Drobo FS gains native Time Machine support, we go hands-on
By Darren Murph 
posted May 20th 2010 8:30AM
posted May 20th 2010 8:30AM
Setup couldn't have possibly been easier. We installed the Drobo Dashboard (a three minute + reboot ordeal), slammed our HDDs into the device, plugged a single Ethernet cable from the Drobo FS to our WLAN router and powered 'er up. Drobo Dashboard recognized that a device was connected, and from there we were able to establish various Shares (we stuck with one main one, but adding 'em isn't tough) and enable Time Machine with a single click. We should note here, however, that once you set a size for a given Share, you'll have to reformat everything and start over if you want to adjust that larger or smaller. Moving on, we launched the Time Machine app within Snow Leopard (and Leopard, on a separate machine) and it immediately recognized our recently mounted Share and asked if we wanted to establish a backup there. Naturally, we slammed the confirmation button and sat back as 150GB here, 400GB here, and 128GB here were all transferred over from various Macs. We'd recommend making the initial transfer via a wired connection to prevent any tears from potential WiFi dropouts, but after that, AirPort updates were made in the background without us even knowing.
For those concerned about potential Time Capsule reliability, or those in need of something more scalable or more redundant, the Drobo FS is hard to overlook for Mac users. It's a pricey piece of equipment, sure, but the execution of Time Machine integration is downright flawless.
You guys sure get rough with your NAS's, slamming themm against walls...
@10nisman94 If it doesn't have S&M, they blew it!
I want one of these
Ok, ok. I'll buy it already. Wanted to for some time anyway ;)
Only 956GB? You're starving your Drobo, Engadget!
What about wired transfer performance?? I've had really bad experience with performance / transfer speed of NAS drives.
Can I assume that you will update this "hands-on" article with more than just Time Machine reporting that it's working just fine? Even restoring a random file or two would be a nice start, but but I'm sure your readers are really looking for your experience with activities like restoring a backup to a new machine. Ya know, things that products which do not bear an Apple logo tend make a little more difficult?
@bch75: Agreed, I was really hoping for a far more thorough review; this article is, for all its good intentions, largely worthless. It would have been nice if they would have talked about restoring files, or how long it takes to 'rebuild' the content on a drive if a drive fails/is yanked out, as on previous Drobos, the performance of that was simply appalling - I've known people who've had to wait a fortnight to get a 1TB drive rebuilt; in the end, I'm pretty sure everything was okay, but that is an irresponsibly long wait time, especially for people who use these products in a business setting where time is of the essence. Anyhows, looking forward to a proper review over the coming weeks.
Yawn..
What is so special about Drobo... I mean compared to any other NAS? Does Time Machine need special kinds of NAS to work?
@desinerd
The qNap devices are all supporting TimeMachine natively too. They also do video recording from IP cameras, host a larger number of servers and services, and have some additional nice perks, for not much more money.
@zelannii
That's how I have my Qnap 219p set up (sans the video recording). Time machine service plus all of the other typical NAS bells and whistles.
@desinerd On your NAS, can I just pull a drive and replace it without skipping a beat?
Very nice - now all I need is a remote backup provider that is time machine compatible and I'm done
This review is PURE FICTION!
I purchased a Drobo FS as soon as they were available and a month later it does nothing as described.
The documentation on their site claimed Time Machine compatibility from the start.. it does not work.
The set-up procedure on their web site is 360 from what it is in reality.
And…
It doesn’t work!
You can’t even copy files without getting permission errors and leaves you with a expensive piece of hardware that is unusable.
I have been working with their “Support Group” for over a month ( now called the lack of support group”)
They initially had me believing the issues were with my system. I went to Apple worked for days to get the “issues” resolved…. Then all of a sudden when I went back to Data Robotics… “ Oh yeah we are sorry, we just discovered the issues are on our end and we are working to resolve them with a new firmware update to be deliver on 5/14 or 15.
I get no communication, no satisfaction
Needles to say here it is 5/20 no communication and no update.
I read your review and went nuts!
I have tons of emails and communication to document what I am calming.
Time for some truth in journalism here, don’t you think?
@kemck http://support.datarobotics.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/412/kw/time%20machine%20drobo%20fs/r_id/100004
Probably should have read that before you bought it, if Time Machine was your primary purpose. 10.6.3 dropped before Drobo FS was even announced.
If you join the drobospace forums, there are some workarounds to get Time Machine working in 10.6.2, and as this article states, they've been working on an elegant solution which is what engadget was testing in this article.
@kemck
if something is 360 (as in degrees) from what it claims, then it actually does exactly what it claims. you're thinking of 180.
it's fun to pick apart stupid posts based upon their use of language instead of the merit of their argument.
They'll let ANYBODY into clown school these days. This is a gorgeous and hassle-free piece of hardware. If there are permission errors (what OS are you using?), it is most likely because you have mounted it as a guest (assuming Windows here) and you have not let everyone have read/write privileges.
@kemck We all understand you're frustrated, but this is a review based on what this website got, not on the dissatisfaction of one customer. Saying an article is fiction because you, as an individual, got burned is fallacious.
@kemck
You are correct. I have had the exact same problem with the Drobo FS. I have just spent a month trying to back up 6 Macs running Snow Leopard with Drobo's tech support team. They have had us deleting files on all our machines and today...finally after 30 days...just told me that IT IS A KNOWN PROBLEM and will not be fixed until Drobo Dashboard 1.7.2 and a frimware update are released. So all of our work trying to get Drobo to work was for nothing. They have been fully aware of these issues all along but did not tell us, their customers. Our experience with Drobo has been very disappointing. The system does not work as advertised. They had us, "Delete all of the files associated with .fseventsd on the drives we are trying to back up. Then create a directory called .fseventsd on each volume to backup and inside that folder put a single file named no_log (this will disable the creation of the files)". This does not work. Nor did any of the other so called work arounds. Editors Choice in Macworld Magazine!!! Are they kidding. Drobo's press release today, 5/20/10, stated that Drobo FS now works with Apple's Time Machine. I called and asked them for the updates and was told it is not available. I said. "You put out a press release that it is available." They said, "Not yet and we cannot tell you when it will be available." Drobo's tech department set up an Mac Mimi today and tried to back is up to one of their Drobo FS's and it failed…just like our's have been doing for the last month. What a surprise. Their final suggestion was for us to return the Drobo and the drives. That's the first correct thing they have told us to do that will indeed solve Drobo's problems. Get rid of the problem. We are all very disappointed with Drobo to say the least.
Look at all those fingerprints :(
I was looking for it as a back up system for my files... Time Machine was a nice to have. The basic issue is that it will not let you copy files without errors.
@kemck Copy files in general? or with Time Machine? If you can't copy files at all you need to bother DRI more, you might have a faulty unit. Tried resetting to factory defaults? I have almost 2TB of data on my Drobo FS and I read and write large amounts of data on a daily basis..
Until drobo make their filesystem format open recovering from a drobo failure is too risky. You have to return your drobo back yo drobo to get your data back. Great concept pity its a proprietary format.
@zathras
True or you can just buy another Drobo and put the same drives in and copy your data off.
If I had one of these, I'd go back to 1982 and have coach put me in the game. Then we would have made state.
@ChristianTexan Instead, you just whup a steak at your nephew as he's riding a bicycle.
@evilspoons
that was one of the best parts.
How much you wanna bet I can throw a football over them mountains?
Can I plug this into a wireless router and access it that way?
@Stepup yes.
@schlub Sorry submited whils I typed.
What do I need to look for in a TV to make sure it can access a drive like this?
I assume I could have a TV hooked up watching a film in one room and be working on a pc in the other.
@Stepup Well, you could get a TV with DLNA/uPNP functionality, as Drobo does have a DroboApp for that, but the best thing would be an HTPC or an htpc-like device like the upcoming boxee box. Any media player that can see files over a SMB network share should play nice with the Drobo FS.
Try moving your iTunes or iPhoto libraries to the Drobo FS... then try accessing them from the application.. just one example of the error messages you will get
@kemck ahhhh, I see. The error is that you are using iTunes. Uninstall that crap and see how much better everything works with non-Apple devices.
But for serious, this is not a Drobo FS issue in general. You either have a bad device or a bad setup.
@kemck That seems like an Apple problem with the SMB mounts to me. You might want to try switching the FS to AFP? Or you might want to try using the Firefly DroboApp to share out your iTunes library from the FS to the whole network instead of trying to access it directly from iTunes.
Not to imply that you have done anything to mess up. It did take a reset of the device to iron out any bugs for me.
@schlub You sound like someone who has no idea what they are talking about :p
@scld Tonight. You.
Drobo strikes me as a pretty shady company. I've yet to see a single independent review of the Drobo Pro, and I've heard from at least 1 tech journo that that's because Drobo didn't make any review units available (hiding something?). Oh yeah, and the 1 year warranty for a high end device combined with a proprietary data format that can only be read by other Drobo devices ... God help you if the company goes under or the underlying tech is abandoned for any reason and your device craps out: your data's toast.
I'll pass, thanks.
@LANjackal
I don't know if they are shady... I've had my first Drobo for 3+ years now and it's still running. You can extend your warranty every year if you want. Greedy yes, shady no.
@LANjackal I guess you never watch Twit?
@pika2000 Nope. I can read a LOT faster than I can watch, so I generally don't watch tech news videos
"once you set a size for a given Share, you'll have to reformat everything and start over if you want to adjust that larger or smaller"
What exactly needs to be reformated? The whole Drobo? Or just the sparsebundle used by TimeMachine? If its just the sparsebundle, why doesn't "hdiutil resize" work? And can the different shares be limited in size?
If the Drobo FS is your only means of backing up your data, you aren't actually concerned about losing all of it. Propriety sucks when it breaks, but that's why you have redundancy. That's why you have redundancy. There are drawbacks to everything, and that is Drobo's. If you like, pay for online backup. Drawback: you don't physically own it. The list goes on.
Sensitive and sentimental data should be backed up as many times in as many places as possible.
So it is this or a ReadyNas NV+. I thought I'd kick things off with a pair of 2TB drives in RAID, then double that next year. My main use is DLNA through XBOX 360, PS3, etc.
Thoughts?
Ok, I've used the FS for one month and it works as advertised. What I do not have is a link to, or an identifier for, the new Drobo Dashboard. I'm running version 1.7.1 which does not include TM support. So, Engadget, what version are you running? What's the link?
First, I have Time Machine working on a classic Dobo w/DroboShare via an application called "BackMyFruitUp" available from Drobo.
Second, Data Robotics blew it. There is NO upgrade path from Drobo to Drobo FS. It would have been nice if they had a way to pop out my terabyte drives from my Drobo and pop them into the FS. BUT NO!
I'm happy with my Time Capsule. Drobo is big, ugly, noisy and overpriced in comparison. The only advantage I see is the extra storage.
As for reliability, I am hoping the issues are now fixed in the 3rd gen devices and if not I'm covered by a 3 year Apple Care which again is better than Drobo.
@simonsharks Time Capsule? Are you serious? Time Capsule has zero redundancy. If the drive crapped out (and any hard-drives WILL crap out), you're screwed. With a drobo, I can just take it out, plug in a new one (regardless of size), and I'm good to go.
@pika2000 Sure. Drobo is redundant against a drive failure but not a device failure. A power surge, data corruption, theft, fire and your just as "screwed". Data should be on 2+ devices as well as 2+ drives and that is what Time Capsule does for me.
SICK. I've been considering getting a Drobo FS because I've got the Mac Pro full of drives already, and would like to have a NAS so I don't need to leave my machine running all the time just for torrents. This is icing on the cake since I just acquired a new 13" MBP and it would be nice to back that up as well.