Drobo user reviews (Second generation)

Pros Firewire800 really improves the usefulness of the Drobo. I can now use it as the primary storage in doing my photoshop work.

Cons A network option would be nice.

Summary My experience with this second generation Drobo has been much different then this reviewer's. I have had a first generation Drobo for over 9 months. I really liked the 'simplicity' of management of the storage array. I have grown from 500 GB to almost 2TB with its brain-dead handling of inserting of new drives. This is by far the easist RAID array I have ever used.

The one draw back was it was rather slow on USB on my iMac and Vista systems. So, I purchased a DroboShare back in Feb and that has worked out well for backups.

Now I have just gotten my 2nd gen Drobo and on the iMac (Fw800) it just screams! I can open a raw photo in photoshop in 1/3 the time of the USB Drobo. It is fast enough to use for all my editing. I only have FW400 on my Vista box, but using IOmeter, I was still seeing read speeds of 44 MB/sec and write speeds of 32MB/sec.

This is a great improvement from Data Robotics!

Pros Does what it claims.... but slow, but proprietary,

Cons Nothing can restore the data if there is a hardware failure. Guaranteed to loose your data, sooner, rather than later. There is no official recovery software. Takes DAYS to remap drives during failures . Better have a GOOD UPS.

Summary Nice toy, minimally built with low spec for what some may consider a critical device. This should never EVER be a back up device, just a big pool to manage data SLOWLY and immediately back up... errr. SLOWLY.

Pros Looks good.
Great concept.

Cons Does not behave as advertised and so far is not reliable.
Support folks are trying but struggling.

Summary Mine is unstable (1) spontaneous uncommanded shutdowns (2) often refuses to go into standby mode which is required for safe power down (3) speeds never exceed 12-13 MB/s with USB2 and usually drop over time with a large transfers,

DRI support folks have a positive attitude, but seem to struggle. (1) the firmware downloads and Dashboard downloads from the site are hit and mis - sometimes they just don't work (2) a number of links they have sent me were to things other than what was being referred to (3) they just don't sound surprised that it is flaky.

I bought this (at a premium to competetive products) because it was to be easy and reliable. So far it has been neither. I'll give DRI the rest of this week to sort it out, but running as it is I cannot justify keeping it because (1) it is a pain right now and (2) I don't trust it.

Pros Fast, Quiet, No-Brainer

Cons would like an activity light + activity alert in the Drobo Dashboard (DataRobotics... if you're listening...?)

Summary I wrote this review in the Drobo 4tb section... but have moved it here.

I pre-ordered the Drobo II in Zurich a couple weeks ago, and paid about $650 for it. I was nervous... actually very nervous.... because the reviews for the 1st Gen Drobo were a bit Hit-or-Miss.... and the reviews for the 2nd Gen were spotty as well. I read and re-read the CNET review.... hoping there would be a third iteration to it that said, "despite our 1st and 2nd attempts with the Drobo... our 3rd attempt reveals that it is the most amazing, lightning-fast, whisper-quiet, energy-efficient, super-secure piece of hardware we have ever tested".

That review never came.... and I was constantly bothered that they hadn't reviewed the Drobo with a Mac / OS X.

I am a storage junkie, and so this is my Drobo experience (thus far) in so many words:

Performance....

With iMac 2.8Ghz, 4gb RAM, OS X 10.5.5 - ONLY TESTED FIREWIRE 800 - Drobo II with 4tb (4 x 1tb) Seagate Barracuda ES.2

Transfer speeds are not lightning-fast..... but they are certainly AS Fast - if not faster - than the CNET tests. I transfered 100gb of small data files and music, with an average transfer/write speed of 260Mbps. I then transfered 1tb of larger files with an average write speed of 310Mbps. I can't be certain why there is such a significant difference here... but I think it has to do with the file structures.

In Comparison.... I have a 2Tb WD drive that runs at roughly the same speed.

Frankly... to me... this is fast enough. And, the Drobo feels more stable than the WD, as it doesn't go to sleep after 5 minutes, and then completely freeze my operations for the 3 minutes it requires to wake itself up.

Sound...

I have bad ears from a childhood and adult/childhood spent on/in/around motorcycles. But, I swear.... I cannot here the Drobo from 2ft away. In comparison, I can hear my WD 2tb from up-to 10 feet away. The Drobo is Whisper Quiet.

Setup....

Took a total of about 7 minutes, once I had inserted the drives (literally, like CNET says... "just like putting a CD into a CD-ROM drive"..... there are no cartridges to assemble!!!) and installed the Drobo Dashboard. The Software tells you that it needs to "initialize" the drives, and then within a couple minutes (maybe 3-4), you have the Drobo sitting on the left of your finder window. Really Easy.

Use....

I have moved my iTunes folder over to the Drobo, and I am streaming from my iMac in the den (where the Drobo resides), to my AppleTV in the living room. Strage is currently at 1.9tb. No hiccups... perfect stream.

Design....

This is the only area where I believe some of the other manufacturers get higher marks for "Quality". The Drobo looks sweet...!! Don't get me wrong... it looks awesome sitting next to my computer and speakers, and if I could upload a photo to this review, I would. But, my only complaint is the general fit+finish doesn't quite have the same feel as the Netgear, or Lacie..... probably more on par with Western Digital. The drive "trays" feel thin and plastiquey...... and the front panel is a little lightweight. Not a Deal-Breaker.

Conclusion....

I don't know how it works. I don't really wanna know how it works. In fact... I don't really care how it works. But, it does.... and it works well. Its fast enough that I would never have any complaints... quiet enough that I can't hear it.... and smart enough that I know not to ask questions. I realize its not RAID..... but it still feels safe, and frankly, it should after eating 1.3 of my Terabytes with its backup function.

Great Product, Highly Recommended for media freaks and storage geeks who aren't geeky enough to know better.

dougan.