Friday, April 5, 2013

I have seen the light!



I have recently purchased a Synology DS213+. This piece of equipment is nothing short of a marvel of modern technology. It is everything a NAS should be. The interface is AMAZING.

I encourage everyone to try the web interface here:

http://www.synology.com/products/dsm_livedemo.php

It required zero software to configure. The logs are excellent and, more importantly, unencrypted. The built-in backup works flawlessly. The permissions, user groups and sharing is equally good.

Low and behold, I did have a legitimate drive failure. The nas notified me immediately, cut off the drive and continued to run without failure.  I replaced the drive, and it rebuilt flawlessly.

This thing just runs and runs and runs. I have had months of 'UP' time. I was so thoroughly impressed, I purchased two more identical units and installed them at other offices that I manage. And then I bought one more for home to host all the network backups. All 4 have been working flawlessly.

Seeing this makes me wonder why the DROBO insists on being so closed without any form of web interface. I'll never understand.

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10 comments:

  1. TophersApril 6, 2013 at 5:59 PM

    I completely agree. I went though a similar hell with DROBO. I recently purchased a Synology DS1812+ and I couldn't be more happy with it. It just showed me how terrible DROBO really was. The Synology is three times as fast, Open source, built better, performs better, provides more options...simply put it's just better. When I found out the logs on my DROBO were encrypted, a piece of me died inside. I gave the DROBO to my brother to mess with after I labeled it as it should be from the manufacturer. http://imgur.com/jBiQHl9

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  2. Alex the Photo GuyJune 18, 2013 at 8:02 PM

    Just found your blog. Love it.

    Out of the 17 months I have owned mine, it has only worked for 9 months or so. It has also corrupted a 2TB hard drive that was about 10 months old. As soon as tech support figures out how to fix it, I'm going to ebay it IMMEDIATELY. I have asked the tech support guy is he personally wants to buy it for CHEAP. I am awaiting his response.

    Their tech support is responsive but usually filled with "well, is it plugged in?" type of questions. So far I've found the only way for it to work is by owning a second laptop in which to reformat every quarter, thus decreasing its usefulness as an archive. So glad I also backup to the cloud. It takes a lot of the pressure off. #drobo #sucks #balls #hashtag #crashplan #hooraycloud

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  3. UnknownNovember 22, 2013 at 3:14 AM

    May I just paste my conversation (not including phone calls) with Drobo's Tech Support on your blog? Beware it goes on since 10 days...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousNovember 22, 2013 at 10:34 AM

      Yeah, go ahead! I'll even post it on the main blog too.

      Delete
  4. sahrensDecember 2, 2013 at 1:02 PM

    Yes, Drobo support is really awful, except when they tell me they can upgrade my service plan. The problem with Drobo is the data corruption. The errors. sector problems appear to replicate as opposed to other RAID platforms. I nearly lost all of my data because of unreadable sectors. However, I did get my data saved. That's when I took a gamble, an ran "GRC's Spin-rite. Amazing program. Two weeks later, I am back in business. When drobo does finally die, I am going with synology or snap..

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    Replies
    1. UnknownApril 10, 2018 at 7:23 AM

      Dear sahrens: I'm experiencing the same nightmare right now. Could you please share more details about SpinRite (level 2 or 4 scan, mount the disks back...) Thanks!

      Delete
  5. AnonymousJanuary 9, 2014 at 11:15 PM

    Hey I'm considering buying a Drobo 5d and 5N, but after reading all these blogs here, I'm rethinking it. Now I want to buy a Synology DS1513+, but I dont think using web interface is a good idea (security and all). Advice please.

    ReplyDelete
  6. IzzoApril 9, 2014 at 9:48 AM

    I must get my frustration out :). Drobo5N is a worthless product. My Drobo5N run for 5 months. I had to move it to another place and had to shutdown it and that's when all problems started. When I tried to boot it up It never started again. The support sent me a replacement Drobo5N. Just a couple of days after I installed my new Drobo5N, when copying files it rebooted it self and it happen several times. I decided to get help from the support again and did everything they told me to do and I got it up and running for about 2 months. Yesterday it rebooted it self once more and now I can't even access the share or my files anymore, it will not mount the disks. I am very lucky that I have backup on all my data. I can't recommend this product to anyone. A NAS should be a product that you can trust to put your vacation photos and videos of your children growing up, Drobo is not a product to trust.

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  7. UnknownDecember 30, 2014 at 9:38 AM

    drobo is definitely junk...the support is terrible and costly....they only offer 1 year warranty...lol...the software has numerous problems and haven't been fixed(drobo dashboard)...I just got off the phone for the second time I ever had to call support and they denied me service because after 90days I need to buy support. HAHA...ebay here comes a drobo for sale. Other companies offer FASTER products with LONGER warranties and SUPPORT! so costly yet so foolish...I hope drobo fails in the future....their sales would go down if people would listen to other admins that use this in the business world...such as myself.

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  8. J0llyr0gerJanuary 29, 2015 at 9:05 PM

    Drobo sux ballz. I am on my 2nd one, and it mysteriously just locks up. OS X shows it as still connected. But nothing is there. Lights are all on, but no sounds from the unit. Pisses me off. They don't stand behind their product unless you are willing to PAY and PAY.

    ReplyDelete

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