if it'll work, but it might be worth trying. You don't have anything to lose.
Note that this kind of expansion isn't really viable long-term. If you expect to do this frequently you might consider alternative options like XSAN which can add any sized volume to a virtual pool of storage, growing organically.

External hard drive and backup advice please

hi,
Sorry if this is a common question to the forum but I have only just registered and need advice that is a bit more taylor made than the other posts I've read.
I am going to be buying an external hard drive - firstly I have read that it's better to get firewire so that if need be I can boot up from it. Is this the case??
I want to make a clone of my hard drive, this can be done using deja vu, but is this the best thing to use? or do i need to get something like carbon copy cloner?
next.....partitioning disks. How is this done and what are the advantages? Why do this? This may be the answer to my next question.....
...I want to use the external drive for (1) making a clone of my HD that I can do each week for backup purposes and (2) using it to copy files onto daily/weekly - keeping it separate from the clone
help would be much appreciated
thanks

I am going to be buying an external hard drive - firstly I have read that it's better to get firewire so that if need be I can boot up from it. Is this the case??
Yes.
I want to make a clone of my hard drive, this can be done using deja vu, but is this the best thing to use? or do i need to get something like carbon copy cloner?
You can also try SuperDuper to perform the clone.
next.....partitioning disks. How is this done and what are the advantages? Why do this? This may be the answer to my next question.....
To partition a disk, use the Disk Utility in the /Applications/Utilities/ folder. Partitioning a drive on your model of computer will usually only give you benefits if you want to maintain multiple bootable installations of Mac OS X or Linux on a single disk.
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Storage Backup Advice

Just curious to know what are the better 3rd party backup programs available. I need to figure out a good, easy-to-use backup scheme for my footage, projects, etc. For some reason, Windows 7 backup is confusing to me. I have several external drives, mostly eSATA and USB. I have tried online backups, but way too slow for large files.
I work with HDV and tapes for the most part for now.
INTERNAL
120 GB SSD Syteme drive Wildfire
4 TB RAID 0 (2-disk) - Capture footage and PPr and AE projects
2 TB RAID 0 (2-disk) - Previews and pagefile
EXTERNAL
1 TB Buffalo drive eSATA - Stock footage, DVD exports, misc
2 TB GRAID eSATA - Old/Completed projects
NAS
2 TB NAS iOmega StorCenter ix2 - Web video storage, backups
with 1TB USB3 Drive attached additioanl storage

I use a free program called EZBackitup and find it works perfectly. It can be run manually or scheduled. I've just completed 6 seperate back up jobs with over 3TB of data and EZBackitup performed flawlessly and without the slightest hitch.
Even though one of my back up jobs contains 1.5 TB of data, it takes literally a couple of minutes at most to compare the whole lot and add or remove any changed files/folders, etc.

Seeking RAID/Backup advice...?

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