Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Wojciech Puchar

I just looked at one of the most popular online shops around
here.  They have about 50 different USB enclosures; prices
start at 10 EUR.  But they have only six Firewire enclosures
(and none of them is 2.5"!), the cheapest one is 34 EUR.


i think this 24 EUR it's worth of.



However, they do have a larger number of eSATA enclosures,


SATA works fine too.
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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Christopher Sean Hilton


On Jun 17, 2008, at 11:40 AM, Oliver Fromme wrote:


Wojciech Puchar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:


you must have something wrong. my USB drive gets 27MB/s. yes this
480Mbit/s is USB isn't real, but half of it is.


 I agree.
 Want to take this private and help figure out what's wrong?
:-)


i simply have no idea why it could work so slow.


Cheap controller in the USB enclosure.  I've used quite
a few USB enclosures in the past years, and there are
significant performance differences.  As a rule of thumb,
the cheaper the box, the slower it is.  Of course there
are exceptions to that rule.

By the way, for backup purposes I use a hot-swappable
IDE drive frame.  The one I use is PATA (UDMA-133), but
there are also ones for SATA.  It's much faster than
USB and more reliable.  You can use atacontrol(8) to
attach and detach the drive while the system is running.
(For that to work reliably, the frame must be the only
device on its channel, i.e. no slave, in the PATA case.)

Best regards
  Oliver



I get good speeds from USB but they are bursty. I have a pair of  
identical controllers and both are USB/Firewire. Both have different  
brands and sizes of disk drive. Could the drive be part of the  
problem? One is connected via Firewire and doesn't have the bursty  
speed issue. I've only got it with USB.


The poster who mentioned that I'm only looking for a backup against  
catastrophic disk failure is spot on. Offsite backup is something I'll  
work out down the road.


Chris Hilton   e: chris|at|vindaloo| 
dot|com


  "The pattern juggler lifts his hand; The orchestra  
begin.
  As slowly turns the grinding wheel in the court of the crimson  
king."
   -- Ian McDonald / Peter  
Sinfield




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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Oliver Fromme
Wojciech Puchar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
 > > Cheap controller in the USB enclosure.  I've used quite
 > > a few USB enclosures in the past years, and there are
 > > significant performance differences.  As a rule of thumb,
 > > the cheaper the box, the slower it is.  Of course there
 > > are exceptions to that rule.
 > 
 > actually - firewire enclosures are not much more expensive, but you always 
 > get at least 40MB/s

Actually they are much more expensive.  And more difficult
to buy.  Most shops here don't have them at all, they only
have USB and eSATA, because most people want USB or eSATA.

I just looked at one of the most popular online shops around
here.  They have about 50 different USB enclosures; prices
start at 10 EUR.  But they have only six Firewire enclosures
(and none of them is 2.5"!), the cheapest one is 34 EUR.

However, they do have a larger number of eSATA enclosures,
about 30 different ones.  But I don't know how well FreeBSD
copes with hot-plugging of eSATA devices; I've never tried
one of these.  I'm not aware of any specific support yet,
but it might work just as well as hot-plug IDE frames.

Best regards
   Oliver

-- 
Oliver Fromme, secnetix GmbH & Co. KG, Marktplatz 29, 85567 Grafing b. M.
Handelsregister: Registergericht Muenchen, HRA 74606,  Geschäftsfuehrung:
secnetix Verwaltungsgesellsch. mbH, Handelsregister: Registergericht Mün-
chen, HRB 125758,  Geschäftsführer: Maik Bachmann, Olaf Erb, Ralf Gebhart

FreeBSD-Dienstleistungen, -Produkte und mehr:  http://www.secnetix.de/bsd

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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Robert Huff

Oliver Fromme writes:

>   > > >  you must have something wrong. my USB drive gets 27MB/s. yes this
>   > > >  480Mbit/s is USB isn't real, but half of it is.
>   > 
>   > i simply have no idea why it could work so slow.
>  
>  Cheap controller in the USB enclosure.  I've used quite
>  a few USB enclosures in the past years, and there are
>  significant performance differences.  As a rule of thumb,
>  the cheaper the box, the slower it is.  Of course there
>  are exceptions to that rule.

Would you care to offer experiences and recomendations?


Robert Huff

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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Wojciech Puchar

Cheap controller in the USB enclosure.  I've used quite
a few USB enclosures in the past years, and there are
significant performance differences.  As a rule of thumb,
the cheaper the box, the slower it is.  Of course there
are exceptions to that rule.


actually - firewire enclosures are not much more expensive, but you always 
get at least 40MB/s


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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Oliver Fromme
Wojciech Puchar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
 > > > 
 > > >  you must have something wrong. my USB drive gets 27MB/s. yes this
 > > >  480Mbit/s is USB isn't real, but half of it is.
 > > 
 > >   I agree.
 > >   Want to take this private and help figure out what's wrong?
 > > :-)
 > 
 > i simply have no idea why it could work so slow.

Cheap controller in the USB enclosure.  I've used quite
a few USB enclosures in the past years, and there are
significant performance differences.  As a rule of thumb,
the cheaper the box, the slower it is.  Of course there
are exceptions to that rule.

By the way, for backup purposes I use a hot-swappable
IDE drive frame.  The one I use is PATA (UDMA-133), but
there are also ones for SATA.  It's much faster than
USB and more reliable.  You can use atacontrol(8) to
attach and detach the drive while the system is running.
(For that to work reliably, the frame must be the only
device on its channel, i.e. no slave, in the PATA case.)

Best regards
   Oliver

-- 
Oliver Fromme, secnetix GmbH & Co. KG, Marktplatz 29, 85567 Grafing b. M.
Handelsregister: Registergericht Muenchen, HRA 74606,  Geschäftsfuehrung:
secnetix Verwaltungsgesellsch. mbH, Handelsregister: Registergericht Mün-
chen, HRB 125758,  Geschäftsführer: Maik Bachmann, Olaf Erb, Ralf Gebhart

FreeBSD-Dienstleistungen, -Produkte und mehr:  http://www.secnetix.de/bsd

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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Wojciech Puchar


 you must have something wrong. my USB drive gets 27MB/s. yes this
 480Mbit/s is USB isn't real, but half of it is.


I agree.
Want to take this private and help figure out what's wrong?
:-)


i simply have no idea why it could work so slow.
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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Robert Huff

Wojciech Puchar writes:

>  >I /do/ have problems with speed.  The fast recorded throughput
>  > was aroud 3.5 bytes/second; faster than the SCSI-1 DLT it replaces,
>
>  you must have something wrong. my USB drive gets 27MB/s. yes this 
>  480Mbit/s is USB isn't real, but half of it is.

I agree.
Want to take this private and help figure out what's wrong?
:-)


Robert Huff





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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Robert Huff

Wojciech Puchar writes:

Wojciech Puchar writes:

>  > Do the tapes get taken off-site, or do they sit in the same
>  > location that the servers will burn when a fire breaks out?
>  
>  probably sits on place, if not he wouldn't need tape changer, but
>  would change manually :)

The backup system previously mentioned stores the data four
feet from the machine serviced.  It is - explicitly - designed to
protect against catastrophic disk failure, not conflagration.
And the backup job runs at 01:59:00, when all operators are
happily asleep.
The other advantage to this system is the cost.  A (new) SCSI
LTO-2 and 35 tapes runs US $2000 and up; the same four week's
capacity is less than $400, maybe less than $300.


Robert Huff

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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Steve Bertrand

Steve Bertrand wrote:

Wojciech Puchar wrote:



  - monthly
  - yearly

...cycle them in that manner. No matter what anyone says, experience 
states that I will bet on my monthly and yearly tapes as opposed to hard 
disk every time when the CFO is under pressure to get that directory 
that was 'overlooked' at last fiscal tax time.


I've just realized that after being awake for far too long, some people 
may be reconsidering their use of tapes and replacing them with hard 
disks now ;)


Steve
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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-17 Thread Steve Bertrand

Wojciech Puchar wrote:


Do the tapes get taken off-site, or do they sit in the same location 
that the servers will burn when a fire breaks out?


probably sits on place, if not he wouldn't need tape changer, but would 
change manually :)


...not always. A tape changer in some cases is the difference between 
someone getting off of their a**, and not.


Once the network backup is complete, cycle this complete backup to 
tape which can be taken off site for longer term storage (after the 
network backup to 'hot' storage is done, the tape backup time becomes 
irrelevant).


today tapes are so expensive (not just drives, but tapes) that it's 
better to just have many disks and swap them.


Expensive is in the eye of the beholder. I have DDS-1 tapes, in the 
drawer above my head that are from pre-2001 that I can still pull data 
from. As a matter of fact, I've never (knock on wood) experienced a bad 
tape (numerous types).


In that meantime, I've electro-magnetized dozens of platter-based hard 
disk drives that just went 'bad' (and subsequently recovered/restored 
servers from live, and tape-based backup for).


I personally don't think that swapping hard-disks (one, or many per day) 
is a viable, feasible or cost effective approach as a backup solution 
for long-term data storage, especially if you prefer to be able to 
recover the data.


Here:

- network to live storage (hourly perhaps)
- live storage to tape
  - daily
  - weekly
  - monthly
  - yearly

...cycle them in that manner. No matter what anyone says, experience 
states that I will bet on my monthly and yearly tapes as opposed to hard 
disk every time when the CFO is under pressure to get that directory 
that was 'overlooked' at last fiscal tax time.


Steve
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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-16 Thread Wojciech Puchar


Do the tapes get taken off-site, or do they sit in the same location that the 
servers will burn when a fire breaks out?


probably sits on place, if not he wouldn't need tape changer, but would 
change manually :)


Once the network backup is complete, cycle this complete backup to tape which 
can be taken off site for longer term storage (after the network backup to 
'hot' storage is done, the tape backup time becomes irrelevant).


today tapes are so expensive (not just drives, but tapes) that it's better 
to just have many disks and swap them.


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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-16 Thread Wojciech Puchar

and six incremental backups.
I have had no problems with reliability.
I /do/ have problems with speed.  The fast recorded throughput
was aroud 3.5 bytes/second; faster than the SCSI-1 DLT it replaces,
you must have something wrong. my USB drive gets 27MB/s. yes this 
480Mbit/s is USB isn't real, but half of it is.

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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-16 Thread Steve Bertrand

Christopher Sean Hilton wrote:
I run FreeBSD 7.0-STABLE on a file server and until recently used a Tape 
Changer for backups. I'm considering my options for a new backup 
solution. I'm actually thinking of ditching tape and using an externally 
attached USB or Firewire disk drive.


Do the tapes get taken off-site, or do they sit in the same location 
that the servers will burn when a fire breaks out?


My experimentation isn't giving me good feelings about doing this with 
FreeBSD. To start this off I installed an Adaptec USB 2.0 interface into 
my server. In the time that I've been working with it I notice that it 
periodically bogs down and that it has the potential to panic the kernel 
and cause a reboot. I recognize that this could be:


 The USB card that I'm using.

 The chipset in the USB enclosure that I'm testing with.

Has anyone gone this route? If so what was your experience?


Yes, I use external USB 2.0 external disks for backup for workstations 
that are encrypted with either GELI or TrueCrypt on the fly.


The problem with USB hard disks is that they A) are prone to failure 
very quickly (as has been pointed out); and B) they never get taken 
off-site on a routine basis as they should.


My recommendation (FWIW) would be to build/buy/acquire a network storage 
device with a 1000Mbps Ethernet interface that you back up your entire 
network to. Depending on the size of your network, it may be advisable 
to pop an extra NIC (gigE) in every box that requires a backup and 
create yourself a private backup subnet, as to not disturb the 
production network.


Once the network backup is complete, cycle this complete backup to tape 
which can be taken off site for longer term storage (after the network 
backup to 'hot' storage is done, the tape backup time becomes irrelevant).


This setup provides an always-on, live-as-of-yesterday recovery 
mechanism without having to load tape.


Also, depending on the amount of data that requires backup, and the 
throughput capacity/cost of your Internet link(s), it is always a 
benefit to do an rsync (or equivalent) copy to a remote location, in 
order to best accommodate a 'hot spare' location (ie, users migrate to 
remote temporary location, and have to change as little as possible).


USB disks are as useful as the people that you put in charge of taking 
them off-site, multiplied by the number of drives you cycle, divided by 
the life expectancy of the disks (and/or the people taking them offsite ;)


One more thing...a good backup is not measured in how far back the 
backup goes...a good backup is measured in the amount of time it takes 
to recover from it


Steve
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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-16 Thread Christopher Sean Hilton


On Jun 16, 2008, at 7:34 PM, Chuck Swiger wrote:


On Jun 16, 2008, at 3:59 PM, Christopher Sean Hilton wrote:


External drives make nice, fast external hot-standby backups.  They  
are lousy for making long-term backups that you can take offsite,  
though.  I can and have restored decade old 20/40GB and 40/80GB  
DLTtape IV cartridges, and have happily moved to a 220GB sDLT drive.


I've got a few 10-year-old SCSI drives that still work, but I've yet  
to find a commodity PATA IDE or SATA IDE brand of drives which make  
it much over 5 years, and a large percentage have issues trying to  
get much past 3 years of heavy usage.




I've had pretty much the same result. SCSI Drives seem to have a solid  
lifetime of about 3+ years with some of them lasting better than 6.  
I'm not trying to keep my backups that long though. This is basically  
insurance against a catastrophic machine failure more than anything  
else. The machine in question has a Mylex Acceleraid 250 and RAID 5  
SCSI array with a hot spare. The function of this backup is to protect  
my time if the RAID array fails for some reason that I cannot diagnose  
quickly. To some extent I also need the ability to go back in time if  
delete a file by accident but that's happened once in the past 5 years.




While I really liked the AHA 1540/2940 controllers, I'm dubious  
about Adaptec's USB controllers.  I've got a few external drives  
with both USB2 and Firewire 400 interfaces, and they are faster and  
more reliable going over Firewire.  YMMV...




I've had the Adaptec Firewire controller and have the same problem as  
I do with the USB one. I have a hand full of USB drives in external  
enclosures that I used for different things. Mostly to transfer video  
from one place to another. Right now I'm using one of them and getting  
rid of some ancient video that I no longer need. My USB drive has a  
UFS2 filesystem on it and it's mounted with Softupdates turned on.  
When I remove a large file or a large directory. Everything works  
great for a minute and then file access to the drive just stalls. A  
good minute later everything is fine. The interface is either USB or  
Firewire because the enclosure can do either.


-- Chris

Chris Hilton   tildeChris -- http://myblog.vindaloo.com
email -- chris/at/vindaloo/ 
dot/com
.~ 
~ 
.--.~ 
~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.
 "I'm on the outside looking inside, What do  
I see?
   Much confusion, disillution, all  
around me."
 -- Ian McDonald / Peter  
Sinfield


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Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-16 Thread Robert Huff

Christopher Sean Hilton writes:

>  I run FreeBSD 7.0-STABLE on a file server and until recently used a  
>  Tape Changer for backups. I'm considering my options for a new backup  
>  solution. I'm actually thinking of ditching tape and using an  
>  externally attached USB or Firewire disk drive.
>
>  Has anyone gone this route? If so what was your experience?

I have been using this for at least a year - USB2 connecting to
a PATA drive.  The protocol dumps a week's worth on one disk: a full
and six incremental backups.
I have had no problems with reliability.
I /do/ have problems with speed.  The fast recorded throughput
was aroud 3.5 bytes/second; faster than the SCSI-1 DLT it replaces,
but nowhere near the 60 mbytes/second of the USB,  (Yes, I know it's
"theoretical maximum" ... but even if we halve it and then halve is
again, we're still factor-of-4 off the actual performance.)  This
has resisted serious attempts for remedy,
Hardware:
no-name disks
Addonics Saturn drive cartridge system
Acer Labs USB2 add-on controller


Robert Huff

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Re: Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-16 Thread Chuck Swiger

On Jun 16, 2008, at 3:59 PM, Christopher Sean Hilton wrote:
I run FreeBSD 7.0-STABLE on a file server and until recently used a  
Tape Changer for backups. I'm considering my options for a new  
backup solution. I'm actually thinking of ditching tape and using an  
externally attached USB or Firewire disk drive.


External drives make nice, fast external hot-standby backups.  They  
are lousy for making long-term backups that you can take offsite,  
though.  I can and have restored decade old 20/40GB and 40/80GB  
DLTtape IV cartridges, and have happily moved to a 220GB sDLT drive.


I've got a few 10-year-old SCSI drives that still work, but I've yet  
to find a commodity PATA IDE or SATA IDE brand of drives which make it  
much over 5 years, and a large percentage have issues trying to get  
much past 3 years of heavy usage.


My experimentation isn't giving me good feelings about doing this  
with FreeBSD. To start this off I installed an Adaptec USB 2.0  
interface into my server. In the time that I've been working with it  
I notice that it periodically bogs down and that it has the  
potential to panic the kernel and cause a reboot. I recognize that  
this could be:


While I really liked the AHA 1540/2940 controllers, I'm dubious about  
Adaptec's USB controllers.  I've got a few external drives with both  
USB2 and Firewire 400 interfaces, and they are faster and more  
reliable going over Firewire.  YMMV...


Regards,
--
-Chuck

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Replacing tape changer with USB disk drives.

2008-06-16 Thread Christopher Sean Hilton
I run FreeBSD 7.0-STABLE on a file server and until recently used a  
Tape Changer for backups. I'm considering my options for a new backup  
solution. I'm actually thinking of ditching tape and using an  
externally attached USB or Firewire disk drive.


My experimentation isn't giving me good feelings about doing this with  
FreeBSD. To start this off I installed an Adaptec USB 2.0 interface  
into my server. In the time that I've been working with it I notice  
that it periodically bogs down and that it has the potential to panic  
the kernel and cause a reboot. I recognize that this could be:


 The USB card that I'm using.

 The chipset in the USB enclosure that I'm testing with.

Has anyone gone this route? If so what was your experience?

-- Chris

Chris Hilton   tildeChris -- http://myblog.vindaloo.com
email -- chris/at/vindaloo/ 
dot/com
.~ 
~ 
.--.~ 
~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.--.~~.
 "I'm on the outside looking inside, What do  
I see?
   Much confusion, disillution, all  
around me."
 -- Ian McDonald / Peter  
Sinfield


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