How to and why you might want to partition your macs hard drive. Raid 0, also called striping, essentially treats multiple hard drives as one big drive, splitting data evenly across the raidconnected drives. Using two 500 gb 7200 rpm hard drives in a raid 0 array can produce. I have a 4tb mybook thunderbolt duo and would like to partition drive a into 2 partitions and also be running raid 1 mirrored.
Mac promultiple hard drives,boot drive, internal raid. It features four drives at 3tb each also available with four, six, or eight drives and two thunderbolt 3 ports, which are backward compatible with older macs that support thunderbolt 2 you just need a 32 cable. To set up a raid array in mac os x, follow these steps. Get a raid that uses at least four drives, have a cold spare. Some raid controllers have performance issues if the drives are of differing specs. Some raidlike devices for instance the drobo support multiple drives of varying size and specifications. Western digital 4tb my passport best external hard drive for mac i bought the wd my passport 2tb back in 2017 and guess what. Mar 10, 2015 raid stands for redundant array of independent disks. Powered by softraid, the most advanced software raid for mac. It requires four hard drives to use, and is essentially two raid 0 sets mirroring each other. The owc thunderbay 8 is like a highperformance personal data center that offers multiple configuration options to suit everexpanding storage needs. According to an idc report in q4 2014, apple is now the fifth largest pc vendor in the world and has reached its highest pc market share exclude the ipad ever reported, and you may see even stronger mac sales this year as there might possibly be new macs powered by intels broadwell.
Looking to add storage, or for a smart way to back up your mac. For example, a pair of 1 tb hard drives would show up in your nas as a single 2 tb drive. So using the 310k drive raid for apps,os, and data, along with a 1tb for storage and backup would be the best setup based on what i have now. Raid is an acronym for redundant array of independent disks, which is a storage method that combines multiple physical disk drives into one virtual drive. I just love the transfer speed and its still working fine for me.
When you create a mirrored raid set, your data is written to multiple disks so the information is stored redundantly. Connected storage is more versatile storage, but thats just one of the many benefits of buying a nas device. The best external hard drives for mac in 2020 pcmag. A nas drive that provides shared storage for everyone on your network is ideal for homes that own multiple macs and mobile devices. Softraid offers multiple flavors of raid formats check out jeff carlsons take control of digital storage for a deep dive into which one is right for you, but at a cost. Raid allows for combining multiple drives storage space into a single volume. As you can see, thunderbolt available on macs and a few pcs is by far the fastest protocol available today for external hard drives and raid systems more on raids a bit later.
Photographers should never ever use raid level 0 or 1. Raid stands for redundant array of independent disks. Raids can use a mix of striping storing data across multiple disks, mirroring. I currently use tm to backup my main internal drive, however id like to add a second drive 24tb to backup my main external working drive 24tb raid, 21tb configured.
In short, a raid array is a group of two or more independent hard drives that work together to basically form one super hard drive. The first thing to talk about with configuring a raid is the drives you put in them. This is similar to raid 0 in that all you need is a couple hard drives and the raid function in disk utility. Here are the best mac hard drives and external storage options in 2020.
Mac storage across multiple, separate external drives. Best thunderbolt raid systems for imac pro of 2020 imore. The end result is that raid 10 is speedy because data is written to multiple drives and redundant because. Jan 09, 2020 it features four drives at 3tb each also available with four, six, or eight drives and two thunderbolt 3 ports, which are backward compatible with older macs that support thunderbolt 2 you just need a 32 cable. Nvidia shield tv pro, appletv 4k, various rokus model. Across the top you should see the options first aid, erase, partition, raid and restore. Is it possible to have multiple partitions with raid 1. With apologies if this is a dumb question, but once a hd a lacie tb drive with two 500gb hds is set up as a mirrored raid using disk utility, can i use it with two different macs both will be running yosemite or only on the mac that ive used to create the raid. If you can see all of these options except for partition, you have selected the wrong disk in the lefthand column. A reader wonders if hed see a great benefit from combining two external usb drives into a single raid set. A collection of spinning drives configured with a raid level.
Go beyond external hard drives with networkattached. Photo, film and video editors can take advantage of the largest capacity desktop raid storage solution weve ever offered to handle the voracious drive space appetite of raw, 4k, large format. Nov 28, 2009 simultaneously writing to multiple drives by. Create a disk set using disk utility on mac apple support. This small compact ssd drive from samsung comes with both a usbc to usbc cable and a usbc to usba, meaning its perfect to use with your macbook or mac. Secured time machine backup for multiple macs by james w. Raid 10 combines mirrors raid 1 with stripes raid 0 for a fast yet redundant array.
Using mirrored raid raid1 drive with multiple mbps. Now select your macs internal hard drive to reveal more information about it. A raid array beats any singledrive solution by utilizing multiple drives to offer. Once i fix the one that was stopped, then the other one stops working.
Go beyond external hard drives with networkattached storage. Raid is a technology that is used to increase the performance andor reliability of data storage. I want the partitions and data on disk a to be mirrored on disk b. Depending on the type of array, a raid configuration can offer faster speeds, more storage space, or both.
Jbod will let you use each drive in a multibay disk array independently, while a raid will utilize some or all of the drives simultaneously, depending on how it is formatted, and provides performance, data redundancy, or a combination of both. Raid stands for redundant array of independent disks, while jbod stands for just a bunch of disks. What i read about might have been for macs i dont remember. Use raid 5 if cost, speed, andor storage space is most important. The abbreviation stands for either redundant array of inexpensive disks or redundant array of independent drives. Lacie 16tb 2big dock thunderbolt 3 raid storage,lacie 8tb 2big dock thunderbolt 3 raid storage.
If you have one of these devices, then there is a performance advantage to having all your drives match. You can also create a set that concatenates smaller disks to act as one larger disk. I bought the wd my passport 2tb back in 2017 and guess what. Mac storage across multiple, separate external drives may 19, 2009 im relatively new to backing up. A network attached storage device can provide shared storage, a time machine backup target, and additional useful features for mac, iphone, and ipad users on a local area network and beyond. Raid arrays can solve some problems you may experience with your macs current. Allows for hotswapping of drives in certain configurations. The drive connects to pcs or macs through a thunderbolt connector. Raid is simply an acronym standing for redundant array of inexpensive disks. Jan 12, 2019 photographers should never ever use raid level 0 or 1. How to use time machine backup with multiple drives and the cloud.
If you are only going to use it for backup, the redundancy is not as critical. Raid 1 uses two hard drives and doesnt come with the speed advantage of raid 0. The best nas network attached storage devices for 2020 pcmag. Apples time machine software helps you create a backup of your mac hard drive. Raid is basically structured to take multiple drives and put them together in a volume. May 09, 2019 the best external hard drives for mac in 2020. The 8 best external hard drives and ssds for mac and pc users. These can be hard discs, but there is a trend to also use the.
Hack old usb drives into a mini raid on a mac make tech easier. With two or more drives in a system serving up data in this case audio, it is possible to create two types of raid array. From the raid tab of disk utility, click and drag the disks from the list at the left to the disk box at the right. I know you can use multiple drives with tm, but is there a way to individually select and deselect which drives are backed up. A raid system consists of two or more drives working in parallel. Its fast 540 mbs read and write speeds are more than enough to transfer any file. The next fastest available is esata which is a somewhat obscure format that is available on a few windows pcs but never really gained much ground and never made it. Raid level 0, 1, 5, 6 and 10 advantage, disadvantage, use. Find out which hard drive can help increase your storage or safely back up your mac. Now, you could use two drives and set up two raid0 volumes, 1 on each drive.
Every time i partition it with disk utilities on mac, wd drive utilities rebuilds it and i lose my partitions. Some raid like devices for instance the drobo support multiple drives of varying size and specifications. How to choose the best network storage for a macpc home. There are many types of array, all of which use a collection of disks to create a single storage volume. After reading a few posts i was thinking about getting a 1tb 7200 drive for apps and os, using the 310k drives as a. Secured time machine backup for multiple macs qnap blog. Raid 5 uses data striping techniques with at least three drives to preserve data even if one drive fails. Disk utility raid controls on your macbook dummies. The best nas network attached storage devices for 2020. Raid 1 constantly mirrors the data from one drive to another so if one fails, all the data is on the other.
Raid drives typically have multiple storage units in one box, and are also used for network storage. Feb 03, 2020 the best nas network attached storage devices for 2020. Owc raid central your complete guide to raid solutions. After reading a few posts i was thinking about getting a 1tb 7200 drive for apps and os, using the 310k drives as a raid, and a 1tb external hd for storagebackup. Western digital 4tb my passport best external hard drive for mac. How to and why not to combine external drives into a raid. Heres what you need to know, along with our toprated applefriendly drives. Hack old usb drives into a mini raid on a mac make tech. The lacie 5big thunderbolt 2 is a powerful external hard drive system capable of holding up to 40tb of data individually, and more than a petabyte when connected together. You need at least two additional hard drives on your system besides the startup disk, which you shouldnt use in a raid set. A raid combines multiple drives into a single logical unit for the purposes of what is called data redundancy or performance improvement, so in other words, either secure, fast, big, or combos of all three. You can daisy chain up to six devices with this system and you can configure it for raid 0, 1, 5, 6, and 10.