Rig of the Day: mini RAID

Althought this setup is not meant for production, what is the performance like to the drives? Is it a Raid 5 set? I am considering a 3 drive raid 5 setup as a media server running from a new MacMini with front row. Any thoughts on how well it could serve our digital video? I'm concerned the machine will not have enough performance to run the Raid Level 5 processes and feed out the video without frames dropping.

this machine is by no means meant to be a productive server people would do serious work with.

it is just a backup. a very expandible one, that is. you can add almost infinite drive space to it and it looks cute - and it's a mac. that's the reasons i chose it.
the drives are handled as one logical volume, they synch their contens with the main server every five minutes.

so, if the main server goes down, a maximum of five minutes of work is lost and everybody can switch to the mini and continue working until the main server goes online again.

i didn't have any problem fitting the hard drives in those cases. that is, once i figured the first one out. ;)

all in all the whole setup took me less than one hour. that's including unpacking the stuff, installing the drives in the cases, hooking it all together, creating the NRAID volume, creating the users, etc.
impossible to do this in such a short time using linux... ;)

...still waiting for the Mini Stack with card reader, FW/USB2 Hubs and integrated Digital TV Tuner built in. I'm fed up of waiting for Apple to build that lot in to the Mini...

.....Oh and at least some of the ports need to be on the front/side where you can actually get to them.

Hey Omdot,
great setup.
I am looking forward for a RAID 1 setup.
Any ideas/links/tips to get me started.
I have a Lacie 1TB.
Thanks in advance.

How funny. I just purchased one from Newer where it is known as the MiniStack for $69. I didn't know it was a generic item. I didn't read the manual (at first) and it only took about 5 minutes to pop the drive into it--just dropped it into the top. It doesn't have Apple's almost perfect fit-n-finish but overall it's very nice. Gives you some extra much-needed ports (though none on the front still) and supports large drives (over 128 MB) with its ATA/133 controller. Very nice unit.

When Apple introduced the Mac Mini, their site showed 5 of them stacked--roughly the height of a plain-vanilla minitower PC that was next to them in the pic. The pic quickly came off the site once Apple's official position became "don't put anything on top of a Mini."

Could the owner of the mini raid explain the setup if possible? Are the extra hard drives dasisy chained through firewire? This is software raid correct? And then for the automatic take over what do you mean? Is this a file server?

the URL that I posted was eaten by the blog server, try this one:

http://dealmac.com/deals/LACC-mini-Companion-for-59/109005.html

Those are actually drive enclosures sold under a variety of names such as Mini Stack or Mini Companion. LACC has them for $60 right now (you just put in any desktop hard drive, which are very cheap)
http://www.lacomputercompany.com/cgi-bin/rpcart/index.cgi?command=dispitem&type=sku&sku=23737

I have one for my girlfriends Mac Mini with a 120gb drive in it -- the fit and finish of this device is lacking. The color is a close match to the Mini but it is plastic, so it's not exact. Getting the drive to fit inside will take you about 45 minutes -- don't bother trying to use the screws that hold the drive or you'll never fit it. You'll want to put the Mini on top, as the white plastic top is sort of cheap looking (and unmarked).

However, it works as advertised, isn't especially loud (louder than the Mini, however), and does have a built in USB and Firewire hub which is helpful. If you've got spare IDE drives (even from Windows computers) laying around, or watch for deals online/in the paper for IDE drives (which can be had in large sizes for very cheap), you can't go wrong.

These are Iomega drives. A bit expensive for what they are, I bought the 250GB one for 250 euros but they do look nice.

These are the MacPower M9-DX cases. They come without hard drives.
But iomega is selling exactly the same cases with hard drives already built in - and with a iomega logo.
You can find the cases' specs here:
http://www.macpower.com.tw/products/hdd3/m9/m9dx