Yesterday, one on my Drobo units warned me that it was running short of space. This is hardly surprising given the amount of video production I have been doing recently.
I opened the Drobo dashboard software and checked the drives. The software showed me the unit had 2 x 2TB and 2 x 1.5TB disks installed. It also indicated I should replace one of the 1.5TB disks with a larger capacity volume, highlighting it amber. The replacement drive I ordered from Amazon was 3TB and cost only £74 including delivery.
Today the drive arrived, I popped the magnetic cover off the Drobo, ejected the recommended disk and inserted the replacement. It took me around 30 seconds to swap the disks and I didn’t even need to turn the unit off. The Drobo dash then popped up a few messages before turning on data protection mode. This is where the content of the Drobo is spread across all the installed drives in case one ever fails. As for the 1.5TB drive, I popped that into my other Drobo unit which had 2 x 4TB, 1 x 1TB and 1 x 500GB disks.
What I find great is, even though the Drobo is busy protecting the data on the disks, I can still use it just as I would normally. In fact, I just finished editing another video lesson, saving it to the Drobo.
This is how technology should work.
The Lightweight Photographer 
When technology works it is so wonderful, innit? It’s even better when it’s your backups that are working so well. Congratulations!
Thanks. I would say it’s the sense of relief you feel that makes it so wonderful.
Thanks, your blog reminded me that I need to review my storage & backup regime. I’d be interested to know:
– if you use the Drobo on a network or connected via USB
– is it used just for backup or as your primary drive for your images as well & I if the latter are you happy with speed / performance
I’m sure your approach & setup would be of interest to others.
I have also found your photoshop & nik guides invaluable.
Keep up the good work!
Thanks for the positive feedback Chris.
I have two Drobos, one on my Mac and one on my PC. I am currently considering some NAS storage for my network but I don’t have the spare cash at present.
In terms of the Drobo’s, one is an old USB2 and the other USB3. I edit directly to both and have never noticed poor performance. Having said that some of the large PSD files do take a little while (20 seconds) to save.