Please help me store my data

Dan.Scott1234

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Hi all,

I'm in a bit of a dilemma at the moment and could use some advice.

First off setup is all Mac, Mac Mini server and a few laptops in the house.

Currently the Mac mini has a 750GB firewire drive attached with my file store on. I used to have a second drive that I would sync periodically with the primary drive as an offline spare just incase!

Anyway that secondary drive is now my primary drive as the primary was dying. Now the fan bearing in the secondary is rattling away. I'm a bit sick of external drives breaking down all the time!

So do I go for a NAS? I like the look of the Netgear Readynas Duo the only thing that puts me off is it's maximum capacity of 1TB in raid1 and I'm pretty much there already. All the 4 drive enclosures are very expensive - around £500 which is more than I'd like to spend. Perhaps as HDD capacities increase Netgear may enable support for higher drives but that could be a gamble that doesn't pay off and I'm stuck with a nas that's not big enough...

I could get more USB drives - they never seem to last more than about a year before the enclosures give up which is a rather expensive habit!

I have looked at the Drobo but consider it too expensive and don't like the proprietary nature that will see me locked in or risk losing data.

I don't really need loads of fancy features just good file storage so I can put my iTunes library on (iTunes server feature not needed as I will use iTunes on the Mac Mini which is required so I can use the iPhone remote application) The rest is mainly movies/tv shows that stream to the laptops or xbox (Chipped with XBMC) so nice and easy (He says!)

So what do you all think - I keep changing my mind too much:lease:
 
Last edited:
The questions - why do your drives only last a year?
 
The questions - why do your drives only last a year?

God knows and it's not like they really get a hammering. The drives I have both have exhibited the same problems - mainly with the fans in the enclosures going. They are both the same drives however so it must be a manufacturing thing.

I've been looking at the Seagate (They do a dedicated Mac version) and Western Digital but even then you read the Amazon and other reviews and there are stories of "I'm on my third one in two months" etc that makes me nervous about being in the same situation all over again hence why I though about a nas so I can use internal drives.
 

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