Data Robotics Drobo Hard Drive Array

Drobo utilizes a revolutionary storage technology that makes it simple for anyone to use, yet is powerful enough for business. Once you experience the power of Drobo, the idea of keeping multiple external drives or a RAID 5 array will seem as antiquated as that 28.8Kbps modem in the back of your closet.

Add Your Review

Not a member? Register Now.

Add Your Review

E-mail Address

Password

Sign In

Forgot your password?

Submit your Review

On a scale of 1 to 5 stars, how would you rate this product?
5 - Superior 4 - Very Good 3 - Good 2 - Fair 1 - Poor

How Long have you owned or used this product?
Days Weeks Months Years

What are this product's strengths?

What are this product's weaknesses?

What's your overall evaluation?

Submit

• Reviewed by: robberns

  03-17-09

  Duration of ownership: 1 Years

  Strengths: Ease of set-up, expansion capabilities

  Weaknesses:Speed, if that is what you need.

  Overall Evaluation: I have had a drobo for about a year, has worked flawlessly. The previous reviewer has no clue as to how the drobo works, it is NOT RAID, they have their own redundancy scheme. There is no software or hardware that needs to be installed, the drobo takes care of all of the overhead. I agree that the price is a bit high when you add drives, but for what it does, there is no comparison to "creating your own" with a PC, drives, RAID hardware, etc...

• Reviewed by:

  02-07-09

  Duration of ownership:

  Strengths: supposedly easy to set up

  Weaknesses:priceno drives includedno Etherneteasy to set up means hard to diagnose problems when they occur

  Overall Evaluation: $410 is very expensive for what the box does. In fact, it's so expensive that I fault Mwave for offering it. Here are some problems with the device:* No drives included. You'll have to spend at minimum ~$250 more for 500MB drives or ~$400 for 1 TB drives.* No indication of what kind of RAID is supported: hardware-based or software-based. It it's hardware-based, you are stuck forever with that brand of controller (which is?). If it's software-based, then (in theory) you can move it to another system.* No Ethernet. This is inexcusable for a box that costs this much. It should offer Gigabit Ethernet.A cheaper and just as feature-full alternative is to buy a cheap desktop PC and stick some drives in it. Use the RAID capabilities of your OS (Windows, Linux or BSD) to manage the disks. Cost of cheap PC: less than $300.Of course you'll have to do some work, but you could hire someone for $50/hr to set it up for you and still come out ahead.

• Reviewed by: GoldenAnkh1

  09-12-08

  Duration of ownership: 4 Days

  Strengths: ease of use, small form factor, ability to use multiple sized hard drives

  Weaknesses:none noted

  Overall Evaluation: I like the easy set up and maintenance of the Drobo. Not everyone has the technical knowledge to set up and maintain a RAID system. Some of us simply want to prevent our precious music, videos, and pictures from being lost without a lot of headaches! Drobo does this quite well!!

See more user reviews »