*Hello everyone. Apologies if I’m doing this wrong. I haven’t asked a community-based question before. I’m about to purchase a Drobo 5DS and was wondering whether or not it can be networked. Ask this as the 5N I wanted was sold and as compensation have been offered a 5DS for the same price. If indeed it is possible, then some guidance would be greatly appreciated. Its primary use will be as media storage to run Plex on it but now I’m having some doubts. Thank you all in advance.
Regards.
Hi - There is no Drobo 5DS - there is a 5D3 however.
Either way the D stands for Direct as in DAS Direct Access Storage meaning it requires a PC/Mac to operate. Together the 5D3 and the PC/Mac can be networked however both need to be kept operating with the 5D3 acting as the media server linked through to Plex on the PC/Mac.
The 5D3 cannot operate alone on a network as it does not have any RJ-45 outlets or is WiFi capable.
Hi TwinTiger. Thank you for the reply and for correcting my error. Can I connect the Drobo to a router via the USB? If not, what if I connected it directly to the Mac that is connected to the internet? In my head, they are both connected to the internet. If it is not possible in any configuration then I will sell the 5D3 & continue my search for the 5N.
Regards
hi all
regarding connecting the 5D3 to a router, maybe we should be more precise
if we consider what a router should be, from a network perspective, as TwinTiger said, that is not possible
but if we consider what vendors sell as “routers”, that do beyond that, this is an option I would consider
for instance, I use a RT-AC86U which is neither very recent nor a high end model and it implements SMB sharing of drives connected to USB
and I think this what marinesniper asks
so I would say : if your router can share usb drives on the network, then any drive would do, including drobo C and D series
I’ve mostly only used Drobo NAS devices (starting with the DroboFS, way back when). So I don’t know this with certainty, but don’t the Drobo DAS devices require Drobo Dashboard in order to correctly work? If so, that would disqualify a router as a potential host for a Drobo DAS as Drobo Dashboard will only run on Windows and MacOS (and possibly a full-ish Linux distribution using drobo-utils, though I haven’t played with it in years and I’m not sure if it’s still maintained).
I don’t think drobo dashboard is mandatory as it is an admin tool
Maybe at first setup you’ll have to use it to define a volume but when that’s done, on a day to day basis, I don’t think you need it
In my opinion, buying a drobo today means being ready for compromise (no update, no support…) so it makes sense if you’re in that mood so such a non standard setup could work
If marinesniper is an classic user searching for a future-proof solution, the point is she should consider another solution that one of a bygone company anyway