Storage Solutions for our OUT-OF-CONTROL iTunes Libraries

[Wardotron]

Anyone using a NAS with UPNP and/or iTunes server functions?

I currently have an old eMac serving an iTunes library of films to an Xbox 360, but would like to cut out the middleman (the eMac). I am thus thinking of porting my huge iTunes library to a monster NAS for sharing.

Another question: if I use a Windows formatted NAS, could the Xbox recognise the drive as a 'source'? Would I encounter problems editing the iTunes library on a Windows drive using iTunes in OSX?

 

[Slovak]

I am thus thinking of porting my huge iTunes library to a monster NAS for sharing.

I've set up RAID 1 on an old PC box with FreeNAS. I am not using it the way you'd like to, but it appears to have those options built in. Might be a viable solution for you, even if you had to put together a cheap box.

 

[Cuthbert]

I've pretty much decided on the Drobo for backing up all of my data. Can anyone suggest a good 1 TB internal hard drive? Seagate? WD?

1TB mind you; I will be buying 2 of them and would like to keep 2 slots open in the Drobo for future added storage. Thanks guys, you're all awesome!

 

[ant1ers]

Personally, I like Seagate or WD. Both make quality products.

However, for the Drobo, I highly recommend that you buy the hd's from different manufacturers if you purchase them at the same time. It keeps you from getting two drives from a bad batch.

 

[hualon]

Data Robotics suggests simply "the cheapest drives you can buy" because of the built-in redundancy of the Drobo. I use the Western Digital Green-edition 1TB drives since they consume about half the power of the Seagate 1TB. The WD drives aren't as fast but it doesn't matter on the Drobo anyway.

 

[Karpfish]

+1 to WD Green Power drives. You don't need the speed so much, so they are a great option for a 1TB drive.

 

[ascender]

Well, I've just bought a second Drobo unit.

I had a few problems with my first one, but got a replacement shipped out which fixed all the problems. I was then left with an ever-growing iTunes library which wasn't backed up. I took a manual copy of the whole thing on to an old Mac, but that really wasn't a viable solution going forward.

Now, the one thing that I was very impressed with on my first Drobo, was that despite the problems I had, the data remained intact. But the problem is obviously that if something catastrophic happened, you could lose the lot.

So, having looked at the various options I've decided to buy a second Drobo. Its the most effective way (and cost effective way) I can see of backing up my entire library via Time Machine at the moment.

 

[phrehdd]

Well, I've just bought a second Drobo unit.

I had a few problems with my first one, but got a replacement shipped out which fixed all the problems. I was then left with an ever-growing iTunes library which wasn't backed up. I took a manual copy of the whole thing on to an old Mac, but that really wasn't a viable solution going forward.

Now, the one thing that I was very impressed with on my first Drobo, was that despite the problems I had, the data remained intact. But the problem is obviously that if something catastrophic happened, you could lose the lot.

So, having looked at the various options I've decided to buy a second Drobo. Its the most effective way (and cost effective way) I can see of backing up my entire library via Time Machine at the moment.

Sounds like you have a plan here.

For those more cautious about backing up - consider this
get an external drive case that has mirrored drives. OWC offers some good cases that you can populate with your own drives. Decide on how you want to attach these drives -meaning usb2, fw400 or fw800 (esata for some too).

Also, for music, if you can make backups on DVD or CD medium as "files" not music. That is a wise thing to do. Use good quality CD/DVD medium that has a reputation for long life or the more expensive "archival" medium.

The question is not whether a drive will fail but WHEN will it fail. The solutions for handling a failed drive is another matter. In a 4 drive raid, set to raid 5, if a drive fails your data is still protected. If 2 drives fail all is lost. Having a spare drive as quick as possible is important. Rebuild times are often SLOW. Some if not most SOHO NAS virtually are unusable during rebuilds and that can be (depending on the size of your drives and data) 20-40 hours.

I do use a NAS and central storage of media. I am careful to create appropriate directory/folder structure for easy access. It serves up media to my Macs, Mac to ipod/iphone and PS3/TV.

If you can afford a blu ray rw unit, might consider backing up in "data" format your libraries and in the meanwhile use dvd5 or 9.

Just a working opinion here - don't mix size and models of drives in a NAS. NAS will work BEST when using same type of drives (when using raid). If you are only using the NAS for play back of your itunes etc., the green drive should be fine and consume less power. If you are doing hard core usage of reads and writes, opt for the higher line drives that are designed for extreme usage and raiding.

As for NAS's - QNap, Thecus, Netgear NV, Synology - lots of them out there.
I wouldn't use Jobo as a NAS but as directly attached storage. Do read up on the NAS performance, whether they include a media player (like Twonky), etc. Of equal importance, is the interface. Thecus for a long time was known to be the best of speed with the worst interface I don't know if the interface is any better but QNAP seems to do ok in speed and its interface is decent enough. The 5 drive QNAP while expensive seems to be the SOHO leader in speed now.

I use QNAP 409pro. It is a mixed bag. Had some hiccups with it but in general it works okay. The biggest drawback - when adding media files, it doesn't do well in showing up on the PS3. PS3 uses UPNP to connect. The QNAP Media system built in (Twonky) ends up having to be rebuilt each time to function properly. As for itunes stuff, it works flawlessly when the Mac and NAS are talking to each other.

Again - easy and safe - external mirrored drives directly attached...

just my two cents

- Phrehdd

 

[ascender]

That's the thing about media libraries, they're probably not changing much, regularly. Once you've ripped your music/video, the bulk of that data will remain consistent, so if you can back that up to DVDs for example, the incremental backups you then need when you buy/rip new media are going to be much smaller.

The main problem I had is that my iTunes library is sitting at 1.5TB just now and growing as I'm ripping a lot of video at the moment. Hence my looking for the easiest option!

 

[aaronthomas]

I recently got the WD shared space... and well... had all kinds of issues with it. I was able to send it back and for less money I bought 2 2tb my book studio addition II's. I already had a 1tb my book which im now using for music and art (im an illustrator). And using the new 2tbs for movies and tv. Have to say im very happy... if not in use they take 3 or 4 sec. to warm up but that doesnt bother me a bit. All three unites take up less space that the shared space unite. Best part is you can add more if needed.

 

[ironjaw]

Has anyone tried Lace networked drives? They have 2 years of warranty, not much but are they stable and reliable drives?

 

[cuestakid]

so after many months and various scenarios I have decided on the Mybook Studio II 2TB-ordered it today and I should get it hopefully by the end of the week.

I also came across two other pieces of interesting but note worthy information

1. Drobo has decactiviated (for now) the use of the 1.5 TB drives-apprently like OWC they are seeing issues with those drives so for anyone hoping to create a RAID array with them I would wait both companies iron out their issues.

2. The Mybook Studio while being user servicable can only use the same exact drive that it ships with-so again if you wanted to place a 1.5 TB WD drive when they come out (which they will eventually) you are out of luck

just thought I would share some of my thoughts

 

[tcoop25]

Well my Drobo experience has been pretty lame. I bought a V2 and four 1.5TV Seagate drives last week. The stupid thing keeps rebooting every few minutes. Completely useless. Tech support hasn't called or e-mailed back. The support forum is helpful but nobody really knows what's going on.

Looks like this wasn't Drobo's fault. Seagate's 1.5TB drives have issues...

http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/11/11/2125227

On a side note, just got my Drobo last night, transferred all of my 500GB of content to it over night, and now I have 400GB more of free space (3x500GB). Everything worked well. Had a bit of trouble updating the firmware (did a hard reboot of the Drobo, and it worked). I am thinking that I will use Mozy as a triple backup soon.

-TC

 

[TMo70]

Hard Drives for Drobo

I've just ordered a Drobo with 3x1TB Samsung spinpoint drives. Samsung's new drive uses only 3 platters to achieve 1TB (vs 4-5 for the others), and tops the perfomance tests while having low noise and power usage. So far the tests look pretty good. Speed may not be a big deal for the Drobo, I don't know, but why not, since the Samsungs are pretty inexpensive and the latest in HDD tech. I'll post again after I get the setup installed.

I made my Drobo decision based largely on this thread, so thx all for sharing your experiences. It seems that the Drobo is a superior RAID5-like setup, which allows for 1 drive failure in the array, with a vastly simpler and easier to maintain setup and management. The downside is total failure, which is is also possible in a RAID setup. With Drobo's unique technology however, you can only put your drives in another Drobo (assuming the chassis failed, not multiple drives). While that's not so bad in terms of a recovery option, I'd still like to explore other methods of backing up the Drobo so I can reallocate data to some other setup if the company goes belly-up. Its funny how just a few weeks ago, time machine was my only backup, then I started in with the movies and realized I'd hate to do that all again. B4 TM, I didn't backup at all and now I'm not satisfied without 2+ levels of backup. My how times change.

My setup is a 2.33G iMac, with 2 1TB external OWC F/W drives, one for Time Machine, and the other equally partitioned for a bootable clone and an iMovie media drive. The Drobo will be for ripped movies, which have an insatiable hunger for gigs. I don't use an aTV, as I don't think they currently support 1080p res (plz inform me if I'm wrong). I stream or copy (1080p doesn't stream too well) over a Powerline AV ethernet extender to my PS3 (way faster than what I can achieve with wireless-N), with its newly upgraded 500G HD (Samsung also just released this 2.5" drive, the first of its kind, but I think Fujitsu just released one too...). Anyway, great thread, thx to all who've contributed.

 

[skyfire]

1TB drives for Drobo

I've pretty much decided on the Drobo for backing up all of my data. Can anyone suggest a good 1 TB internal hard drive? Seagate? WD?

1TB mind you; I will be buying 2 of them and would like to keep 2 slots open in the Drobo for future added storage. Thanks guys, you're all awesome!

Drobo has been good to me so far. I'm doing the same thing as you leaving 2 bays open for future expansion. Got 2 WD WD10EACS from Newegg. Great price right now at $115 each. Same drives that Drobo sells in their Drobo Store. So figured couldn't really go wrong. Going strong for me. I also backup important stuff like my photos to an additional 1TB Lacie external and keep at work (offsite).

 

[jwilcox09]

So I am pretty set on getting a Drobo, but was wondering if i don't have Firewire 800, is the 2nd generation Drobo any different that the 1st. The 1st gen is about 150$ cheaper and was wondering if I would regret it after....Thanks..

 

[Capt Crunch]

So I am pretty set on getting a Drobo, but was wondering if i don't have Firewire 800, is the 2nd generation Drobo any different that the 1st. The 1st gen is about 150$ cheaper and was wondering if I would regret it after....Thanks..

Supposedly the 2nd generation improves performance with an improved internal controller in the hopes of being able to use it as a "primary" HD. For example photographers who want storage for all their photos but want to edit them while they are on the drobo.

If you are planning on using the drobo for the storage and streaming of movies, I would get the $350 drobo, which is what I did. I am completely happy with my purchase and see no downsides for my application.

 

[hualon]

Now that I have replaced the stupid 1.5TB Seagate drives with 1TB Western Digital Green drives my Drobo V2 is excellent. I'm disappointed to only have 2.7TB instead of what I had with the extra 2TB afforded by the 1.5TB drives. Oh well.

Anyway, I talked trash about Drobo earlier but it turns out that the problem was Seagate. I wanted to set the record straight in this forum.

 

[jwilcox09]

Supposedly the 2nd generation improves performance with an improved internal controller in the hopes of being able to use it as a "primary" HD. For example photographers who want storage for all their photos but want to edit them while they are on the drobo.

If you are planning on using the drobo for the storage and streaming of movies, I would get the $350 drobo, which is what I did. I am completely happy with my purchase and see no downsides for my application.

Great! Thanks for that. I am all for saving some money....

 

[eleven59]

im pretty much sold on a drobo as a b/u. i would just have itunes content, movies, shows, and music...

with the droboshare connected to a time capsule, is there any speed increase/decrease if it was to be set up as the main itunes HD? im using the tv wirelessly.

when i had files on the TC, it was slower in starting up a movie (took up to a min or more to load up the movie; streaming not syncing) than it was with an external connected to the comp itunes was on..

ultimately doesnt matter as what i have is fine, its just an added layer of b/u in an ever increasing all digital world..

 

[bergmef]

Phrehdd

I think a qnap409 is in my future, how do you like it? Work as good as you hoped? Much in the way of firmware updates? Good throughput? I'm currently using a dns323 with 2 500G disks raid 1. I need way more space and I'm looking for something quiet and has a sleep mode.

Oh yeah, something that comes back on when the power returns would be nice, the dns323 does not. That alone sucks when you have a symbolic link to your itunes library on the NAS!

Frank

 

[phrehdd]

Phrehdd

I think a qnap409 is in my future, how do you like it? Work as good as you hoped? Much in the way of firmware updates? Good throughput? I'm currently using a dns323 with 2 500G disks raid 1. I need way more space and I'm looking for something quiet and has a sleep mode.

Oh yeah, something that comes back on when the power returns would be nice, the dns323 does not. That alone sucks when you have a symbolic link to your itunes library on the NAS!

Frank

The QNAP409pro is a mixed bag with some areas being mildly "buggy" in my estimates. Do I get good use out of it... absolutely.
1) For reads it does fine
2) For writes, like many NAS out there, slow
3) Reconnection to the NAS, fair..a little slow but discs do take time to synch up properly which is acceptable.
4) Media Share via Twonky - it does work for PS3 and in my case, it can find it whether wireless or direct cable or router bridge (wireless).
5) Add a file to your media library, don't expect QNAP's Twonky to work as it should and add the file properly to its db. Rather, it at times is faster to rebuild the db than to "rescan on manual command."
6) The QNAP509pro, gets top marks for speed. I would consider this even knowing it might have the shortfalls of the 409pro.
7) Permissions, one level deep only. For me this is not a problem but for others it could be.
8) I dont use the Web Server portion so I cannot comment on it.
9) Fan always is going..it doesn't sleep and I wouldn't sleep with it in the same room but overall it is not a noisy system..simply the sound of a fan for the most part humming.

The problem with many of these NAS, is the price vs guts. Many solder in the memory so you cannot upgrade it yourself. Take a look at the difference in the 409 and the 509 series on RAM. Huge difference and yes, it does impact performance in certain activities.

If I had more patience, I might have made a FreeNAS type system with an ITX board or mATX either with software raid or possibly a card akin to say a broadcom.

I would give the QNAP409 a B on doing its main function but a C- on exploitability of added features. - They work but are quirky.

Itunes - If you only store 1 version of your file (I often have two - lossless and lossee aac 256/320 bit rates). I let the local Mac do the work and organize it properly. I then move it up to the NAS and "add" without moving.
This way, I have all my files organized itune style and on the NAS. Yes, its an extra step but pointing directly to your NAS causes issues when the NAS is not ready. (The library db is local and the files on NAS). This method lets me hook in my other Mac to the same library and make any playlists I like.

What I might suggest is you go to QNAP's forum site and see other folks commentaries. Some might be doing far better than myself in their experience and certainly, many far worse <grin>.

I guess I expect far more for the price. BTW I did have the NV+ that Netgear now sells from back when. It did better in certain respects but yet, the drive drawers were cheap and jammed (as did a friend of mine who admitted it later after recommending it to me).

- Phrehdd

 

[bergmef]

Thanks

I've been using this website (http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/content/blogcategory/50/75/) for NAS info and they seemed to like the qnap too. I don't think I'll use their media player, never used twonky before, mainly because my music and photos are all on the appletv and if I want a movie, I can turn on the macbook for the ones I don't have sync'ed. I'm thinking about a mac mini if new ones come out to be my media server. That way I wouldn't need to turn on the macbook as much and if Apple is nice enough, I can get the video out to a 42 inch plasma. It would be so nice if they screen sharing on apple tv so I can bring the computer display over.

 

[phrehdd]

Thanks

I've been using this website (http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/content/blogcategory/50/75/) for NAS info and they seemed to like the qnap too. I don't think I'll use their media player, never used twonky before, mainly because my music and photos are all on the appletv and if I want a movie, I can turn on the macbook for the ones I don't have sync'ed. I'm thinking about a mac mini if new ones come out to be my media server. That way I wouldn't need to turn on the macbook as much and if Apple is nice enough, I can get the video out to a 42 inch plasma. It would be so nice if they screen sharing on apple tv so I can bring the computer display over.

Sounds like you have a plan there. - Glad to hear it.

From my own experimenting and gaffs I have found that I like to do my itunes work on one computer, create the itunes "structure" album/artist/song etc and then movie it up the the NAS manually per item.
After that, each computer can do "add library" (without the move files) and have their own subset or complete access to the itunes portion of your NAS.
The other advantage is that sometimes you enter your itunes before the NAS is synched to your computer, itunes in turn will default a library locally to your computer and fails to see the NAS. With "add library" the db is local to the computer and just the files are on the NAS and I avoid those problems.
Also, make sure all your artwork is in place before moving and editing of files. There is a little overhead/maint involved but in the long run, you'll find it very second nature and easier to handle.

itunes share is offered by QNAP and I have found very little use for it. It only has a "list" view of the files.

Presently i have two main directories on NAS for itunes - a master locations for lossless audio and itunes purchases. The other directory has compressed 256/320 bitrate lossee AAC files for my ipod and iPhone.

Btw, skip the usual top of itunes for listings if you have a set up similar to mine and use smart play lists.

Enjoy

- Phrehdd

 

[Cuthbert]

$50 off Drobo

Just to let people know... I've finally decided to buy a drobo with 2, 1 TB WD green drives. I went to buy them at Buy.com who have a 5% off deal right now. However, I noticed some bad opinions about Buy.com. I therefore went to the Drobo website and then called the company asking them if they price match. They gave me a $50 off coupon code! Which is even more off since the Buy.com coupon maxes out at $15. Sweet baby!

Just so you all know...