http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/ Engadget Comments for Data Robotics announces second-gen Drobo with FireWire 800 http://www.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2009 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/Jul 8th 2008 8:48AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/

woot

1st post]]>Jul 8th 2008 9:07AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/Jul 8th 2008 9:21AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/Jul 8th 2008 9:47AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
someone got there before me!]]>Jul 8th 2008 9:10AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
What a letdown.

Bring on third-gen then...]]>Jul 8th 2008 10:09AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/Jul 9th 2008 12:15AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/Jul 8th 2008 10:20AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
Put a gigabit ethernet jack in it or GTFO...]]>Jul 8th 2008 11:00AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
Where's the eSATA, Drobo? USB and FireWire are so early 2000s. This is 2008 for crying out loud. ;-)

Like Bellerophon, I think I'll wait for the 3rd gen device, or just stick with other, less expensive RAID solutions.]]>Jul 8th 2008 10:50AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
Fuckin' finally.

Oh, and thank you Data Robotics. :)]]>Jul 8th 2008 10:51AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/Jul 8th 2008 10:56AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
Oh well, so it goes with technology I guess.]]>Jul 8th 2008 12:31PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
but Firewire 800 is great news.

better news would be dropping the MSRP down to $299.

i might just pick up on eof the first gen models (if i weren't going to drop $600 on 2 new iphones this week, i already would have bought one)

...$500 for an EMPTY drobo still seems pretty steep to me, especially considering ZFS raid will be in 10.6.....]]>Jul 8th 2008 12:33PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
The transfer speeds were always good enough for me but I'll be upgrading just because it's supposed to be quieter - that's reason enough for me.]]>Jul 8th 2008 12:43PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
....And 54 MB/s on FireWire 800!?!?! WTF? Back in 2004 I bought a simple single external hard drives that did over 62MB/s. Drobo has got to take the prize for the SLOOOWEST FW800 RAID box.

I hardly trust any company that makes a product such as this - for data storage - and does not include or support the drives that you will put in it. Hard Drives are usually the first point of failure and by not providing a complete product support Drobo is telling you we don't want to deal with the failed drives. It also means that you have to call Drobo for support of unit and HD manufacturer for support of drives. Finally - 1 Year Warranty on a $500 box? Really Drobo? That's the same warranty I just got on my $29.99 no-name DVD player I just picked up at Wal-Mart.

Finally, what happens when my computer hangs in the middle of a write while the Drobo software is running it's "virtualization"? And what type of a load does this Drobo software put on my CPU - slowing down my computer in essence to process this virtualization? Can data recovery labs recover data from a failed Drobo with the Drobo specialized virtualization software in case of failure related to power, or dual drive failure, etc? No they do not. They sure as heck know how to recover it a RAID 5 with eyes closed should worse happen.

I for one am not sold on this virtualization of storage gimmic. Drives are so affordable, you may as well put a proper protected solution in place from the start. You're not saving, you're simply putting off the inevitable costs for storage you will need, and putting your data at risk while you do it. When it comes to your data storage and it's safety it should be "measure twice, cut once" approach - you should figure out what you need and configure it before you start putting your valuable data on it. Only an uninformed user would risk their data with something like this. Everyone else will go with the field proven (over decades) reliable hardware controlled RAID 5 or RAID 1.

You can take the Pepsi challenge anyday with a proper hardware controlled RAID 5 product and they will spank the Drobo. And you can have a hardware controlled RAID 5 with Gigabit, eSATA, and it's much faster on FireWire800, and it doesn't put any load on your CPU, and it doesn't need any software running on your system. etc. etc. etc.

NEXT!!!

]]>Jul 9th 2008 9:11AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/
Most retailers have either a 14-day or 30-day return policy. I find this to be poor customer service. Especially since they don’t have a written policy online. What if Best Buy, Dell, Apple and others didn't have a return policy? Not acceptable.]]>Jul 9th 2008 8:40PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/08/data-robotics-announces-second-gen-drobo-with-firewire-800/Jul 10th 2008 8:23PM