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Tinman,
Yes, the external units with multiple drives can be shut down just like any other hard drive. It's best to "park" or "eject" them before turning them off, but I've never had a problem and have been using the LaCie for several years.
It depends a little on what kind of RAID you set up. My LaCie is set up so parts of each file is written to two different drives (A & B), then those two drives are backed up by two other drives (C & D). The unit has 4 drives in all. If one drive fails (say A), a red light comes on to warn you. You pull it out and replace it with an empty drive and C drive then copies everything to it. You then send in the bad drive for repair so it's ready if/when another drive goes out.
The Drobo is similar but different. It's a little cheaper, and it's nice in that it'll work with any size drives -- they don't have to match each other. It's pretty new to me so it's a bit early for me to praise it, but it's quiet and seems to work fine. It does take a few seconds when I first try to open an image from it -- like it must awaken from its sleep mode.
The fan in the LaCie that I have is quite noisy. Otherwise it's a good unit.
I'm not sure what you mean by "If the drive can be used in the future what time frame are we talking...and what care should be used on the storage."
They're just hard drives, no different than those built into your computer tower except that there's an extra for backup. You see the files on them just like on any other hard drive.
Mine are not set up for emergency back up, as I don't have a battery. (Well, I do, but it's not working.)
I use a couple of Seagate 1TB external drives that I keep in sync with Synctoy. A RAID setup would be even better, and I'll get around to that some day as well. They speed up file reading, right?
Multiple hard-drives are great. However, they don't protect you from theft, fire or other disaster. So really you still also need off-site storage, or an on-line backup scheme if you really want to be safe.
Tinman,
Yes, the external units with multiple drives can be shut down just like any other hard drive. It's best to "park" or "eject" them before turning them off, but I've never had a problem and have been using the LaCie for several years.
It depends a little on what kind of RAID you set up. My LaCie is set up so parts of each file is written to two different drives (A & B), then those two drives are backed up by two other drives (C & D). The unit has 4 drives in all. If one drive fails (say A), a red light comes on to warn you. You pull it out and replace it with an empty drive and C drive then copies everything to it. You then send in the bad drive for repair so it's ready if/when another drive goes out.
The Drobo is similar but different. It's a little cheaper, and it's nice in that it'll work with any size drives -- they don't have to match each other. It's pretty new to me so it's a bit early for me to praise it, but it's quiet and seems to work fine. It does take a few seconds when I first try to open an image from it -- like it must awaken from its sleep mode.
The fan in the LaCie that I have is quite noisy. Otherwise it's a good unit.
I'm not sure what you mean by "If the drive can be used in the future what time frame are we talking...and what care should be used on the storage."
They're just hard drives, no different than those built into your computer tower except that there's an extra for backup. You see the files on them just like on any other hard drive.
Mine are not set up for emergency back up, as I don't have a battery. (Well, I do, but it's not working.)
I'm not sure what you mean by "If the drive can be used in the future what time frame are we talking...and what care should be used on the storage."
If you had data on the drive, say 500 images can that be stored off power with out and problem..like a mega DVD or Blu-Ray disc. Or does the information on the hard drive degrade after a period of time?
Location: Splitting time between Dayton, NJ and Needmore, PA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Tinman313
I'm not sure what you mean by "If the drive can be used in the future what time frame are we talking...and what care should be used on the storage."
If you had data on the drive, say 500 images can that be stored off power with out and problem..like a mega DVD or Blu-Ray disc. Or does the information on the hard drive degrade after a period of time?
Had the same question as WyoNews.
The platters that make up a HDD will degrade over time. The bigger issue will be the electronics that make up the rest of the drive. I've had some drives that can sit around with data on them for upwards of 15 years (One was from an early Packard Bell 286 that was sitting in a storage closet. I was able to find the ribbons I needed and it worked. Actually found some old files on it I could still use. ) Then there are others that just stop working. If a drive does stop, you can go the route of sending them out to a company like OnTrack Data Recovery, but it will cost you.
Like kdog mentioned, nothing beats having an off-site storage option, especially if you are a semi-pro or pro.
FWIW, I use Macs and use Time Machine with a third-party external drive from Other World Computing. My off-site storage is handled from SmugMug.
I don't pull drives and store them. In the case of the one mentioned above, I actually had 86'ed the box, but kept the drive with the intent of pulverizing it. I wound up moving to a new home before I could and placed the disk in with other important archive files.
The platters that make up a HDD will degrade over time. The bigger issue will be the electronics that make up the rest of the drive. I've had some drives that can sit around with data on them for upwards of 15 years (One was from an early Packard Bell 286 that was sitting in a storage closet. I was able to find the ribbons I needed and it worked. Actually found some old files on it I could still use. ) Then there are others that just stop working. If a drive does stop, you can go the route of sending them out to a company like OnTrack Data Recovery, but it will cost you.
Like kdog mentioned, nothing beats having an off-site storage option, especially if you are a semi-pro or pro.
FWIW, I use Macs and use Time Machine with a third-party external drive from Other World Computing. My off-site storage is handled from SmugMug.
I don't pull drives and store them. In the case of the one mentioned above, I actually had 86'ed the box, but kept the drive with the intent of pulverizing it. I wound up moving to a new home before I could and placed the disk in with other important archive files.
Thanks
I'm just an ole man looking into getting a bigger system for doing my hobby of photography that has been sitting on the back burner for over 30 years. Not over kill... Just a home system and looking in to all sorts of items . Storage for one.. the off site you pay or free some what concern me. What if their systems crashes or they just go out of business.. I have heard they can be very expensive.. I like this multiple hard drive systems.. that's why I was curious on how long the data on the drive will stay viable once the drive has been removed from the system off power.. I know that has to been some sort of magnetic substrate on the hard drive.. or is it etched into the surface of the drive like a ole record.. like those round black things we had 40 years ago..
Well, the way hard drives have been getting bigger, ever since my first 20 megabyte hard drive 25 years ago, I usually drag the old files to new, bigger hard drives when I get them. I don't know that I have any files quite that old, but I know I have some that are 20 years old.
So no, it's not etched in like an lp record; it's magnetic I guess. That stuff is way over my head, but it should last for several years if it's not subjected to heat, dust, magnets, etc. I think "they" say it'll last on hard drives longer than it will on CDs/DVDs.
Big hard drives are very cheap these days. I think when I got my Drobo a couple months ago, the salesman said the cheapest (per gb) drives were 500gb or 1tb now.
And yeah, I remember the old black things from 40 years ago -- those music album things you bought if you didn't have a new 8-track player.
Storage for one.. the off site you pay or free some what concern me. What if their systems crashes or they just go out of business.. I have heard they can be very expensive..
I've heard some of them are fairly reasonable, although I haven't implemented one myself yet. I really need to. I'm not a pro, although I have some shots I sell and others that I'd hate to lose.
Regarding them going away, that's exactly the point of a redundant system of hard drives plus on-line storage. That way you're always guaranteed at least one safe version of the files.
I use Smugmug for hosting my photos as JPGs. I always shoot RAW, so it never occurred to me to use them as off-line storage. I'm not sure Smuggie actually accepts RAWs, although maybe they do. FWIW, I do happen to know that none of the management of Smugmug uses Smugmug itself to archive their own files; they use other archive services. Smugmug itself is archived on Amazon S3, and they co-brand an archive service with them. But I think it's expensive.
Most of these online archive services have you download and install a piece of software on your system that mirrors selected hard drives up to their site. So your stuff is continually being archived with no manual intervention. That's great for lazy meatheads like me.
Location: Splitting time between Dayton, NJ and Needmore, PA
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You're welcome, Tinman.
Today's drives actually have a "read/write head" that is actually a tiny magnet which "moves" the magnetic surface as it passes over it to "write" the data.
Your concern about the free services "just shutting down" is a legitimate one. But even with some of the pay sites, there have been a couple in recent years that didn't even tell their paying subscribers they were shutting down. The Digital Railroad debacle (http://www.nppa.org/news_and_events/news/2008/10/digitalrailroad.html - broken link) comes to mind. As kdog noted, the well-thought-out redundancy system is what saves you in those instances, for the most part.
BTW, kdog, you're right. SmugVault is pricey. That's one of the reasons I won't bother with it.
Well, the way hard drives have been getting bigger, ever since my first 20 megabyte hard drive 25 years ago, I usually drag the old files to new, bigger hard drives when I get them. I don't know that I have any files quite that old, but I know I have some that are 20 years old.
So no, it's not etched in like an lp record; it's magnetic I guess. That stuff is way over my head, but it should last for several years if it's not subjected to heat, dust, magnets, etc. I think "they" say it'll last on hard drives longer than it will on CDs/DVDs.
Big hard drives are very cheap these days. I think when I got my Drobo a couple months ago, the salesman said the cheapest (per gb) drives were 500gb or 1tb now.
And yeah, I remember the old black things from 40 years ago -- those music album things you bought if you didn't have a new 8-track player.
LOL I can guarantee theirs a whole bunch of people scratching their heads on what's a " 8 Track " ...
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) Then there are others that just stop working. If a drive does stop, you can go the route of sending them out to a company like 
