Drobo Drobo 5N (DRDS4A21) Diskless System Storage Array

Pros: It works well i like it

Cons: na

Pros: Appearance, Ability to use drives of different speed and capacity, Convenient, Better protection against loss of data vs use of a single drive.

This DROBO may not be ideal for all users but it does exactly what I wanted. The ability to take a variety of spare drives (some which were too small for my needs) and combine them into one large drive that will not lose data if one of the drives eventually dies. It is also really nice that all my PC's can access the drive which is something new for me.

Cons: A common complaint is the rattling of the plastic that separates the drives. This is less of an issue for drives that run smooth. My last DROBO had that problem with an out of balance drive but runs smooth now that it was removed. There was mild rattling with this model but it was barely noticeable. The fan in the back makes a decent amount of noise if it is on high but it only seems to hit that RPM during startup/initialization. I have been transferring HD videos for more than 10 hours straight and the fan speed is still on low which barely makes any noise.

Other Thoughts: Setup was more of a challenge than expected but I am very happy with this product. Quick formatting all the previously used drives before use in this DROBO will prevent many of the issues I experienced. I couldn't figure out if I had done something wrong but the DROBO was accessible via Drobo dashboard for two computers but the OS could not find it. Resetting the DROBO solved that problem.

While transferring 704GB of HD videos (~18 hours) I used two PC's to play different videos simultaneously. Playback for both 720P videos was smooth with no visible problems. I tried the same test with two 1080P videos and playback was still smooth. I was thinking of upgrading with the SSD caching feature but I'm not running Drobo apps and I am pleased with the unit as is.

The only other con is it makes my 2nd gen DROBO seem like a piece of junk by comparison.

Pros: ssd caching, 5 disks at a 4 disk price range, extended support options are good if you're willing to pay. Theorhetical ease of use, and ease of disk configuration options (if everything worked right and fast)

Cons: firmware and software are unfinished at best. The device is almost unusable with the lack of supported protocols. No ISCSI!? this is the "N" or network based device in this class, which would directly imply iscsi. When i called them they said it doesn't support it because its a network device and not a direct connect.. HUH!? Normally the lack of decent software on drobo devices is well supplemented by the community using drobo apps, unfortunately they did not see fit to get drobo apps working on this model, without it its pretty much worthless. Also no dlna server support, this is pretty much expected from this class of device, but may not be needed for most small business uses so it would be trivial to some. The list would go on and on, but these are some of the major issues.

Other Thoughts: Could be a great device if they finished the software and firmware, and supported drobo apps.

Pros: I have been wanting to try out a drobo for a long time. Newegg had 10% off so I finally pulled the trigger. So far I'm glad I did. Installing the disks was pretty easy. I wanted to do a speed test so I shoved 5 Crucial M4 drives in it and I was getting about 100Mb/s read/write. Then I stuck a mishmash all the loose HDDs I had lying around (500GB-1.5TB) and copied all my files onto this thing. I wanted to see what happened if I stuck a bad drive in there so I put in a drive I knew was failing. It worked for about a day, then the drive light on it went red. I stuck a good drive back in and 4 hours later everything seemed happy again.

Cons: No Active Directory support, only has username/password support for shares. No NFS or iSCSI support for VMware, only CIFS.

Pros: So far i have three drives(2TB+2TB+1.5TB) in my drobo. Firmware is up to-date. I am able to stream to multiple devices at the same time(2tvs 2iPads 1phone).Date transfer speeds are great.

Cons: I am still unable to register my drobo using the software or he website. FAIL.....

Pros: I have 6 Apple TVs, plus many tablet devices using and AirVideo connected to two different iTunes Library running on two older Mac Mini's connected to the Drobo...which houses ~3,000 movies at high quality...over a Cisco 10/100MB switch...and there's NEVER any latency.

I've spent many $1,000s on LaCie, and other brands, only to be disappointed in the speed and data loss. I had a drive failure on the Drobo, which the drive was under warranty, and once put back in,hot swapped, all my data was back in about a day.

Not sure what anyone's gripe is...perhaps they need newer better network equipment.

Cons: None yet

Pros: It fills you with hope...

Cons: ....but doesn't deliver. This has to be the slowest of this type of device I have ever used. The bullet list of features sounds great, but at this price point I just want the thing to work quickly and quietly and to know how to handle a failure. It's neither quick nor quiet.

Other Thoughts: I tried this out for holding HD video for FCPX but it was just too slow, had random delays and latencies, and when some thing did go wrong with one of the drives it just gave up. "This is not the RAID you are looking for..."

Sorry, Drobo. You're great guys trying to do something awesome, and I can see the hope you have of a great future, but this device isn't any part of it. Improve your recovery routines, and make a device that you can use in an office or edit suite without it sounding like a wind tunnel, and we'll talk.

Pros: Looks nice, cool lights on the front. tray-less hard drive usage

Cons: Other than looks, this unit doesn't do anything right. I bought some suggested hard drives, and it wouldn't use them all. I thought the drives were defective, but they work fine in other RAID systems. I finally got a working set of hard drives after returning the drives a few times. The unit has the slowest transfer speeds I have ever seen. The Drobo dashboard is klunky, and the critical alerts do not work all of the time. The unit is also loud. You can insert hard drives right into the unit without a tray, but after a few days the plastic bays start to rattle and make a loud buzzing noise. The single fan also runs 24-7 even when the unit goes into a low power mode and shuts down the hard drives.

Other Thoughts: avoid the Drobo brand name at all costs, it might look cool... but the performance, support, and reliability are lacking. their products are just not ready for the market yet