Storage Solutions

michaelg · 13 Dec 2015

Hi guys,

So I have a PC with an SSD for Windows 7 and progs and 2x1Tb internal HDD's with one as the main one storing about 250Gb of music, 520Gb of photos and various other assorted files taking me near to capacity.

As I'm mostly playing music from Spotify these days as I get it free from Vodafone, I'm wondering whether to move the music files to a separate HDD (internal or external) and have the internal ones just for photos as I think in the even I had to play the music files again (internet down etc) they'd still play ok even via USB2 external HDD.

I'm also noticing that photos are loading quite slowly when I flick between them in lightroom recently (files are quite big as I shoot with a D800 and use standard NEF files).Re computer set up, it's a Win7 PC with i5 overclocked at 4.2GHz with 16Gb of RAM. No separate graphics card and I mentioned the rest above.

I'm vaguely aware of the whole RAID thing but not 100% sure on how to set it up, what I'd need and whether any of the configurations would make it run any faster.

Alternatively, as I saw there was a 1Tb SSD on Amazon Lightning deals recently, is it worth sitting tight til the price of 1TB SSDs come down further and go in that direction - with one or two of them?

Sorry for all the questions! Just wondering what the best direction to go in is to allow room for further expansion and maintain a decent speed for reviewing and editing shots.

neil_g · 13 Dec 2015

Get your lr cat and working set of images onto the ssd, lr loves fast CPU and fast disk.

Don't bother with raid, you wont see a performance increase there.

Meeten · 13 Dec 2015

I have a QNAP NAS. Great for backups and one work is done on the PC, files are left on there, leaving the PC free of files that i don't need to access readily.
Had it for a couple of years now and works for me. Allows access to files out of the house as well.

michaelg · 13 Dec 2015

neil_g said:
Get your lr cat and working set of images onto the ssd, lr loves fast CPU and fast disk.

Don't bother with raid, you wont see a performance increase there.

I have the catalogue on the SSD but as it's a smallish SSD there's not much room for many images. That's another idea i had had though was to have another larger SSD for more recent images as the cost has come down for larger SSDs.

Deadlock · 13 Dec 2015

Split your catalogs by something suitable e.g. year, subject, etc to keep the size manageable & on SSD

petersmart · 13 Dec 2015

neil_g said:
Don't bother with raid, you wont see a performance increase there.

I've used striped raid in the past and it gives a massive increase in speed so if there's a bottleneck there it could make a difference, albeit with a doubling of HDD cost and the increased possibility of total data loss.

But obviously it doesn't speed up the program itself.

neil_g · 14 Dec 2015

there was an article a while back when they raid0'd a couple of velociraptor drives. the result was that for the minimal performance increase the price increase was not worth it.

neil_g · 14 Dec 2015

michaelg said:
I have the catalogue on the SSD but as it's a smallish SSD there's not much room for many images. That's another idea i had had though was to have another larger SSD for more recent images as the cost has come down for larger SSDs.

even if its just the current working album of images you have on the SDD it will help. once youve finished editing then move them off to the slower spinning drives.

michaelg · 14 Dec 2015

neil_g said:
even if its just the current working album of images you have on the SDD it will help. once youve finished editing then move them off to the slower spinning drives.

Thanks, will see what I can pick up SSD wise in the sales since I think my OS/progs/catalogue one is nearing capacity too

Meeten · 14 Dec 2015

They're getting cheaper and cheaper by the day.... Soon I may be able to afford replacing my 4x 2gb spinners in the NAS.... Buy then not sure if there will be any benefit for the outlay.

neil_g · 14 Dec 2015

Meeten said:
They're getting cheaper and cheaper by the day.... Soon I may be able to afford replacing my 4x 2gb spinners in the NAS.... Buy then not sure if there will be any benefit for the outlay.

probably not in a NAS, remember you're limited by network throughput. even on gig ethernet the theoretical max is 125 meg. response times may improve though.

Meeten · 14 Dec 2015

neil_g said:
probably not in a NAS, remember you're limited by network throughput. even on gig ethernet the theoretical max is 125 meg. response times may improve though.

Probably not going to happen on the near future. The current set up is perfectly adequate.

OP might want to consider this option... (I'm somewhat bias....)

michaelg · 27 Dec 2015

Hi guys, sorry to bring this thread back to life!

So, I ordered one of the Sandisk SSDs (960Gb ones) and then ordered a second one on a whim.

So here is what I was thinking, and as I'm really not up to speed with all this, wondering if I'm going down the wrong path or not.

So, if I put the two SSDs into my computer with one as a main storage for photos and the other as a back-up and put photos onto those.

Then, I see the Synology DS215j is on Amazon Lightning Deals tomorrow, so I was thinking maybe I could take my two 1Tb HDDs out of my desktop and put them in there to store my music files, general documents and for my wife to store her photos on (she doesn't have as many and smaller files than mine as mostly on point & shoot or camera-phone) in whatever RAID configuration is safest (can't remember offhand which is which). The two HDDs are different brands and I would be copying the content over to an external 1TB HDD before reformatting them for use in the NAS.

Is this a crazy idea? Or can anyone think of a better solution (ideally one that doesn't cost too much more!)

Snapsh0t · 27 Dec 2015

I don't think it's a crazy idea because you're making use of existing resources. It really depends on whether 1TB* in the NAS will be enough for any length of time or if you're likely to need to upgrade to, say, 3TB before long. From the sound of it you're pretty near capacity now so it may be worth biting the bullet to save the hassle of upgrading later. For my taste, the DS215j is a little under-powered but will probably serve you well enough. However, a request in the Wanted section may turn up something better.

BTW I bought a Sandisk 960GB SSD too as Ebuyer's price was too good to resist. Your idea of using the second as a backup is good as I don't think Windows can handle TRIM with SSDs in RAID. I use Robocopy in scheduled batch files to synchronise the data on my PC with my NAS every night and you're welcome to a copy.

*Yes, I know you have two 1TB drives but they'll be in RAID1 (mirror) so the effective capacity is 1TB.

michaelg · 27 Dec 2015

Snapsh0t said:
I don't think it's a crazy idea because you're making use of existing resources. It really depends on whether 1TB* in the NAS will be enough for any length of time or if you're likely to need to upgrade to, say, 3TB before long. From the sound of it you're pretty near capacity now so it may be worth biting the bullet to save the hassle of upgrading later. For my taste, the DS215j is a little under-powered but will probably serve you well enough. However, a request in the Wanted section may turn up something better.

BTW I bought a Sandisk 960GB SSD too as Ebuyer's price was too good to resist. Your idea of using the second as a backup is good as I don't think Windows can handle TRIM with SSDs in RAID. I use Robocopy in scheduled batch files to synchronise the data on my PC with my NAS every night and you're welcome to a copy.

*Yes, I know you have two 1TB drives but they'll be in RAID1 (mirror) so the effective capacity is 1TB.

Thanks for the detailed reply! Currently I'm using the 1Tb drives as with one as storage and the other as a backup. If I had all my photos on the SSD then 1Tb would be enough for my music (220Gb) and wife's photos (not sure but estimate 60Gb or less). Might put in that Wanted request at some point as the Synology isn't as cheap as I had hoped on the Lightning deals!