New external drive advice needed – G-Drive

[Shanegrla]

Hi folks,
I’ve reached that dreaded point where one of my drives is filling up and it’s time to get a new one. My iMac has 2 Thunderbolt ports and I was hoping to take advantage of some (hopefully) significantly higher Thunderbolt speeds than my current FW800 drives can offer. I’ve got three G-Drives daisy-chained together right now, so I was thinking I might as well stick with G-Drive since they’ve done pretty well for me so far. (Haven’t had one fail on me yet!)

I want 4 TB so it won’t fill up so quickly this time. It looks like my two choices are the G-Drive w/Thunderbolt or the G-Drive Pro w/Thunderbolt. Both come in a 4 TB option.

G-Drive w/Thunderbolt. It says transfer rates are up to 226 MB/s. It only has one Thunderbolt port, and the other is a USB 3.0 port, which means it might make a faster daisy chain connection to my 2nd drive in the chain (my sample library drive) which also has a USB 3.0 port (along with 2 FW800 ports). Also, it’s significantly cheaper than the Pro.

G-Drive Pro w/Thunderbolt. It’s just about twice as expensive as the other one (which I would be willing to shell out for if it’s the right one for me), but it boasts up to 480 MB/s speeds! Also, it’s got only 2 Thunderbolt ports and nothing else. So daisy-chaining to my sample drive would require going into the FW800 port on that 2nd drive. Significantly slower I would guess. Also, they say this one is RAID. I don’t know anything about RAID, whether I even can or should be using it for an audio drive with Pro Tools. Not sure if I wanna open that can of worms if it’s not necessary.

I’m kinda leaning towards the first one (cheaper one). I guess the main questions are: Do the speeds really make much difference here or are the 480 MB/s speeds just overkill? (Especially since I’m on an Mbox 3 Pro which is only FW800 anyway.) And how does the RAID figure in? I read somewhere that I should avoid RAID (but like I said, I really don’t know anything about it, and that info may have been specific to a completely different situation). Any advice would be much appreciated!

[Darryl Ramm]

Are you trying to start a computer museum? If you want performance why are you looking at HDD and not SSD? Why do you want to by a HDD RAID box like these? they are almost certainly not the way to go.

Get a good SSD for a working drive.

Get a lower performance HDD for archive capacity.

iMac has USB3? Samsung T3 USB SSD are a good affordable choice.

LaCie make various thunderbolt SSD dives from the rugged range up to the Little Big Disk 2 Thunderbolt 2.

If you want high end "Thunderbolt performance" you will only really get that with a PCIe based SSD (like the Little Big Disk 2 Thunderbolt 2). But Thunderbolt 2 is long in the tooth and Apple just is dawdling not shipping Thunderbolt 3 yet which is likely holding up a whole slew of intersting new external SSDs.

Meanwhile PC users can spend a few hundred dollars and buy one of these performance monsters... http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-950-PR.../dp/B01639694M

The Apple closed garden is looking pretty sad and underwatered right now....

Ah and no you can't chain a USB 3 drive to a Thunderbolt drive just because it also has a USB connector. Things don't work that way.

[Shanegrla]

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

If you want performance why are you looking at HDD and not SSD?

See, that's why I was asking. Didn't know if that was an option for me. Wasn't sure if SSDs came in external drives, and if my iMac would be qualified for it. From the research I've been doing, I was seeing SSD drives but a lot of them seemed to be internal drives only.

The LaCie looks like an option, but the spec sheet says it's not as fast - 180 MB/s. Even the cheaper G-Drive says 226 MB/s.

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

Why do you want to by a HDD RAID box like these? they are almost certainly not the way to go.

I didn't know if I should or not. That's why I needed to ask. Are you saying the cheaper G-Drive is RAID also? Because according to their product guide it's not.

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

iMac has USB3?

No, the G-Drive has a USB3 port. That's why I was considering going Thunderbolt from the iMac into the G-Drive and then USB3 going out of the G-Drive to the next G-Drive. But, you're saying that won't work(?), so that changes things now considerably. Now I think I'm even more screwed.

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

Ah and no you can't chain a USB 3 drive to a Thunderbolt drive just because it also has a USB connector. Things don't work that way.

I had no idea you couldn't daisy-chain USB3 drives. I thought that, like with a Thunderbolt to FW adapter, you might be able to daisy-chain them but it would just go at the slower speed of the slower cable.

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by Shanegrla

See, that's why I was asking. Didn't know if that was an option for me. Wasn't sure if SSDs came in external drives, and if my iMac would be qualified for it. From the research I've been doing, I was seeing SSD drives but a lot of them seemed to be internal drives only.

I'm not sure what you mean by "qualified". Nobody involved with the Pro Tools ecosystem including Avid "qualifies" any particular consumer storage device at all, and certainly not with any particular computer. Any SSD drive that has USB that is compatible with your USB (you only have USB2? A USB3 drive would work but run painfully slowly) and any Thunderbolt SSD drive will work on your Mac. All for some reasonable definition of "work". The next question is how well they perform/work and wether they are bootable. That is why I'm pointing you at particular brands/models/products.

The LaCie looks like an option, but the spec sheet says it's not as fast - 180 MB/s. Even the cheaper G-Drive says 226 MB/s.

I cannot guess what exact model Lacie drive you are looking at but at that performance you are clearly looking at a model with a HDD in it not an SSD. http://www.lacie.com/products/mobile...ed-thunderbolt... see the "SSD" labels...

I didn't know if I should or not. That's why I needed to ask. Are you saying the cheaper G-Drive is RAID also? Because according to their product guide it's not.

The cheaper one is just a slow old HDD. Not that intersting. The "faster" one is just RAID using slow old HDD, and the "fast as SSD" marketing is just ******** marketing desperation from a hard drive vendor severely lagging in the SSD product space. But not given that Western Digital owns both G-Technology and SanDisk I expect that to change. Avoid RAID, although in this case you could just use the drives as JBOD if you really wanted a pretty aluminum box full of slow old HDD. G-Technology do make nice products, I have lots of their old HDD external drives, and still use the for backup devices, and I would buy more for that. But the world has moved on if you want high performance...

No, the G-Drive has a USB3 port. That's why I was considering going Thunderbolt from the iMac into the G-Drive and then USB3 going out of the G-Drive to the next G-Drive. But, you're saying that won't work(?), so that changes things now considerably.

That absolutely won't work. The drive is usable as either Thunderbolt *or* usb. You can chain Thunderbolt devices (if they have multiple ports) but not USB. There are *are* various Thunderbolt to USB adapters and docks, but these drives and other drives do not do that.

You talked about wanting fast and big. And that's somewhat a contradiction, well it depends on your budget. Which we have no idea of. If you want Thunderbolt and high performance then Lacie Little Big Disk 2 Thunderbolt 2 is a good choice, but getting long in the tooth. Or look at Samsung M.2 (esp. SM951 drives if you need it bootable) in an external PCIe enclosure if you want to play building something. More moderate performance is available from any number of SATA SSD drives in external encloses. Prebuilt like this one.. (http://www.lacie.com/products/mobile...ed-thunderbolt... see the "SSD" labels). Or a Samsung 850 Pro or Evo packaged yourself in a Thunderbolt tray or dock (e.g. Nice dock: http://www.sonnettech.com/product/ec...rboltdock.html).

Given the performance available at great price on modern M.2 SSD drives it's just sad to think about how crippled the Apple Thunderbolt/storage ecosystem is.

Also you say you do not have USB 3? A late 2012 iMac *does* have USB 3. So if you are just after SATA SSA type disk performance and some capacity and on a budget then, again, look at the T3 I pointed you at before.... http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01AVF6UHK/...ing=UTF8&psc=1 It's a well regarded Samsung 850 Evo SATA III drive inside that enclosure. Available up to 2TB. Nice portable, robust, and much faster than what you have now. if needed archive/move stuff to HDD as you finish with it. Buying a more expensive Thunderbolt SSD if it's only a SATA drive inside won't provide much increase in performance.

[Shanegrla]

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

I'm not sure what you mean by "qualified". Nobody involved with the Pro Tools ecosystem including Avid "qualifies" any particular consumer storage device at all, and certainly not with any particular computer. Any SSD drive that has USB that is compatible with your USB (you only have USB2? A USB3 drive would work but run painfully slowly) and any Thunderbolt SSD drive will work on your Mac. All for some reasonable definition of "work". The next question is how well they perform/work and wether they are bootable. That is why I'm pointing you at particular brands/models/products.

OK that's all pretty useful. Thanks.

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

I cannot guess what exact model Lacie drive you are looking at but at that performance you are clearly looking at a model with a HDD in it not an SSD. http://www.lacie.com/products/mobile...ed-thunderbolt... see the "SSD" labels...

Yes, i was definitely looking at another one. I think I googled Little Big Disk 2 Thunderbolt 2 and accidentally clicked on the "d2" instead, which also showed up in the search results. Regarding this on in your link, it looks cool, but it doesn't look like I can daisy-chain it. It just has one TB port and one USB3. Also, the SSD 1 TB ver. I noticed was $849, which is the same price as the G-Drive Pro. I do have that kind of budget that I'm willing to pay for if it's the right fit. But I DO need to be able to daisy-chain it to my sample drive, so that could be a deal breaker.

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

Avoid RAID, although in this case you could just use the drives as JBOD.

Is JBOD an actual setting found in Disk Utility? Or is that kind of just a slang term for something else? Is it a term used for using RAID drives as not RAID or something? (Like I said, I don't really know anything about RAID.)

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

Also you say you do not have USB 3? A late 2012 iMac *does* have USB 3.

Hmm, I don't know. I was looking at the specs in the system report and I'm pretty sure it said USB2.0. I'll have to double check just to be sure.

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

So if you are just after SATA SSA type disk performance and some capacity and on a budget then, again, look at the T3 I pointed you at before.... http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01AVF6UHK/...ing=UTF8&psc=1 It's a well regarded Samsung 850 Evo SATA III drive inside that enclosure. Available up to 2TB. Nice portable, robust, and much faster than what you have now. if needed archive/move stuff to HDD as you finish with it. Buying a more expensive Thunderbolt SSD if it's only a SATA drive inside won't provide much increase in performance.

That looks pretty nice! But again, I need to be able to daisy-chain it to the next drive. Also, I see it talks about "sequential read/write speeds" that it has. Is that the same thing as the "transfer speeds" that some of the other drives talk about?
Thanks for the help BTW.

[Shanegrla]

Oh, and another relevant question is: Is all this talk of speed and performance kind of useless if I still have just a FW800 interface (Mbox 3 Pro)? So does the FW bottleneck any speed advantages anyway that some of these faster drives are advertising? (Kinda like with how Pro Tools when it was still 32 bit, any RAM over 4 GB was pretty much wasted?)

[Darryl Ramm]

C'mon you can Google most of these and anwer questions yourself. Find stuff on a vendor's web site and read their specs.

Lacie Little Big Disk 2 (LBD2) can daisy chain, it has two Thunderbolt 2 ports. I'm not going to insult you intelligence by providing a link to Lacie's product page that describes all that very clearly.

LBD2 and all other Thunderbolt 2 storage devices are now long in the tooth and hopefully about to be replaced by Thunderbolt 3 devices. The LBD2 appears to being discontinued and I expect a new version will appear soon. But if you need high performance (better than SATA) *now* in a pre-packaged solution then it is likely the device to buy.

What is "your sample drive" exactly? With exactly what connections? If its Firewire you connect it to a Firewire bus/adapter. If its USB you can't daisy chain it. Connect it to the iMac USB ports or use a USB hub if really needed (well put other slow peripherals on a USB hub).

You can google JBOD and find what it means right? Software RAID (what the G-Tech uses) vs. leaving the drives in JBOD is set up in OS X disk utility.

You can also Google you exact Mac model and find out what it has. System Profiler will report USB 2 and USB 3 devices on a iMac with "USB3" ports.

Again since you seem to be struggling so let me make it easy for you... A late 2012 iMac *does* have USB 3. So if you are just after SATA SSD type disk performance and some capacity and on a budget then, again, look at the T3 I pointed you at before....

Disk performance itself always helps, independent of what you are driving the interface over. And getting Firewire disks off the same Firewire bus as an interface is always a good idea. It is not clear if you are doing that today or not. There is really no reason for most DAW users to buy a HDD when they could be using a much faster SSD (faster access times and sequential bandwidth, access times are what cause many DAW issues).

[Shanegrla]

Sorry, I know I'm being a pain. It's just that I did google a lot of this stuff and found that the more I was looking into this stuff, the more I realized I didn't know. And with so many different choices and technologies it just got more and more confusing really fast. A lot of these blogs & wikis don't necessarily explain this stuff in simple layman english so it sometimes helps to have it spelled out by someone who knows their stuff. Again, thanks for taking all your time here.

Anyway, I've decided yes you're definitely right. I need to get an SSD. I just have to bite the bullet and not worry about a large 4 TB size and just do a lot more archiving to make room as needed. (Should be a lot faster anyway than it is now with the FW800.) The only question I gotta figure out now is whether to go with the LBD2 or the Samsung T3.

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

What is "your sample drive" exactly? With exactly what connections?

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

Disk performance itself always helps, independent of what you are driving the interface over. And getting Firewire disks off the same Firewire bus as an interface is always a good idea. It is not clear if you are doing that today or not. There is really no reason for most DAW users to buy a HDD when they could be using a much faster SSD (faster access times and sequential bandwidth, access times are what cause many DAW issues).

So right now I'm daisy-chaining my "sample" drive (Kontakt library etc.) right behind the audio drive. They both have 2 FW800 ports. (And the audio drive also has a USB3 port, which is not being used.) So it goes like this: The iMac has the two TB ports (pretty sure it's only TB1). Out of one port (via a FW800 adapter) I'm going to the Mbox (which I just realized is still FW400, jeez!) with a FW400 to 800 cable. Out of the other (also via FW800 adapter) I'm going out to my daisy-chained drives.

So now that I know the USB3.0 is an option (going from my USB ports), I just have to decide whether to go that way (with the T3) or go with the original plan with Thunderbolt (LBD2). I just have to figure out whether I really can afford that one or not. I'm not so worried about it getting "long in the tooth" because, as mentioned, pretty sure my computer still is only TB1 anyway. So even with the LBD2 being TB2, I'm not able to take advantage of those speeds anyway.

Thanks again for your help. I think I can figure something out from here.