Comments on: Drobo, my experience so far.

By: Patrick

Patrick — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 04:29:31 +0000

I am reading this blog in late August of 2011. To Mario’s point, Drobo has been helping me to guard my data, hence my client’s data for 4 years. I was impressed when I first purchased my Drobo that was talking to a live person when I called who was personable and smart. I was also impressed and confident that I could invest in a system I could indefinitely update. I was really appalled to read that they were ending support for my first generation unit well before it could ever live up to storing the 16TB as promised. And to hear that I may possibly have trouble moving my data to a new unit is even more disturbing. What’s the story? At this moment, my Drobo is relaying out the data from a 4TB config to a 5TB config and it says that it will take 85 hours. This is like bombing someone with a 100 mb email. Seriously, the Videos show a different experience of disk swapping. I can’t imagine that those disks weren’t optimized to behave in that way. Perhaps there is a class action to start on this. If I lose data in this process, I will have a lot more emails/blogs to write.

By: Mario

Mario — Tue, 24 May 2011 21:38:26 +0000

Hello, my name is Mario, I work for Drobo. This is a great article; we appreciate anything that is fair and balanced, and always like seeing detailed analysis and opinions. For anyone who might come across this review in 2011, there are a few points to confirm:

- Drobo offers free access to software updates on our web site @ http://www.drobo.com/support/updates.php
- Drobo forums are open to anyone @ http://www.drobospace.com/forums/
- DroboCare is a low-cost investment for extended peace of mind beyond the standard warranty, including 24/7 access to telephone support as well as expedited same-day replacement shipping for next day delivery (available in US and select European countries), details @ http://www.drobo.com/support/drobocare.php

Drobo packs sophisticated storage virtualization and protection into an ultra easy-to-use package, with >150,000 customers (as of February 2011) using Drobo to protect their valuable digital assets. Drobo products and support continue to improve, and and the family of products continues to grow. With 3TB drives, it is possible to keep massive amounts of data in a protected location for efficient access. Thanks!

By: Josh

Josh — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 19:29:18 +0000

OH and GREAT ARTICLE thanks so much for writing this!

By: Josh

Josh — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 19:28:45 +0000

Hey you guys,

Any body purchase the Drobo S. I really wanna buy it but I’m still on the fence. At the moment I’ve got a macbook pro and the idea of putting it in standby all the time kinda stinks. Does anyone know what changes have been implemented.
Thanks!

By: Mark

Mark — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 06:55:29 +0000

I have a Drobo, but only use it to archive photos. I also have numerous other ext. drives that I use for archival purposes. I bought an “American Dj” model pc-100A that I plug all my ext. drives into that allows me to switch on or off any one drive at a time. It’s rack mountable with 8 rocker switches on the front. I don’t have to mess with unplugging or plugging in Ext. HD to turn them on or off. I leave the usb/firewire plugged into the computer. The unit is very inexpensive, around $30. Hope that helps.

By: Aaron Beaucher

Aaron Beaucher — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 14:49:12 +0000

While I love this device and have had no issues with it for almost 2 years now my biggest complaint is that it doesn’t have a power switch on it. Sure it is great that it automatically starts up and shuts down with my PC but not at the cost of that boot up taking several minutes as opposed to seconds. My only solution has been to disconnect the power once I shut down and then reconnect it after a quick boot up if I know I am going to need access to the device.

By: Brian Dusablon

Brian Dusablon — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 22:42:54 +0000

Thanks for the article and continuous updates. They help tremendously. I have a Drobo v2, and, while still working on the perfect setup, I’m giving it a 6 out of 10. I had mine replaced due to a faulty power supply. Second one is okay, but sometimes has a nasty hum/vibration that eats at my brain.

By: peter

peter — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:36:59 +0000

good post bram consdiering the topic top league..

as my 2nd gen [4 bay] drobo showed the drivers were faulty
I’ll have to reformat probably and just as I transfered 100 gigabyte of music files the 60 gigabyte of movies is troubling me as I’ve deleted the movie folder contents how do I get
hold of the itunes list

otherwise I am loving the product just hope I can move to the next phase

By: Bramus!

Bramus! — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 16:27:13 +0000

Hi Jeff, the rebuild indeed was 27 hours. During the process I could use my Drobo, but at a reduced speed.
When I got the faulty drive repaired I popped it back in after which the Drobo recognized it without any problems and increased my free space.

Regarding the Drobo v3: DRI has released the DroboPro recently. I’ve read reports that it can perform rather good, but it’s still flaky (as mentioned in the updates). Don’t know if they are making a Drobo v3 though, it only was a speculation of mine. Have you gotten a link with info about that?

Regards,
B!

By: Jeff

Jeff — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 15:55:51 +0000

Hi, nice article. I am a future drobo owner trying to balance the positive and negetive benefits of the device. With all the technolgy out there it seems silly that a company, like DRI, cannot build a solid attached starage device capable of housing 4-drives, and giving you the sense of security and speed needed when a user is accessing up to 6TB of data. I wish they would release a Drobo v3 that would incorporate all the the user flaws to date. I have heard that one is in development, but with beta testing we probably will not see it for another 6 months. So, this last weekend I purchased a v2 from Amazon and will see how it performs.

How did your rebuild go after your drive failed? Was it a true 27 hours?