Software RAID using JBOD enclosure?

[Mac_User 0101]

Since (as you said) you really need a duplicate array I have since quit using RAID-5 and just use RAID-0 on two arrays which are synchronized nightly with Carbon Copy or other tools. That way if a failure happens I can be back at full performance within minutes vs hours or days of degraded performance during the rebuild.

This particular suggestion has me thinking. Perhaps what I'll do is RAID 0 two arrays in a quad enclosure via the hardware switches and SoftRaid the two striped arrays as RAID 1 essentially creating a 0+1. Please let me know if you think that's a better idea than RAID 5 or 6.

Edit: the enclosure I'm considering has RAID 10 option which is probably a better idea than what I mentioned above.

To be honest, I'm no stranger to Carbon Copy Cloner. My current backup system is RAID 0 and manual backup using CCC to another array in a different enclosure. I'm running out of space and the drives are old. I would like to consolidate all these various drives to a single quad rack unit with brand new hdd's or even ssd's. The data does not change often because it's projects I'm no longer working on and various software and driver backups. Current projects are on m.2 then manually backed up to identical m.2 and the external array so there are two backups.
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You can try this..

https://www.vantecusa.com/products_detail.php?p_id=33&p_name=NexStar+HX4R&pc_id=2&pc_name=3.5"+Enclosures&pt_id=1&pt_name=Hard+Drive+Enclosures

It is a 3.5" 4 disk Raid enclosure USB 3.0 or eSATA supporting RAID 0,1,5 and 10 for not a lot of money. You can buy a 2.5" to 3.5" disk converter if you plan to use SSDs. Plus it is OSX compatible. The RAID rebuilt time for unit like this is around 1Gb/min or 1Tb/24 hrs (to be conservative if you're accessing data). I don't have this unit; rather I own the more expensive Drobo 4 drive RAID and a Netgear 4 drive RAID NAS Gigabit and pair them together for dual and triple redundancy (meaning copying files from Drobo 4 to Netgear via Carbon Copy Cloner for backup). I used it mainly for video and audio work in the past when I was working in the digital media industry.

Don't forget that the RAID unit can fail as well as the disks in it, so you want 2 different RAID units or at least made at different times so both don't fail at the same time.

The reason I would recommend the hardware option is with RAID failure. When you have a disk failure, the hardware RAID will go on to rebuild your drive array in the background while not affecting the Mac Pro at all. In fact, you can turn off the Mac Pro while letting the hardware RAID box rebuild the array saving you time and electricity. With 8TB with a 4TB dual redundancy, you can expect around 4 to 5 days of full rebuild or sooner (for a single 4TB drive), so you can see the appeal of the standalone hardware RAID. And that's why I went with hardware. I started with Softraid in the past.

Personally, I love my RAID setup as I had a RAID failure twice over a span of 8 years and RAID had saved my rear on my audio and video files which for a single drive would be a devastating loss. I went with RAID because of the one drive failure on my storage drive that held my precious travel memories from a number years back that I didn't have a backup for. Though the only backup I had of those photos and videos are in my own memory.

The Vantec option is a much cheaper option than Drobo or Netgear, but the manual is atrocious. You can spend more of course, but it gets uber expensive with higher end options. I got the uber setup thanks to my former company paying for the gear and allowing me to keep them after leaving them.

Hope this helps..

Thanks for the suggestions. I took a look a the Vantec you linked. Looks like a nice enclosure but I really need something that fits in a 19" 1U rack space. I have a few enclosures currently and I'm tired of setting them up and braking them down after backup. The Mercury Rack Pro from OWC fits the format but it's limited to USB 3 gen 1 maxing out at a theoretical 500MBps. That's not too big a deal, but if I go SSD I'd like a USB 3.1 gen 2 enclosure that could theoretically do 1000MBps. I wouldn't expect to see more than 750MBps on a pair of striped SATA SSD's but will take advantage of the extra bandwidth the USB controller has to offer when dealing with an array of 4 or more drives.
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I abandoned USB for main storage years ago, just more trouble than its worth. I've been using OWC, LaCie, and Oyen Thunderbolt Enclosures mostly in JBOD or mirror mode. They just work. So I dunno where the current market is on USB enclosures.

I've used the 3.5 to 2.5 adapters and they work just fine. Its just SATA, after all. Some SSDs include an adapter plate in their packaging that will sometimes work.

If Apple ever decides to make a real modular, completely upgradable Mac Pro again then I'll have Thunderbolt as well. Otherwise I'm stuck with USB 3.x for the time being until I decide to just build a Hackintosh.

 

[Cassady]

This particular suggestion has me thinking. Perhaps what I'll do is RAID 0 two arrays in a quad enclosure via the hardware switches and SoftRaid the two striped arrays as RAID 1 essentially creating a 0+1. Please let me know if you think that's a better idea than RAID 5 or 6.

Edit: the enclosure I'm considering has RAID 10 option which is probably a better idea than what I mentioned above.

To be honest, I'm no stranger to Carbon Copy Cloner. My current backup system is RAID 0 and manual backup using CCC to another array in a different enclosure. I'm running out of space and the drives are old. I would like to consolidate all these various drives to a single quad rack unit with brand new hdd's or even ssd's. The data does not change often because it's projects I'm no longer working on and various software and driver backups. Current projects are on m.2 then manually backed up to identical m.2 and the external array so there are two backups.
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Thanks for the suggestions. I took a look a the Vantec you linked. Looks like a nice enclosure but I really need something that fits in a 19" 1U rack space. I have a few enclosures currently and I'm tired of setting them up and braking them down after backup. The Mercury Rack Pro from OWC fits the format but it's limited to USB 3 gen 1 maxing out at a theoretical 500MBps. That's not too big a deal, but if I go SSD I'd like a USB 3.1 gen 2 enclosure that could theoretically do 1000MBps. I wouldn't expect to see more than 750MBps on a pair of striped SATA SSD's but will take advantage of the extra bandwidth the USB controller has to offer when dealing with an array of 4 or more drives.
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If Apple ever decides to make a real modular, completely upgradable Mac Pro again then I'll have Thunderbolt as well. Otherwise I'm stuck with USB 3.x for the time being until I decide to just build a Hackintosh.

I know this is a good 5 years after the fact — but hey... First time in my life that I have been burned by updating my macOS, without checking things comprehensively. The RAID Manager software that came with my Vantec NexStar DAS, remained on 32-bit. After updating to Catalina, I have no manner of interacting with the Vantec, to reformat it into a RAID array.

All that can be seen now by my Mac mini 2012, is one of the 4 available drives — so, 2TB instead of 12TB — and I have no means to access the others (with the exception of hard swapping them within the single bay that the OS is seeing). Have written to Vantec, to query if they plan on updating the software — but since it's now discontinued hardware, I guess that's unlikely.