Mac Pro, what's your storage arrangement

[hfg]

Well here is my current setup:
2012 12-core 3.33GHz Mac Pro

Internal:
ODBu: BR Disk Burner
ODBl: 256GB SSD Windows (boot and VMware Fusion access)

Bay1: 512GB SSD OS X boot, apps, user, etc.
Bay1: 4TB hard disk video library, photo archive, other archive, (seldom accessed stuff)
Bay3: 4TB hard disk 1st level Time Machine backup (will expand when needed)
Bay4: --

PCIe: 1TB SSD (pair of 512GB) RAID-0 (Sonnet Pro card) Photo library work master (also on NAS)

External:
DAS: 9 TB RAID-5 2nd level Time Machine backup
DAS: 1 TB bootable clone of OS X SSD
NAS: 12 TB NAS (Synology) Server for photo, music, video and TM Backup for all OS X computers and laptops

MacMini Server with additional shared storage

-howard

 

[echoout]

2009 3.33Ghz 12-core

-Sonnet SSD Pro with 480GB OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 6G for OS, 480GB OWC Mercury Electra 6G for After Effects Media Cache

4x 1TB Hitachi Enterprise HDDs in 4 bays striped RAID0 for scratch drive

48TB QNAP TS-1279U-RP NAS connected via 10Gbe for offline projects

4TB Time Capsule for OS Time Machine

And lots of other random network drives connected to a Mini on the network

 

[costabunny]

2009 3.33 5.1

Internal
Slot 1 - 1TB EVO SSD OS X/Apps & working Documents/Photos
Slot 2 - 256GB Intel 520 SSD Windows 7
Slot 3 - 1TB WD RED - OS Boot Drive Clone
Slot 4 - 3TB Segate 7200 HDD Photo library, Design Work & Media library

External
4TB Seagate HDD - Backup of Internal 3TB & Documents
500GB WD Portable - Backup of Windows 7 Drive
3 TB Time Capsule - Time Machine of 1TB Internal SSD

On-site Network
3TB RAID5 Promise Pegasus (hooked to iMac)

Off-Site Network
500GB Remote server using rsync for master files

 

[scottsjack]

Upper Bay: LG Blu-ray burner
Lower Bay: WD RE4 4TB HD - Media
Bay 1: WD RE4 2TB HD - Mountain Lion boot drive
Bay 2: WD RE4 2TB HD - Windows 8 Pro boot drive
Bay 3: WD RE4 2TB HD - Images (photography)
Bay 4: WD RE4 2TB HD - Originals (camera downloads, EyeTV programs

Four OWC Mercury boxes with WD RE4 and Caviar Black drives as backups + one Snow Leopard boot drive (because I still love Snow Leopard).

Mine has already changed.

Lower Bay: Crucial M500 960GB SSD Mavericks
Bay 1: WD RE/Caviar Black 2TB HDs - W7 Pro or W8 Pro or W8.1 Pro, depends on my mood and which one has blown up; W7 = reliable, W8 = usually OK, W8.1 = volatile POS usually lasts about one week with a reinstall.
Bay 2: WD RE 4TB HD - Media
Bay 3: WD RE 2TB HD - Images (photography)
Bay 4: WD RE 2TB HD - Originals (camera downloads, EyeTV programs

Externals;
OWC Mercury Rack Pro with three copies of Bays 2, 3, 4 on WD RE 4TB + one RE4 2TB misc stuff.

OWC Mercury Rack Pro with three WD RE4 2TB drives for Windows, works reliably only on USB 2.

 

[AidenShaw]

Mine has already changed.

Lower Bay: Crucial M500 960GB SSD Mavericks
Bay 1: WD RE/Caviar Black 2TB HDs - W7 Pro or W8 Pro or W8.1 Pro, depends on my mood and which one has blown up; W7 = reliable, W8 = usually OK, W8.1 = volatile POS usually lasts about one week with a reinstall.
Bay 2: WD RE 4TB HD - Media
Bay 3: WD RE 2TB HD - Images (photography)
Bay 4: WD RE 2TB HD - Originals (camera downloads, EyeTV programs

Externals;
OWC Mercury Rack Pro with three copies of Bays 2, 3, 4 on WD RE 4TB + one RE4 2TB misc stuff.

OWC Mercury Rack Pro with three WD RE4 2TB drives for Windows, works reliably only on USB 2.

Why use RAID Edition drives as desktop drives - seems to miss the point....

 

[monokakata]

2010 3.33 hex, 24 gb ram.

2 x superdrives
4 x 3 TB Seagates

One superdrive isn't working properly, so I think I'll take it out and use the bay for SSD.

I use a bunch of externals, including one USB3 box to clone one of the 3 TB drives.

Lenovo/EMC px2-300d NAS with 2 x 2 TB WD Reds (mirrored)
D-link DNS323 NAS with 2 x 2 TB Hitachis (mirrored)

For years I was working at 2 sites and dragging drives around. Now I'm only in one place and do have to rationalize everything.

 

[chris.k]

2009 3.46 flashed 5,1

Bay1: 1TB Bootcamp
Bay2: 1TB Data
Bay3: 1TB X-Plane
Bay4: 1TB Backups
Extnl: 1TB Backups
PCIe: 250G SSD OSX Boot

Simple, easy & Backups are my friend.

 

[haravikk]

My current internal setup is:
120gb SSD +
4x 750gb HDDs (in an Apple RAID-0)

These are combined together into a single Fusion Drive which gives excellent small and large file performance, very happy with it (bit fiddly to setup though).

Externally I have 2x 1.5tb USB drives concatenated via Apple RAID as a single Time Machine volume.


I'm currently looking to move the external drives into a single enclosure along with a spare 1tb drive I have to give me 4tb for Time Machine (so I can actually keep more than a month's worth of historical backups).

Since I'm building the enclosure myself from a PC case I'll also be moving my internal HDDs into the external enclosure along with a spare 750gb drive to create a hardware RAID-5. It'll be over USB3 but should still give decent performance, plus I have more 750gb spares to swap in if a disk fails.

I'm doing this because I'll either be getting a new Mac Pro with its internal SSD, or a new Mac Mini (currently waiting to see what their update is like) which I'll give my current SSD to. In both cases recreating my Fusion Drive to eliminate some of the performance issues with it being part external.


I also have a 6tb (2x 3tb) NAS that is for all the computers in my house. I use a script with rsync to periodically clone the latest Time Machine backup onto the NAS, just gives that extra bit of security when doing things like a clean install, rather than having a single backup that would leave me screwed if it failed while restoring the system

 

[Wild-Bill]

2008 Mac Pro 8-core 2.8GHz

Bay 1: 750 GB WD Black, Music, samples
Bay 2: 1 TB WD Black
Bay 3: 1 TB WD Black
Bay 4: 1 TB WD Black
(three 1-TB drives in RAID-0.... Users folder located on RAID array)

Lower Optical: 128 GB Crucial M4 (Snow Leopard), 256GB Samsung EVO (Mavericks)

Upper Optical: SuperDrive

External: 2GB WD Green (backup for RAID) via USB 3.0
NAS: Synology 1511+ (Five WD 3TB Green) Time Machine backups, mass storage, etc...

 

[AidenShaw]

My current internal setup is:
120gb SSD +
4x 750gb HDDs (in an Apple RAID-0)

These are combined together into a single Fusion Drive which gives excellent small and large file performance, very happy with it (bit fiddly to setup though).

A failure of any of the 5 drives will make all of your data disappear. Especially scary if the 750 GB drives are a few years old.

 

[Gav Mack]

Sled 1: Samsung 840 256 Gb Bootcamp.
Sled 2: WD Green 2Tb
Sled 3: WD Green 2Tb
Sled 4: empty

Both SuperDrives installed but splitter power from lower goes to USB 3.0 card in PCIe slot 4. Lower SuperDrive will be going when I fill up the sleds soon.

PCIe slot 3: Velocity Solo X2 with 750Gb 840 EVO.

2Tb Time capsule for OSX backups.

Got a WHS box with 6Tb storage plus an 8 bay (8x2Tb) esata port multiplier running raid5. 20 plus other HDD's >1tb I store as internals and place in esata caddy on demand, mostly NTFS, exfat and HFS.

 

[haravikk]

A failure of any of the 5 drives will make all of your data disappear. Especially scary if the 750 GB drives are a few years old.

That's why I said I have a Time Machine backup and a NAS
Plus it's why I'm moving those four 750gb to a RAID-5 along with a spare drive I have, which will give me the same capacity but with a bit more peace of mind.

Doesn't help with the SSD, but if the next Mac Mini update still has room for two disks then I'll get a second SSD of the same size (so I'll have an Apple RAID-1 + RAID-5, though I'm not sure yet if Fusion Drive will function on that). Same if I do get a new Mac Pro and it does have a second SSD as a built to order option. Otherwise I'll just have to hope the SSD is okay, but like I say, I have a pretty robust set of back-ups, with Time Machine increased to back-up every 30 minutes instead of the usual hourly.

For the speed benefits of the striped set it's well worth it, but a USB 3 RAID-5 shouldn't be any slower in practice, it'll just have a higher latency.

 

[TyPod]

For years I was working at 2 sites and dragging drives around. Now I'm only in one place and do have to rationalize everything.

I'd be more than happy to drag drives around Hawaii .

 

[gdeusthewhizkid]

I just recently purchased a 1,1 mac pro.

1tb for main drive
500 gig for Leopard for using logic 8 and old vsts.
500 gig for snow leopard
250 gig for Logic Audio Tracks
2 TB WD External Drive for ITunes Media
2 TB Time Capsule for Time Machine Backups.

being that I am using Final Cut Pro X a lot more now for video editing. What setup would u guys suggest for Video Editing with my current mac pro... it's the Quad 2006 Mac Pro 2.26 GHZ..

 

[Draeconis]

2010 Mac Pro 3.2 Ghz 6-Core

Current:

ODD 'Upper' Bay
Intel 330 120Gb SSD - OS X 10.8.5 Boot partition

ODD 'Lower' Bay
Intel 335 240Gb SSD - Windows 7 Bootcamp

Bays 1-4
4x 2Tb Seagate HDDs running a MacZFS 74.3.0 8Tb RAID-Z array

PCIe Slot 4
Sonnet Tempo E2P ESATA PCIe card

USB
USB SuperDrive, com.apple.Boot.plist kernel flags set to 'mbasd=1' to get this working.

Future:

Blu-Ray drive, PCIe Sonnet Tempo SSD Pro with 2x Intel SSDs, swap out the 5870 for a Mac Edition 680.. tempted to try and sell the W3670 and get a W3680 which are now much more affordable..

 

[monokakata]

I'd be more than happy to drag drives around Hawaii .

Dragging drives around the Big Island isn't bad. Dragging them from upstate NY to the BI and back again was annoying.

I take your point, though. It's a nice place to live. I was born and raised here.

 

[gdeusthewhizkid]

I have a 2 tb time capsule that's quickly filling up with my fcp content. Should I opt and buy a 3tb internal drive and time machine to that for my 1tb main drive...?

 

[riggles]

Just got my first MP, and I love all the storage options (I've always had an iMac or MBP). Right now it's a simple split between work and personal files.

512GB Crucial m4 SSD - OSX, Applications, pictures, all work files.
(2) 1TB HDD in RAID 0 - Downloads, music, movies.
3TB HDD - Time Machine backup w/ Mavericks and Windows 8 testbench partitions.

I'm a little disappointed with the SSD transfer rates (around 250MB/s) but I guess that's just a SATA-II limitation? Not as fast as the Fusion Drive in the iMac I traded in, but it wakes from sleep faster.

 

[m4v3r1ck]

Just got my first MP, and I love all the storage options (I've always had an iMac or MBP). Right now it's a simple split between work and personal files.

512GB Crucial m4 SSD - OSX, Applications, pictures, all work files.
(2) 1TB HDD in RAID 0 - Downloads, music, movies.
3TB HDD - Time Machine backup w/ Mavericks and Windows 8 testbench partitions.

I'm a little disappointed with the SSD transfer rates (around 250MB/s) but I guess that's just a SATA-II limitation? Not as fast as the Fusion Drive in the iMac I traded in, but it wakes from sleep faster.

I would recommend the Velocity Solo X2 card for the SSD and stick it in slot#2!
SATA-III is your way out!

 

[ybz90]

Velocity Solo X1 -- 256GB SSD Boot Drive
SATA Bay 1 -- 4TB Media Drive
SATA Bay 2 -- 4TB Backup Drive

Nice and simple!

 

[riggles]

I would recommend the Velocity Solo X2 card for the SSD and stick it in slot#2!
SATA-III is your way out!

I've looked at that or the Sonnet Tempo, but I'm still unsure which one will both boot and wake properly and not show up as an external removable drive.

 

[riggles]

So I went with the Velocity Solo x1. I thought about the x2, but I doubted my m4 SSD would even reach 500MB/s speeds, so why spend $100 when I could only spend $50?

Installation was a breeze. Just moved the SSD from the optical bay to card slot #2, booted, and OSX recognized the new location automatically. Easy.

Ran the Blackmagic test, and my speeds were nothing to write home about: ~255MB/s write and ~385MB/s read. That tells me I made the right choice, this m4 wouldn't have benefitted from a faster PCIe card. Things feels snappier, though, so I'm happy. And now the other optical bay is open for an aux PSU for an additional graphics card later in the year.

 

[Stingray454]

Not that I own a MP yet (still on my iMac, looking to buy the nMP soon), but I use a Synology Diskstation 412+ with 4x3 TB storage in raid 5, so 9 TB total available, that I keep in a closet connected to the same gigabit net. As I don't work with huge projects it's enough space for time machine backup and an archive for previous projects, and I get about 100-120Mb/s transfer speeds so it's fast enough for external storage for my needs. I'm very impressed with the 412+ in terms of performance, software, settings and such, I'd recommend it to anyone looking for a NAS.

I also keep my old 3 TB NAS on the same network in another house in my yard, for important files just in case my house should burn to the ground Had to dig 50+ meters of gigabit cable to get that running last summer, but that's another story

 

[m4v3r1ck]

I've looked at that or the Sonnet Tempo, but I'm still unsure which one will both boot and wake properly and not show up as an external removable drive.

My Velocity Solo X2 (RAID-0) is in slot #2 (MP 3.1 @ 10.8.5) ) and I can confirm it's listed as an external drive!

 

[riggles]

My Velocity Solo X2 (RAID-0) is in slot #2 (MP 3.1 @ 10.8.5) ) and I can confirm it's listed as an external drive!

Yup, my x1 also. But it hasn't really changed anything except the icon in Finder windows, fortunately, and it's barely noticeable. The biggest concern was that I could accidentally eject it, but it doesn't even show up in Alfred as ejectable since it's a boot drive. Everything works great! I wouldn't have even noticed anything different if I wasn't looking for it.