Just installed 2TB My Book Mirror (RAID-1) on 722k

[gadgtfreek]

Its set to Raid 1, so everything is backed up to the second drive. I was wondering, should I set it to Raid 0 and let the 722k format BOTH drives, or is that not necessary?

Just want to make sure my shows are backed up properly.

Thanks.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Couple of pics

 

[Lord_Vader]

No. It should have formatted both at the same time. The controllers mirror the drives and do both actions at the same time.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Ah, ok. I dont know much about the RAID tech, and was wondering if it would auto format the 2nd drive. This is cool stuff.

So when I transfer over shows, its putting them on both drives simultaneously?

Is the only way to tell if your "main" drive has failed is to hook it up to a PC and run the WD software?

 

[Pepper]

The only use for RAID-0 is when you need a lot of space, and you don't care about losing it if there's a failure.

RAID-1 is definitely the better option if safety of data is your concern.

As Lord_Vader said, when you have a RAID-1 array, whatever is accessing it just sees it as a single drive, it's up to the controller to keep everything synchronized. RAID-1 if done properly has two distinct advantages:
- simultaneous writes to both members (there is no "main" and "spare" - both have an equal role)
- quicker read access because it can pull stuff off of both drives more quickly than sequential access to just one.

I'm not familiar with this particular model, you should be able to connect it to a pc and run their software without endangering the proprietary format of the partitions though.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Thanks. The WD SW has a diagnostic, and the drives are easily swappable (without tools). I assume if one fails, I just buy another and its plug and play.

 

[whatchel1]

Keep us informed

I didn't think a RAID would work on the E* DVR's but if it does then there will be a back up safety factor here.

 

[Kirby Baker]

I didnt think Raid played nicely with them either. Wonder if it would work in Raid 0 to use all 2TB of its space. The 722k cant do a USB hub like the 922 can right? (at least I thought the 922 could).

 

[bookworm370]

I depends if it's a hardware or software raid implementation. WD implemented a hardware raid drive and the raid electronics are all in the case. So the DVR has no clue what-so-ever that it's a raid array. Software raid would definitely not work unless E* let you load the drivers into their Linux software.

That's why hardware implementations work very well. Whatever it is has no idea what's over the wall. It just asks for data and gets it! The same for the spin-down option. WD implemented a spoofing delay mechanism to just delay the read until the drive spins up. The DVR just thinks the 1st read after a while is taking a little longer. The Seagates report back a status that says I'm spinning up, which is fine if you have the drivers loaded that understand the status (the process can go do something else) but doesn't work well if you have a preprogrammed process controller (like the DVR) that you can't load drivers to.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Transfered 21 gigs over to the RAID device and all went well.

Just brought it outta sleep and started watching a show with no problem.

Worm is right, these WD's are hardware based RAID.

Starts up a tad slower than the 1TB My Book I had.

 

[navychop]

Thanks. The WD SW has a diagnostic, and the drives are easily swappable (without tools). I assume if one fails, I just buy another and its plug and play.

Hmmmm. This opens up a can of worms:
-How would you know a drive failed while in use with a DVR?
-How would you know WHICH of the 2 drives failed?
-How would you know if you kept getting errors on one drive where the system had to repeatedly reimage. ie- warning that one was about to go.

WD software would be nice- but it's not Windows, and it's not connected to a PC. Is there a light on the unit that tells you there's trouble?

 

[gadgtfreek]

Its supposed to flash its light in a certain way if one drive is failing and it moves over to the backup. You then pull the bad drive (A or B), and it reimages the new drive.

I plan on connecting it to my laptop once per month to run the quick diagnostic on it.

When you connect it to a pc, the diagnostics will tell you which drive is actually bad.

 

[navychop]

You can run Windows diags on a Linux formatted drive?

 

[gadgtfreek]

Hmmmm, good question. Will try now.

 

[gadgtfreek]

I connected it to my laptop, and it was recognized.

I was able to load WD Data Life Guard Program

I was able to run the SMART test on both drive A and B.

So yes, you can check it out.

This will prob be what I do monthly since its so easy.

 

[navychop]

And when you moved it back to use as an EHD, everything was still recognized?

Yep, I'm a pessimist!

 

[bebop]

And when you moved it back to use as an EHD, everything was still recognized?

Yep, I'm a pessimist!

Same here. We just need a confirmation elwaylite. Thanks for sharing on your success thus far. Seems like a great simple solution. How much was it?

 

[gadgtfreek]

Ok, here are some pics!

Shot of the utility screen and it showing capacity and info of A & B

Shot of choosing which one to test SMART

Shot of it testing

Shot of how fat this drive is

You can look at results for both drives

When I plugged it back up

Now working

 

[gadgtfreek]

This drive was $229 at Amazon.

It goes to sleep and spins down in about 10 minutes, then takes about 10 seconds or so to wake back up.

 

[stardust3]

Glad you have your new EHD going. :up Just thinking out loud, but if dish would offer or have some kind of online upload service to backup recordings in case of receiver failure & include it with the price of dhpp. I would sign up today.