Edit Expertise: Storage Shootout
Feb 1, 2008 12:00 PM, By Dan Ochiva
Testing two external storage array options for today's content producer.
The SimpleTech Duo Pro Drive (left) and the G-Tech G-RAID2 (right) are both now owned by Fabrik, which makes that company a good place to start your search for usable, well-priced external storage.
Solid-state storage drives (SSD) are generating a lot of noise as the putative next big thing, but spinning-hard-drive storage isn't going away any time soon. In January, for example, leading drive manufacturer Seagate reported profits that were nearly triple those from the same quarter in the previous year. The dramatically lower costs of spinning hard drives vs. SSDs will continue to drive corporate (and personal) spending.
We'll look at two external arrays that employ the latest SATA-type hard drives. These products from SimpleTech and G-Technology (G-Tech) feature leading high-speed connections such as eSATA and FireWire 800. The review will be a little less competitive than I had expected, however; Fabrik announced at MacWorld that it had purchased G-Tech in an undisclosed cash-and-stock transaction.
Fabrik is on a roll. Founded in 2005 by veterans of Maxtor and Western Digital with money from Intel's venture-capital arm (among others), Fabrik bought out the consumer-product business of SimpleTech — a leading maker of hard disk drive-based external, portable, and network storage gear — in 2007.
G-Tech, meanwhile, was spun off from Medea, which itself was acquired by Avid in 2006. With its products' emphasis on FireWire connectivity and striking physical resemblance to Apple's sleek Mac Pro and G5 workstation designs, G-Tech has long been a favorite of the Mac graphics and editing crowd.
G-Tech G-RAID2
Originally, I had planned to review one of the most recent G-Tech arrays, the G-Speed eS, with capacities of 1TB to 16TB. The unit ships with an eSATA RAID card that offloads all RAID processing. It requires a 4X slot on the motherboard. My speedy motherboard, however, lacked a 4X slot, and only smaller 1X slots were available. Too bad. The company rates the eS drive array at a very fast 135MBps throughput.
Instead, I opted for G-RAID2, a triple-interface array that runs to 2TB capacity. (I used the entry-level 500GB version.) The initial G-RAID, introduced in 2004, became very popular with Mac users because of its tough build and glitch-free FireWire 400 interface; later versions added FireWire 800 ports. G-RAID2 costs less than ever, too. In 2005, a 1TB FireWire 800-enabled G-RAID came with a list price of $1,300. Today, you can get a similarly sized G-RAID2 for $600.
I did my tests on a home-brew system with a 2.44GHz Intel Core 2 Quad 6600, a Gigabyte GA-P35C-DS3R motherboard with 2GB RAM, and an Nvidia Quadro FX 4100 graphics card. I was running Windows XP Service Pack 2, and I used Simpli Software HD Tach to rate the drive performance.
G-Tech touts RAID 0 as being available for its G-RAID2 class arrays, and that's the best way to get speedy results from such a modestly priced unit. My 500GB model featured dual Hitachi 7200rpm SATA II hard drives. These are capable performers that use an 8MB cache. It took only a moment for Windows to recognize the system as a RAID 0 array (its default) after I plugged it in.
But even with a speedy RAID array, connection speed matters. USB 2.0, getting a bit long in the tooth, promises a theoretical 480Mbps throughput, which equals 60MBps. Average read speeds in my tests were a more humble 34.8MBps. That's about 12.5GB per hour. If you're loading files from a big project, it can be pretty time-consuming to transfer at that speed. Moving up to a FireWire 400 connection, things improved a notch. Average reads were now up to 41.3MBps, with burst rates to 42.7MBps.
But with FireWire 800 available, you won't look back. Write speeds averaged 67MBps, and the read speed came in at 68MBps.
(While USB and FireWire 400 cables are pretty common and cheap to come by, G-Tech helpfully includes a FireWire 800 cable — something that can get a little pricey if bought separately from a reputable cable manufacturer.)
The G-RAID2 is well-designed, with a solid, heavy-duty feel. The thick metal, with its handsome anodized finish, won't scratch or dent easily, so you won't mind having it out when clients come around. The included power brick and FireWire 800 cabling also feel substantial. Even the plastic and rubber parts have that subtle “quality” surface feel that's not easy to put into words, but that shows a thoroughness that makes you feel comfortable about the whole rig.
When considering any storage product, video editors will want to know how many usable streams of video a drive array can handle. Of course, it's not a simple matter of comparing theoretical connection speeds.
