[SOLVED] 3x 3TB HDDs, RAID 0 for two and final one backup drive?

samborambo56

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I got given 3x 3TB HDDs from work the other day and I'm plugging them into my system this afternoon - I was wondering if it is possible to run two of the disks in RAID 0 for better performance while editing video - and then have the remaining 3tb as a backup drive?
If its possible does anyone have any suggestions on how best to go about it?

Thanks in advance
Sam
 
Solution
Raid0 is preferred for editing.
Raid5 has awful write speed and only has a 1 disk fault tolerance. Raid6 has 2 drives.

I would suggest getting a dock or enclosure for the backup drive. Ideally you want the backup drive to be unpowered and disconnected from everything when not running a backup.

I have two of these, no problems with either one for almost 2 yrs now and one is running a 2tb 7200rpm drive on a Xbox1 quite often
https://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-External-Lay-Flat-Docking-EC-DFFN/dp/B013WODZH0
I know people will yell, and i know raid is not a backup solution but you would be better off running the 3 drives in a raid 5 for storage and then buy a SSD to work off of.

You will get better speed off the ssd for working and raid 5 will give you up to 2 failed drives before you loose everything.

But like i said you still need a true backup solution (IF) the work is important to you. Veeam makes a free solution, i use the paid version at work for my servers, and i believe Macrium reflect has one as well but i have never used it.
 

samborambo56

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I know people will yell, and i know raid is not a backup solution but you would be better off running the 3 drives in a raid 5 for storage and then buy a SSD to work off of.

You will get better speed off the ssd for working and raid 5 will give you up to 2 failed drives before you loose everything.

But like i said you still need a true backup solution (IF) the work is important to you. Veeam makes a free solution, i use the paid version at work for my servers, and i believe Macrium reflect has one as well but i have never used it.

Unfortunately I'm not as well off kit wise as my work is so a large SSD working drive is a couple of months off - would a RAID 0 configuration actually be worth it for video editing? I can manually back up my RAID 0 config onto the remaining 3tb drive if I have to (I can do that, can't I?)
 
in short yes you can run raid 0 with a 3TB backup

Downsides and just something to keep in mind
raid 0 2x3TB is 6TB
1 3TB backup will not store 6TB of data

Raid 0 2x3TB if you loose ether drive you loose the raid
1 3TB backup, if it fails you loose all your backups.

Raid 0 2x3TB if this is only scratch drive with no storage
1 3TB backup if lost you loose everything.


On a side note, do you know any history of these drives? How long were they in service and what work load they were doing?
 

popatim

Titan
Moderator
Raid0 is preferred for editing.
Raid5 has awful write speed and only has a 1 disk fault tolerance. Raid6 has 2 drives.

I would suggest getting a dock or enclosure for the backup drive. Ideally you want the backup drive to be unpowered and disconnected from everything when not running a backup.

I have two of these, no problems with either one for almost 2 yrs now and one is running a 2tb 7200rpm drive on a Xbox1 quite often
https://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-External-Lay-Flat-Docking-EC-DFFN/dp/B013WODZH0
 
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samborambo56

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Nov 9, 2013
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in short yes you can run raid 0 with a 3TB backup

Downsides and just something to keep in mind
raid 0 2x3TB is 6TB
1 3TB backup will not store 6TB of data

Raid 0 2x3TB if you loose ether drive you loose the raid
1 3TB backup, if it fails you loose all your backups.

Raid 0 2x3TB if this is only scratch drive with no storage
1 3TB backup if lost you loose everything.


On a side note, do you know any history of these drives? How long were they in service and what work load they were doing?

Oh! see I thought by making a RAID 0 config I would be getting 3TB of useable storage from my 2x 3TB drives.
Surely for home use, having one backup drive that I duplicate straight away if the RAID fails or if the backup fails I duplicate the RAID 0 would be OK? These are just personal video projects I'm working on rather than stuff for a client.
The history of these drives was just as backup drives for our LaCie multi hard drive enclosure at work. The main array will contain drives that are put under a lot of stress for sure as we edit video off of them. I forget which RAID config our main drive is in but its damn fast for just a load of 12TB 7200rpm drives.
These drives have only ever been used in the backup enclosure. They probably were being used for 1-2 years max before we had to upgrade everything.

I ran a speed test on these drives and they seem to be on the faster side (160mb/s)?