# External Storage solution for growing storage needs and speed



## PhilGF (May 31, 2019)

Hi,

Besides my photography and videography, I use my PC  for just about everything. I just built a new PC that has Thunderbolt 3.  I need more storage for external storage and want to improve the access speed.

I have two Drobo's and a Synology NAS. I use Backblaze,  which currently holds about 7TB in the cloud. I also am storing my new photos and videos on OneDrive and also keep my Lr catalog there too. So I have backed off from doing backup's locally. However, for everything else, I'm backing up to my Drobo S which is running out of storage and has eSata connectivity. My older 4 bay Drobo only has USB2. My Synology NAS has the storage available but the ethernet connection isn't fast enough to use for photos and video. Also, my Backblaze plan doesn't allow back up from a NAS.

So I'm looking for new external storage that will allow me to use the speed of Thunderbolt 3, also one that can mostly use spinning drives and also SSDs and m.2.

Although I haven't had issues with my two Drobo's since buying the first one in 2013 I hear too many negative stories. I'm thinking about Qnap. But I'm lost, I want to future proof as much as possible so I don't want to buy the cheapest item to fit just today's needs. I'd like the option for the three storage types and to use dual redundancy. Any suggestions. looking to keep the budget to $1500 to $2000.

Thanks!


----------



## clee01l (Jun 1, 2019)

I would be wary of any backup scheme that uses proprietary filesystems.  
I would recommend this TB3 Expansion box   OWC ThunderBay 4 RAID 5 4-Bay External Storage Enclosure with Dual Thunderbolt 3 Ports .  You can put what ever disk drives in it that you might have or might want to add. 
Aside from TimeMachine, I use Acronis and it will back up to any local network or attached EHDs.   I have about 17TB attached and back up about 5TB to an 8TB EHD.  I don't backup to the cloud as restoring takes too long.  I back up to a Time Capsule and an EHD with Time Machine  and to 2 EHDs using Acronis.If you are running Windows, the TimeMachine is not an option but I think there are Windows Apps that will do nearly the same seamless back as TimeMachine.


----------



## Opa (Jun 9, 2019)

Hi Cletus, do you have the OWC box? How do you have it configured? I need to upgrade the locally attached storage on my iMac Pro, mostly for better performance but also additional space.

Thanks,


----------



## clee01l (Jun 9, 2019)

I have an older identical expansion box from Akito.  It is TB2 and I have 4 slots configured as 4 individual volumes.


----------



## Opa (Jun 9, 2019)

clee01l said:


> I have an older identical expansion box from Akito.  It is TB2 and I have 4 slots configured as 4 individual volumes.


Thanks. So not RAID?

I'm also wondering if the slightly better performance of the Thunderbay 6 would be worth it. For a 24Tb system it'd be about $260 more. S/b better performance. It'd also have more useable space (20Tb available from a 6 x 4Tb system vs 18Tb from a 4 x 6Tb system) though I'm not sure how useable that space would be since performance degrades so quickly as disks fill up?


----------



## clee01l (Jun 10, 2019)

Opa said:


> Thanks. So not RAID?


Unless you need 7X24 uptime, swappable RAID is never a solution,   RAID does not replace a good versioning backup app.


----------



## Opa (Jun 10, 2019)

RAID does provide improved performance, no?

4x6Tb RAID s/b higher performance than 3 individual disks providing the same space? 6x4Tb s/b higher performance than 4x6Tb?


----------



## clee01l (Jun 10, 2019)

Opa said:


> RAID does provide improved performance, no?


Not really.  Remember I can think of no reason for an individual to need RAID except for a business requirement to have 7X24 uptime with hotswaping capability.  A Proprietary Raid filesystem and a Failed RAID controller will cause you more headache than any benefit RAID might offer on speed.  Remember Most of the time LR does not use your original files and when it does performance is not a critical feature.


----------



## Opa (Jun 10, 2019)

Perhaps. But RAID five (MacBook pro keyboard so one number key just stopped working) does provide protection from a single drive failure. That's rare today but it does happen and much easier to replace a drive than have to rebuild from backup?  Plus performance improvement? The question may be how much performance improvement.

LR, C1 Pro, Affinity and Photoshop are my most used apps but Davinci Resolve is the most resource intensive and I think benefits greatly from improved drive performance.


----------

