When copying 454 MB from my Drobo 5D to my Mac using the USB 3.0 cable it takes 12 minutes to do so - is this normal - I thought the USB 3.0 must be much faster?
Checking my systems (OSX 10.10.5) USB ports the Drobo 5D is detected with a “Speed: Up to 12 Mb/sec” which means to my calculation 454 MB should take about 5 minutes…
The Drobo shows all lights green and has 30% capacity remaining.
hi saimless,
i just did a copy of some large files on my 5D which has about 19% free and i got about 72 MB on that particular test…
do you know if you had recently upgraded or added a drive (or added/modified any data beforehand?)
it might be self optimising, which can slow things a bit.
also, if you had been deleting a whole folder from the drobo (or lots of files worth) it can also be reclaiming the free blocks, which could slow it temporarily too.
some other factors can also be virus scanning, spotlight mac indexing (or windows search), or a fragmented source drive (never defrag a drobo though) or maybe some other things accessing or using the drobo or computer in some way?
maybe you can try again to see how things go?
Could you please define where you “got about 72 MB” and on what test? - thank you - also for your information and hints.
As the only support I get from techsupport is a link where I can purchase help I did some testing myself.
current status:
testing:
I only can assume that either the top bay green LED is broken or bay0 is faulty (and not the disk); unclear why Dashboard shows no error and most of all, the data transfer is far from what to expect.
thanks for more info,
ah the test i did was just to power up my 5D and try copying some large files to it to see what explorer showed me. (not the most scientific but just wanted to see what it would show me as a quick comparison bearing in mind that i had less free space so i fired it up to do a quick test)
as your drobo is now showing a mismatch of lights/status (compared with the dashboard) then there could be something wrong like you suspected… if it is the bay (slot) though, then it is possible that the backplane has suffered some damage (sometimes possibly if the unit was moved with drives inside or tilted), but if dashboard still recognised the drive, (and shows a green light there) as well as the correct into for that drive model and a good status, then it could be a faulty light…
(for the drive model info, newer versions of dashboard also include another dropdown / tab which shows you drive info for each drive bay that you click on)
are you able to take some screenshots of dashboard (with bays) and to post up to imgur or similar, with links pasted here if you can? (please remember to rub out any sensitive/serial numbers before uploading though to play safe)
can you also remember if your drobo is using single SDR or Dual drive redundancy mode? and also, when you are not doing anything to access drobo files, do the drives in the drobo seem to make lots of chatter noise/vibrations (similar to like when a hard drive is reading and writing?)
if all is ok with the drives (and dashboard), and if it is only the main drobo unit LED light that has blown, then you might be able to carry out a migration process to essentially swap out the diskpack into another replacement model, for example as mentioned here:
http://www.drobo.com/resource-center/migration/
can you remember if the drobo speed increased a lot, when you had removed the failed drive? if so, maybe an option could be to remove the drive from the seemingly-faulty bay, and to then copy your needed data from drobo to somewhere else such as your mac, much more quickly. please note: if you have any really important/critical data on it at the moment, it might be worth trying to make a backup copy of it (even if slow) before trying a drive removal.
you might be out of support (and seeing the pay-per-incident) option, though if you were to buy a new replacement, you might be able to get some support for that (which might be able to help confirm what the current problem is, but in case not, it might still be worth checking and confirming the status of your drobo with support, possibly via diagnostics logs at certain stages that they might ask for, just in case there is something else causing problems that might still persist after a migration process, such as possibly problems with some other drives too?)
First of all I want to thank you very much for the efforts you are putting in to help me with this incident!
To make things more clear: the 5D contains my iTunes Library from which I want to mainly stream contents throughout my home network (to Apple TVs). I keep updating the library and therefore Drobo offered me until now a good solutions. I might want to add that I also own a Drobo (gen2), S (gen1) and 800i - latter as a Time Machine backup for the iTunes lib and my Macs.
During starting up the 5D one day, I noticed that the top bay (0) light was red - then went off. Also, I noticed the slow and lagging streaming/playback of the iTunes lib audio and video contents; that is when I replaced the top bay disk.
you should be able to see the screenshot here
The Drobo is set to single redundancy (as it´s data is back-uped to the 800i)
There are no noises you mention - actually, only the normal r/w noise when I try to playback/add data from/to the iTunes library
[quote]if all is ok with the drives (and dashboard), and if it is only the main drobo unit LED light that has blown then[/quote] …I should not encounter the video lag upon playback - right? Before this incident video-/audioplayback was smooth.
Unfortunately changing the drive did not have any impact.
I have copied a movie from the faulty Drobo to my Macs HD - from there it plays back perfectly.
As I was unable to purchase DroboHelp from their website I suggested purchasing a NEW Drobo 5D (maybe for me the 5N makes more sense?) and migrating the disks. I am still waiting for a reply from Drobo Sales Dept.
Hope to see the light at the end of tunnel, soon!
Again, thank you - Axel
PS: One more thought: could it be iTunes (v.12.3.5.17 under OSX 10.10.5) which is causing this problem? On the other hand - why should iTunes interfere when reading/writing data via the Finder…(?)
Last but not least: WHY IS THE BAY(0) LIGHT SHOWING RED ON STARTUP?
thanks for more info and screenshot axel,
there might be some lag test that can be made… for example, if you copy the video clip from your itunes library, to somewhere else onto your drobo. (or if easier the other way around, maybe to find a video file that just sits on the drobo, and then to shutdown itunes completely, (as well as any other indexing tools like spotlight), and to try and access that file from your computer. (maybe using the vlc player for mac)
how smoothly does that file play?
if you then run itunes,
and try to (directly) play that file in vlc again, how is it now?
and then if you try to put a copy of that file into itunes library, and then if you try streaming it to your tv (if that was your main goal), how does it go now?
i am not sure why 1st visible drive bay was showing red on your 5D, (my 5D has 3 drives insisde it currently, though all bay lights show red/orange for a few seconds when i power it on, before the rest of the boot sequence starts normally), but, in your screen could you click on the arrow next to where it says “System information”, and then to view the information for each separate drive?
you might need to click on a drive bay first though, but can you see any other info about each drive, such as a possible warning or healed label, or health info?
(for the migration part, there is no (direct) migration available to go from a 5D to a 5N but an indirect way could be to get a 5N, and then to copy, paste, and verify the data that way)
also here is a page with some more info about the migration process and paths for you:
http://www.drobo.com/resource-center/migration/
Thanks for your thoughts.
245 MB take about 8 min to copy from one directory to another on the 5D.
VLC takes about 20 sec before playback begins; the play back itself is more or less smooth.
VLC AND iTunes play this file (A) back smoothly - BUT: when I choose another file (B) in iTunes to playback (one that has not been opened with VLC) the extreme lag is back…
Playing then back the file (A) again, takes about 15 sec to start but then plays smoothly.
On AppleTV it takes very long (about 1min - depending on the size of the video I guess) until the stream starts to play back (smoothly)
In comparison to earlier streaming (when the Drobo incident did not exist) the “buffer” time before the video starts was much shorter (5-10 sec)
I have added the screenshot here
I did notice a different Firmware on Bay 0 (01.01L01) in comparison with the other bays (80.00A80) -
I hope Drobo Sales will not take too long to make an offer…
thanks for the info and screen,
if you have cycled through all of the bays (or clicked on each of the drives in dashboard) do all of they show up with ok health?
(there isnt really a need to post all screens though may be worth checking visually for confirmation)
the firmware might simply be different for different makes or models of drives though
thanks for your remarks
ALL bay lights health show green and ok.
Regarding the Firmware: it seems quite a strange figure on bay 0 in comparison to the other -
Anyway - I am finished now with Drobos - Support told me that there is no discount on a new 5D and they cannot reach their sales representative…
From what I understand this company has bigger problems than I have…
Thank you again, for your continuous support
thanks indeed,
(while not perhaps the most enticing time for it, it may actually be of some benefit getting the diagnostic logs analysed at some point, just in case there is something untoward happening, regarding that particular drive as you mentioned its funny / off firmware info. maybe if there is a future xmas sale or something similar where you do end up getting one, you could try getting the logs analysed on this one, as maybe a drive issue of some sort is causing slowness)