[mythtv-users] Re: RAID5 ATA IDE hardware card recommendations for mythbackend machine

Andrew Plumb aplumb at gmail.com
Fri Dec 10 22:18:23 UTC 2004


On Fri, 10 Dec 2004 20:36:55 +0000, Greg Cope <gregcope at gmail.com> wrote:
> > The problem is that there is *NO* economical backup solution for
> > end-users with hundreds of GB of data. The only thing that comes close
> > is to have another RAID in another machine that you mirror to.
[deletia]
> 400Gb drives are becoming common and cheap.
> 
> Plus a surge plug is not that expensive.

For me it's more an all-eggs-in-one-basket/HDD issue, less of a
backup/archival issue.  Also, this machine was a fully UPS'd machine;
expired warranty killed it, not surges. ;-)

Yes, to get an equivalent amount of real storage in a RAID
configuration I'd need 3x200GB (2 storage + 1 error correction) or
6x100GB (4 storage + 2 error correction) or even 11x50GB (8 storage +
3 correction) to match that single 400GB drive.  But a single lost
drive costs me more in wasted time re-building the full machine
OS+software+data, especially the data piece scattered across a
multitude of CD and DVD archives.

What I'm looking at doing is offloading the always-on data access
portion to a RAID-based Linux box in the basement.  I think I'll start
with a 3-drive software RAID configuration; I like that it's not tied
to any specific RAID hardware chipset, and speed isn't super-critical
since networking will be the primary bottle-neck.

Interesting discussion, everyone!

Andrew.

-- 

If you don't know what to do, do something.


More information about the mythtv-users mailing list