What raid setup for editing….

[legrevedotcom]

I want to throw money at a raid setup.
It doesn't have to be too large, because I'm not producing motion pictures.

Basically I need a thunderbolt setup so I can use it on both my laptop but also an iMac or Mac Pro.

Are the any of you who have invested in something similar lately and have some insights to share?

Additional question… would a MBP 2011 2.2 with it's 4 cores and 16gb ram really be able to utilize an external raid setup or will the processors bottleneck the idea? I have an SSD as main drive...

Oh… and this is solely for ongoing editing. I wont be using it as a storage device.

 

[David W. Jones]

I am still using that inexpensive setup I started with. 3 x 3TB Seagate Backup Plus Desktop Thunderbolt drives in a 9TB RAID 0 configuration.

Here is the performance data…

 

[hotchkiss]

I just put a Pegasus J4 together for use with a Mac Mini. Two 480gb SSD's in Raid 0 and a 1.5 GB 5400 drive for backup.

Like you, it is primarily for current projects rather than storage. That being said, it will be some time before I need to offload some of the current projects to a storage drive. It's compact, has an onboard backup drive and is somewhat scale-able. Oh, and quite fast... .

I'm a happy camper.

 

[ddixon]

I've been using this unit for a few months and it's been flawless. I got it empty and added my own drives, but they also have options with drives already installed:

http://www.amazon.com/DataTale-RS-M...losure/dp/B00CC0VRQC/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top

 

[Matthew Smith]

I am still using that inexpensive setup I started with. 3 x 3TB Seagate Backup Plus Desktop Thunderbolt drives in a 9TB RAID 0 configuration.

Here is the performance data…

Hi David,

just wondering if you could go into a bit more detail on how you set it up. I'm on an imac and want to set up a raid similar to yours, just wondering how you did it (I have the newest imac), thanks

 

[David W. Jones]

Just connect the drives via TB cables, then format the drives together as a raid.

 

[Tim Nitsch]

My setup is a OWC Mercury 6TB array formatted to RAID 5 for the main drive and a G-Tech 6TB formatted to RAID 0 for the backup. Unfortunately for me my bottle neck is my connection. I was using eSata but issues with Sonnets Express34 to eSata card and OS Mavericks has forced me to run FireWire 800.

@David
My fear with running a setup like the one you have especially in RAID 0 is that if one on the three drives goes down your kinda screwed. (unless of course you have a backup for the RAID 0 array)

 

[David W. Jones]

I backup often.

FWIW, I also have an older OWC Mercury 8TB set to raid 5, and had 2 drives go south at once.