Mac OS X 10.7 "Lion" is coming, and it's bringing a few storage features to the table

Apple’s not an enterprise company or a storage company. In fact, they’re rapidly jettisoning both – consider the sad fate of the Xserve RAID. But Apple does have enterprise features and storage features in their operating systems. And Mac OS X 10.7 “Lion” is a great case in point. From Versions to Time Machine Local Snapshots to AirDrop, Lion brings some storage love, and iCloud’s Storage API could be game-changing. Let’s look at what’s new and key in terms of storage in the latest version of Mac OS X.

New and Updated Storage Features in Lion

Lion is strong on consumer-oriented features, of course. And Apple is leading the industry in pushing user-friendly storage features for data protection and sharing. OS features like Core Data incremental storage enable Auto Save and Versions, Time Machine gets local snapshots, and FileVault is updated into a whole-disk encryption (WDE) tool.

Update: Probably the most important storage feature, CoreStorage, went un-covered! Read more at Mac OS X Lion Adds CoreStorage, a Volume Manager (Finally!)

Auto Save, Versions, and Resume

AutoSave and Versions leverage advances in HFS+ and a new Core API

Like iOS, Lion enhances the “back where you were” nature of computing with Auto Save, Versions, and system Resume. These completely change the end-user computing experience: Applications don’t have temporal “use once” interfaces but have lasting, historical state. And the ability to move through time (à la Time Machine)

Of course, lots of applications have had auto-save in the past. But Lion adds OS-level interfaces and APIs to enable applications to save data in a standard way. And these will be integrated with Resume (see below) for a very iOS-like experience.

Lion enables all this by enhancing the old, familiar HFS+ filesystem with Core Data incremental storage, a snapshot-like interface to save and recover multiple point-in-time instances of a single document. This is a delta differencing system, probably on a block level, in the filesystem.

Versions are accessed through the title bar document name, as well as a Time Machine-like interface in some applications. Applications can open up multiple versions of the same document at once, and you can cut and paste between them.

Resume is very cool. Applications using the new Lion APIs can save their state, even through reboots! This is what computers should have always done, but no one ever implemented it. Why should a reboot wipe out where you were last? Although not really a storage feature, resume relies on Auto Save and new APIs to store application state.

Time Machine Local Snapshots

Time Machine in Mac OS X "Lion" includes local snapshots as well as storage of backups on external disks

See also Local Snapshots in Mac OS X Lion Time Machine: Is It A Good Idea?

And speaking of Time Machine, it’s been enhanced with Local Snapshots, a mechanism for storing data on the local drive in addition to an external Time Machine drive. The Time Machine interface combines local snapshots and the backup drive or Time Capsule into a single timeline when browsing.

This appears to use Core Data incremental storage as well, though it’s not definite. And it’s unclear how local snapshots will interact with Versions.

AirDrop

See also Snooping on AirDrop in Apple’s Mac OS X 10.7 “Lion”

AirDrop is a new wireless file sharing protocol. Although it smacks of Wi-Fi Direct or Bluetooth, it’s neither. Instead, AirDrop is a newly-developed proprietary mechanism of sharing data between two Macs over a Wi-Fi link. It’ll be speedy and simple but incompatible with the vast majority of systems out there.

FileVault 2

Face it, FileVault was little-used and unfriendly. That’s all changed with FileVault 2 in Lion. It’s encryption done right and might just push average Apple users to protect their data. Kind of like what Time Machine did for backup. That’s a good thing.

What’s new in FileVault 2?

• Full-disk encryption, rather than an image-based hack.
• Encrypt in place, in the background, while you work. No more waiting and losing your computer for hours or days while encryption is installed. And the encryption process will resume even after a reboot (or two)!
• Encrypt external drives, too. Very sweet, especially for Time Machine backups!
• Remote wipe service, probably through iCloud
• XTS-AES 128 support

FileVault 2 is full-disk only, but supports multiple users (each with their own encrypted home area) by storing the full-disk key in each user’s keychain. They access it by using their login password, just like they always did. Apple will offer an option to store the encryption key in iCloud, but this does not appear to be the default condition.

Of course, users with poor passwords, or those vulnerable to social engineering, will still be vulnerable. But some encryption beats no encryption any day! Lion uses the login window for sleep and screen savers, so FileVault 2 protects in those states as well.

NFSv4

Lion adds support for NFS version 4, which is a welcome update. But it doesn’t appear to support version 4.1, or parallel NFS.

SMB with DFS

DFS is a technology in Microsoft Windows that virtualizes file server shares, improving flexibility. Lion’s SMB client supports DFS when connecting to Windows file servers.

Xsan Built In

Mac OS X Server will now be an optional extra to add to the standard Lion install, rather than a separate SKU. Part of this shift is the integration of Xsan, Apple’s OEM version of Quantum’s StorNext SAN file system. Xsan has been quite popular in the media space on client machines, and it appears that it does not require a Server license.

Xsan also gets case-insensitive volumes, which brings it more in line with the expectations of users used to HFS+. Finally, Lion gets ALUA-compatible multipathing, supporting a wide variety of storage arrays.

Probable: TRIM Support for SSDs

Apple enabled TRIM in certain versions of 10.6 “Snow Leopard”, but it only supported their OEM SSDs. Lion probably gets a fully-supported TRIM implementation that works with any SSD with TRIM, though this was not mentioned at WWDC or online. This is a welcome update, and one too-long in coming!

Stephen’s Stance

Mac OS X “Lion” doesn’t give storage folks much, but it could be a harbinger of massive changes. Although not part of Lion per se, the iCloud Storage API will likely see much use by application developers. But even Lion’s smaller storage feature list is welcome. Simple full-disk encryption in FileVault and Core Data incremental storage are promising. Let’s just hope TRIM comes along for the ride!

On the enterprise side of things, Lion is improving as a storage client with NFSv4, DFS, and Xsan built in. But there’s no mention of an iSCSI client, suggesting that project is dead. Thank goodness for Studio Network Solutions! And we’re still stuck with HFS+, suggesting the ZFS transition is off the table, too. Too bad – Versions and FileVault would have been much easier to implement on ZFS!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | Key Storage Features in Mac OS X 10.7 “Lion”
This post was categorized as Apple, Enterprise storage, Everything, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Apple is readying the next major release of their Mac OS X operating system. Dubbed “Lion”, Mac OS X 10.7 is widely expected to hit Apple stores in the Summer of 2011, and brings many exciting new features along for the ride. This series of articles introduces the storage and data protection features of Lion as they are revealed.

Time Machine in Mac OS X "Lion" includes local snapshots as well as storage of backups on external disks

Many operating systems include a backup client, but not many are as widely-used as Time Machine in Apple’s Mac OS X. Time Machine presents an extremely simple interface for data protection, making backups literally a one click task. Until the release of Lion, Time Machine required the use of the second hard disk drive, often an external USB or Apple network attached unit. In 10.7, Time Machine gains the ability to use the local primary hard disk drive to store snapshots of files. Is this really a good idea?

What are you protecting against?

One reason so many people are dissatisfied with their backup solution is that they use it for too many conflicting purposes. They expect the same application to provide short-term file recovery, bare metal restore in the event of a hard disk crash, long-term retention of data, and even off-site disaster recovery.

Most back of applications, including Time Machine, are very good when it comes to short-term file recovery but fall short in answering these other demands. A “best-of-breed” solution requires a number of different applications for end users or a pile of money for their enterprise counterparts.

The real innovation of Time Machine was it ease-of-use: When a user attached and external hard drive, Mac OS X asked for permission to use it as a backup target and automatically configured all other aspects of the system. File recovery is done in a very user-friendly way, with a Cover Flow like interface to move forward and backward through different versions of the folder.

But Time Machine requires a second hard disk drive, and very few Macs ship from Apple in this configuration. Although paired storage is becoming more common, the majority of MacBooks and iMacs ship with a single internal hard disk drive. Until the end user purchases and connects their own external drive, these systems would be unprotected.

Introducing Time Machine local snapshots

Mac OS X 10.7 “Lion” introduces a number of storage enhancements, including the ability to track versions of files in Finder. Time Machine gets a similar function, storing local versions of files in addition to standard backups on an extra drive.

It is not at all clear if Time Machine’s local snapshots capability leverages the “Versions” feature or simply stores files locally the same way it does on an external drive. But the end result is the same: Users will be able to protect their data even when no external drive is attached.

There are serious drawbacks to this approach, however. Storing backup data on the same hard disk drive does not protect from the loss or failure of that device, and hard disk crashes are fairly common, especially in portable devices. This could also present security concerns, since a laptop using Time Machine local snapshots would store confidential data locally long after it is deleted.

Clearly, Apple realizes the limitations of this strategy, and will still recommend using an external drive for Time Machine backups. But it is better to have a local copy of data than none at all, and Time Machine local snapshots will likely be a boon to the average MacBook user.

Stephen’s stance

Although it is not a full-featured backup application, I heartily endorse Time Machine since its ease-of-use encourages average users to backup their data and enables them to recover lost files in a user-friendly environment. Time Machine local snapshots add another layer of protection for Apple users on the go. As long as they do not rely on local snapshots exclusively for data protection, I call that a win.

I wonder whether end-users that have experienced Time Machine are more or less likely to deploy a real backup application or an off-site backup service like Mozy or Crashplan. Perhaps Time Machine piques their interest in data protection, causing them to go out and purchase such a service. A multilayered approach with Time Machine local snapshots and external storage plus an online backup service is light years beyond the data protection enjoyed by average users.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | Local Snapshots in Mac OS X Lion Time Machine: Is It A Good Idea?
This post was categorized as Apple, Everything, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Have you seen this dialog box? Is it an error or a help?

But Apple recently rolled out a ”Time Capsule Backup Update”, and included it in Mac OS X 10.6.4, that is causing confusion and concern. In the name of improving “the reliability of your Time Capsule backup,” this update has the unfortunate side-effect of detecting errors in existing backup bundles and forcing users to start a new backup. It happened with two of my Macs so far, so I was keen to find out what’s going on.

Verifiably Bad

Time Machine may look simple, but it’s an incredibly complex piece of software. It uses multiple kernel-level features and builds a complete files-level copy of your data in a “bundle” that acts like a virtual drive. Rather than storing files multiple times (which would be space-inefficient) or hard-linking them (which is efficient for space but would take a long time), OS X adds directory-level hard links, a fairly new concept. So if no changes have been made in your /Applications directory, it just creates a single link to a previous copy. OS X also includes a new daemon to monitor changes on a directory basis, which is also fairly cool in a geeky sort of way.

This intricate but powerful system can lead to trouble, however. If a backup process is interrupted while it is working, the relationships between directories, files, and dates can become corrupted. This is especially common for network-mounted drives, explaining Apple’s reluctance to allow non-Apple NAS units to be backup targets. But even local direct-attached drives can sometimes become corrupted over months of operation.

As (poorly) explained in Apple’s Knowledge Base article HT4076, corruption can cause previous Time Machine backups to be unavailable. So Apple introduced a more-robust mechanism to check backup integrity and rolled it out in Software Update and as part of OS X 10.6.4. It scans old backups and, if errors are found, flags them read-only and starts a new backup bundle. See this Apple Support Discussion thread and this web site for more information.

What You Should Do

Let’s cut through the confusion caused by Apple’s typical lack of explanation.

Should you install this update? Yes! Corrupt backup images are bad, regardless of the cause, and you need to know whether yours is good or not. Installing the update might cause you to start a new backup bundle, but at least you’ll know your data is safe!

Should you click “Start New Backup”? Not yet! If you see the dialog above, your existing Time Machine backup is corrupt, and you might not be able to recover data from it. But you can save a copy of the corrupt bundle and, perhaps, extract some data from it if needed.

Ask yourself if Time Machine has saved data you might need before deciding what to do next:

1. If you are sure you won’t need anything backed up before today, click “Start New Backup” and let Time Machine do its thing.
2. Otherwise, click “Back Up Later” and save a copy before letting Time Machine start a new backup. Just look for a file called “computername.sparsebundle” (for network backups) or “Backups.backupdb” (for local ones) and create a copy with a different name. You can open sparsebundle files with DiskImageMounter and browse them like any other disk. More information is available here.

There you go. If you click “Start New Backup” when you see this dialog box, Time Machine will erase all of your old backup data and start a new bundle. It won’t be corrupt, but it will be empty.

Note that you can manually initiate a Time Machine backup integrity check by option-clicking the “Time Machine” icon in the menu bar and selecting “Verify Backups.”

Stephen’s Stance

Backups are good.

Corrupt backups are bad.

Time Machine encourages backups, and works pretty efficiently, so it’s good.

This update ensures that Time Machine’s backups aren’t corrupt, so it’s good.

‘Nuff said.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2010. | “Time Machine completed a verification of your backups. To improve reliability, Time Machine must create a new backup for you.”
This post was categorized as Apple. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Iomega's new ix2-200 sports iSCSI, Time Machine, and QuickTransfer

EMC’s low-end storage specialist, Iomega, today introduced a two-drive version of their iSCSI-capable StorCenter NAS line. The ix2-200 also adds native Time Machine support, data synchronization (including a QuickTransfer button), spin-down for its new low-power drives, and will soon boast VMware and Hyper-V compatibility certification. It also sports a more modern (and much less ugly) look and re-calibrated pricing from its predecessor.

Dual-ing Drives

Do you like losing data? If not, I have a simple piece of advice for you: The age of single-disk-drive backup has passed. With new hard disk drives failure rates over 5% per year, massive capacity, and the possibility of bit errors, the use of a single disk drive for backup or long-term retention of precious data is simply irresponsible.

Although a single-drive backup is better than no backup at all, I can no longer recommend the use of single-drive devices like Apple’s Time Capsule or the popular Western Digital, Maxtor, and Seagate USB drives. Redundant multi-drive rigs like the Iomega StorCenter and Drobo and online backup services should be considered a requirement for all computer users. Anything less is a recipe for disaster.

This new ix2 from Iomega is available in three configurations, each boasting two redundant disk drives, thus the “ix2″ name:

1. A 1 TB unit ($269.99 list) offers 500 GB of usable space
2. The sweet spot is the 2 TB unit ($369.99 list) offering 1 TB of usable space
3. A 4 TB unit ($699.99 list) offering 2 TB of usable space will be introduced later in the month

Note that, like all Iomega StorCenter devices, the drives in the ix2 can not be swapped out for later units to give more capacity. Even though this new unit boasts user-replaceable drives, only official Iomega spares are supported. In fact, swapping in a different drive (even one which claims to offer the same capacity) might cause the unit to fail! If you want to be able to expand capacity in the future, buy an HP MediaSmart or Drobo.

New Tricks

The “-200″ in the ix2-200 name proclaims this the second-generation ix2 unit. Like the similar second-generation ix4-200, this device boasts a faster CPU, iSCSI target support, and additional functionality. Let’s look at the best of these new features:

• Like the ix4, the ix2-200 now includes iSCSI target support. Iomega’s implementation is surprisingly full-featured and robust compared to their competitors, and those wanting to learn and experiment with iSCSI should look no further.
• Performance should be much-improved due to the 1 GHz Marvell CPU and 256 MB of RAM, but both are de-tuned from the ix4, which boasts 1.2 GHz and 512 MB of RAM. Don’t expect massive IOPS or blazing throughput, though: It is still only has two drive spindles to service requests.
• The use of low-power Seagate drives and a variable-speed fan, both of which can be spun down, means that the ix2 should be quieter and use less electricity than its predecessor. I expect it to use less than 25 Watts at full-speed and as little as 1 Watt when idle.
• The native Time Machine target support makes the new ix2 much more friendly to Mac users and the 2-drive configuration makes this a compelling Time Capsule alternative.
• The front-mounted QuickTransfer button allows the ix2 to slurp in the content of any attached USB drive. Users can also set up scheduled sync jobs for network-attached file shares.

All of these features premiered with the ix4-200d in August, but this new device is missing that unit’s dual gigabit Ethernet ports and LCD screen, as well as its extra RAM and faster CPU.

Who Buys the ix2?

Its low(er) price and raft of features makes the Iomega ix2-200 an attractive dual-drive system for home office or light business use. But don’t be fooled by the iSCSI support and VMware ESX compatibility: This is not serious storage for servers. Two 5900 rpm hard disk drives, 1 GHz of CPU power, 256 MB of shared RAM, and a single Gigabit Ethernet port do not add up to high performance. My experience testing an ix4-200d demo unit shows that Iomega’s software RAID and iSCSI stack seriously curtail both throughput and I/O speed. The fact that an inexpensive home storage system isn’t a blazing performer should not shock anyone, however.

Dual-drive storage devices may appear to have questionable value, priced much higher than (worthless) single-drive units but lacking the performance of 4- or 8-drive devices. But we expect buyers to migrate in this direction as single-drive devices fail. Indeed, it is the ix2′s low cost and high availability that will eventually spell success. Packed with appealing features, we expect to see sub-$300 street pricing for the 2 TB ix2 from time to time. At that price, it represents a killer bargain for the computer enthusiast and small-office alike. Oddball features like VMware support, iSCSI, and security camera support will likely win buyers here and there as well.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2009. | Iomega ix2-200 Adds iSCSI, Sync To Dual-Drive SOHO NAS
This post was categorized as Apple, Enterprise storage, Terabyte home, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

The Iomega ix4-200d is a sleek 4-drive SOHO RAID system that does just about everything, from NAS to Time Machine to iSCSI for a list price right around $700

Iomega is well into its second coming as EMC’s entry-level storage division. First, they applied EMC’s compact and full-featured LifeLine home storage software to existing gear, giving birth to the Home Media Network Hard Drive, StorCenter ix2, and StorCenter Pro ix4-100. Then they wooed the small-business community with the rack-mount StorCenter ix4-200r, adding iSCSI target support and VMware compatibility.

Today, they are back with the new ix4-200d, probably Iomega’s best product yet. It includes every feature of the rack-mount ix4-200r, including NAS and iSCSI target mode plus great new stuff like one-touch synchronization. All of this is packaged in a Drobo-like desktop system with a starting list price of just $700, or less than half the cost of a comparable ix4-200r!

Desktop Storage

External desktop storage products, exemplified by Western Digital’s wildly successful My Book series, have been a huge retail hit. Priced just over $100, these drives pack a terabyte or more and offer plug and play simplicity. I recently visited a small business with a WD or Seagate USB enclosure on every single desk. I’ve purchased five USB- or FireWire-connected hard drives myself over the last two years!

But these single-drive desktop wonders are a disaster waiting to happen:

• They fail frequently (like my Maxtor 3200), instantly wiping out the data they contained
• They are targets for thieves, so data loss prevention (DLP) experts warn against their use
• They aren’t shareable natively, so most people resort to sneakernet swapping rather than fight with Windows to present them as a network share
• When they’re full, they’re full, forcing the purchase of a whole new drive

Many vendors sell grown-up versions that address some or all of these concerns with multiple drives, network connections, and encryption, but these have been slow to catch on. Since they contain redundant drives and extra hardware and software, they are much more expensive than their little cousins. Iomega has done battle in this arena with their original StorCenter ix2 and the ix4-100, but these have yet to catch on. Even Drobo, with their fanatical user-friendly focus, has failed to convince many buyers.

Then there is the world of business storage. Way down at the bottom of the enterprise storage pyramid lies the realm of small 4- and 8-drive storage arrays. These SMB storage arrays offer a lot of capacity and reliability for the money but very little in the way of features. Iomega’s StorCenter Pro ix4-200r, in contrast, wowed the techies with a full iSCSI target stack that was certified for VMware ESX. But the price, over $1500, definitely limited sales to the home hobbyist.

“Just Right” Storage

Although the name is similar to the StorCenter Pro ix4-200r launched this Spring, Iomega went back to the drawing board for the ix4-200d. They built an entirely new device that could offer the impressive features of their StorCenter Pro line at a price closer to consumer storage offerings. The result boasts everything the Pro has and more at less than half the price:

• You want connectivity? The ix4 sports dual gigabit Ethernet ports that can be teamed up for performance or split off for redundancy.
• You want NAS? The ix4 supports NFS, SMB, and even Apple’s AFP, plus it’s Active Directory compatible.
• How about iSCSI? It’s a full-featured iSCSI target, certified for Microsoft Server 2003 and 2008.
• Want to host virtual machines? The ix4 is certified with VMware ESX 4 vSphere using both NFS and iSCSI, on the Xen HCL, and that Microsoft logo means it will work with Hyper-V as well.
• Need backup? The ix4 comes with EMC’s Retrospect and supports OS X Time Machine over AFP just like an Apple Time Capsule.
• Looking for weird features? How about support for up to 5 Axis network cameras, BlueTooth Picture Transfer Protocol, and UPnP/DLNA media service!
• Iomega also added a new feature, QuickTransfer, to synchronize files between devices.

This is one seriously feature-rich storage system. In fact, this glut of features is the ix4′s Achilles heel: How do you effectively communicate the value of a device that does so much? Most of the buying public has never heard of most of these features, so the price remains hard for some to justify.

Every ix4 configuration comes loaded with four hard disk drives

Another hurdle for the ix4 is Iomega’s decision to fill it with hard drives. One cannot buy an empty ix4-200d, and both the 2 TB and 4 TB configurations come loaded with four hard disk drives. This raises the price of entry and scares off the very techies who might be interested in the device. The majority of Drobos are purchased with no drives at all, and storage geeks like me love the idea that disks can be added as-needed in the future. Although Iomega is open to users swapping out the drives in their own StorCenter device, this is not its intended use case. Iomega’s decision to sell the ix4-200d as a loaded appliance seems counter to the price sensitivity and flexibility needs of buyers.

QuickTransfer: Data Synchronization for Everything

One nifty new feature included with the ix4-200d is QuickTransfer, a one-touch data synchronization capability. Leveraging rsync technology, but hiding this complexity with a more-friendly wizard-based GUI, QuickTransfer allows users to set up synchronization jobs between the ix4 and a variety of targets:

• USB drives can be plugged into one of the three USB 2.0 ports and synchronized with a subset of the content of the ix4. For example, a portable USB drive could be “recharged” with the latest set of data before one heads out of the office.
• Two Iomega ix4′s, or other NAS systems for that matter, can be synchronized over the Ethernet/IP LAN. This would provide a robust and bandwidth-friendly remote office backup or data replication solution.
• A PC or Mac can also be synchronized over a network share, providing a simple alternative to the bundled backup software.

QuickTransfer is exclusive to the ix4-200d for now, but Iomega assured me that it would be included in future StorCenter products and added to the StorCenter Pro ix4-200r in the near future. It is unknown if or when other existing StorCenter devices will get QuickTransfer, however.

Iomega’s Next Move

What will Iomega do next? They must be ready to announce their vSphere 4 and Microsoft Windows Server certification soon, since both company’s web sites already list the device in their compatibility lists. Iomega ought to try to take advantage of the interest among VMware users with a big VMworld splash. They will be there, but it is awfully hard to get noticed at such a large event. I am looking forward to the event to get a hands-on test.

The ix4 should begin showing up for sale at online stores very quickly. Amazon listed the rackmount product within days of its release, and we expect the same this time. But will Iomega offer this cheaper device in retail stores? It would be great to have it available at Staples and Best Buy, but shelf space for a storage system this expensive would be hard to get. Instead, expect it at specialty outlets like Fry’s and perhaps Micro Center.

How much does the StorCenter ix4-200d cost?

• The 2 TB model (SKU# 34546 with four 500 GB drives) lists at $699.99
• The 4 TB model (SKU# 34549 with four 1 TB drives) lists at $899.99
• The 8 TB model (SKU# 34563 with four 2 TB drives) lists at $1,899.99

It also seems likely that the 2-bay product is up for a refresh in the near future. The ix2 can’t be said to be very attractive, so hopefully the company will do something about this with the next-generation product. It is unclear whether the inexpensive 2-bay device will get iSCSI support, but I suspect it will. Beyond this, might Iomega move further upmarket with an 8-drive unit? We shall see!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2009. | Iomega’s ix4-200d: A Killer Desktop Storage Array
This post was categorized as Apple, Enterprise storage, Everything, Personal, Terabyte home, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Can you supercharge a Mac Mini?

Last week I reported my progress upgrading my Mac Mini’s RAM and hard drive to extract much more performance out of Apple’s little desktop. And indeed, adding a 7200 rpm high-performance laptop hard drive did make a noticeable difference in system responsiveness.

But a question came in via email asking, will Western Digital’s killer 10,000 rpm VelociRaptor SATA drive work in the Mac Mini? So inspired, I set out to find out just how far one can push a Mac Mini’s performance!

Pillars of Performance

As I noted in my last update, there are four keys to desktop system performance: CPU, RAM, storage, and graphics. The Mac Mini’s CPU is soldered in place and its graphics are integrated into the system chipset, so neither are upgradable. The best one can do on the CPU side is to order a built-to-order 2.26 GHz Mac Mini from Apple, adding $150 to the base Mac Mini price of $599.

Base Mac Mini: $599

2.26 GHz CPU upgrade: $150

Running total: $749

PC hackers commonly upgrade their systems’ performance by tweaking the system BIOS to overclock the CPU, memory, and system bus. But you can’t overclock a Mac Mini, or at least I haven’t found the secret yet.

More RAM always helps, but the Mini won’t accept more than 4 GB 8 GB of RAM. The graphics can also be improved slightly by installing more than 1 GB of RAM because the system will then use 256 MB of RAM as a frame buffer instead of 128 MB. Since we’re going to be opening the system anyway, we can save some money by upgrading the RAM ourselves. The Mac Mini uses 204-pin DDR3 SO-DIMMs rated at PC3-8500 (1066 MHz). A nice 4 GB matched set can be purchased from Amazon.com for $60.

4 GB RAM upgrade: $66

Running total: $815

Your Apple Mac Mini is now maximally configured, with the exception of storage.

Update: The 2009 Mac Minis can now accept 8 GB of RAM!

Killer Storage

The only remaining upgrade is storage. And here, the Mac Mini is amazingly adaptable. About 2/3 of the vertical space covered by that aluminum and plastic exterior consists of a black plastic cage containing the DVD SuperDrive, hard disk drive, and cooling fan and serving as a support for the BlueTooth and 802.11 wireless antennas. This is your target.

The Mac Mini’s storage subsystem is up to date, with two SATA channels supporting 3 Gbit speed and advanced capabilities like native command queueing (NCQ) even though the stock Mini’s hard drive lacks these features.

The hard drive sits in a cradle immediately under the optical drive, face-up in an open cavity over the motherboard. Although it ships with a slim 9.5 mm high hard disk, my ruler says that the Mac Mini cradle can accept a 12.5 mm z-height disk. This is interesting from a capacity standpoint, since some higher-GB drives are 12.5 mm 3-platter units, including the popular TravelStar 5k500 drive from Hitachi.

However, the Mini was designed to have an air gap between the hard disk and DVD drive, and a 12.5 mm drive will press against the optical unit, potentially causing heat problems. And a larger 2.5″ drive will not fit, including the 15 mm mechanism from the Western Digital VelociRaptor.

Therefore, any crazy disk drive dreams that also include leaving the Mini and its DVD drive in the original case are right out. All is not lost, however! Apple kindly included the MacBook Air’s Remote Disc support, so the Mini doesn’t need a DVD drive at all if you happen to have another Mac or PC handy. Removing the SuperDrive leaves room for up to two 2.5″ hard disks!

Without the SuperDrive in the way, a 2.5″ Western Digital VelociRaptor hard disk drive should fit just fine. Although it ships with a massive heat sink, the VelociRaptor isn’t as power-hungry or hot as you might imagine. It might be a good idea to apply some cooling fins or add an extra fan, but I’m betting the Mini wouldn’t have any trouble driving this 10,000 rpm drive once the SuperDrive is removed. So the WD VelociRaptor is a serious option for the Mac Mini.

Another killer performance option is a RAID-0 set of internal SATA drives. Although the Mini’s second SATA channel (normally used for the DVD drive) does not have the proper connectors or mounting supports for a hard disk drive, iFixit sells a DIY kit to connect a second hard drive. This kit, which includes two 500 GB 5400 rpm hard drives, sells for about what a single 300 GB VelociRaptor costs, and should provide similar performance using RAID-0 striping.

WD 300 GB VelociRaptor hard disk or iFixit dual-500 GB kit: $250

Running total: $1,065

Conclusion

So there you have it! For just over $1,000, you can have the baddest Apple Mac Mini possible. But for quite a bit less, I suspect that a 2.0 GHz/4 GB/7200 rpm disk combo would be nearly as fast.

One more thing: If you decide to use RAID-0 on your internal drives, you must use Time Machine to protect your data! A stripe set of disk drives poorly mounted in a tiny chassis without a properly-engineered cooling or power system is a recipe for disaster. Your disks will fail, and your data will be lost!

Note: Some of these links include affiliate codes that help pay for this blog. For example, buying an Amazon Kindle with this link sends a few bucks my way! But I don't write this blog to make money, and am happy to link to sites and stores that don't pay anything. I like Amazon and buy tons from them, but you're free to buy whatever and wherever you want.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2009. | How Far Can You Push a Mac Mini?
This post was categorized as Apple, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Uh oh, after this backup I'll only have a few GB left on my Time Machine backup drive!

Well, that happened pretty quickly!  After upgrading the internal hard drive on my MacBook Pro to 320 GB, I moved the 120 GB disk Apple shipped with the machine to my Verbatim SmartDisk FireWire+USB enclosure to use as a Time Machine backup target.  Despite applying some tricks to reduce the amount of data backed up by Time Machine, I filled up the 120 GB drive pretty quickly indeed!  So I decided to swap the 160 GB drive from my Maxtor OneTouch 4 Mini USB drive into the (faster) Verbatim FireWire enclosure to give Time Machine some (temporary) breathing room.

It turns out that you can move Time Machine backups easily, with included OS X tools, and without breaking anything.  My old backups are still visible, and I have another 40 GB to work with.  Read on for the details!

This post is part of my series focused on Apple OS X tips and tricks.

• Access NTFS Volumes On Your Mac
• Clean Up Your Mac! Essential OS X Tidiness Tools and Techniques
• How To Move OS X Time Machine Backups To A New Disk
• Hallelujah! OS X Can Reduce PDF File Size!
• Custom Drive Icons in Mac OS X
• OS X Custom Drive Icons 2: Boot Camp and NTFS

The Windup

In order to effectively use Time Machine, you really need a backup target disk larger than the one you’re backing up.  But I didn’t have that.  I was able to prune out 28 GB of data in my home directory that didn’t need to be backed up, along with 22 GB of operating system data, by tuning Time Machine.  Although my lappie has over 300 GB of storage space, Time Machine only has to back up 66 GB of it – Windows Vista has 55 GB, 50 GB doesn’t need to be backed up, and the rest is empty.

The little 111 GB (usable) backup drive that I created when I stuffed the Fujitsu MH2120BH disk that came with my MacBook Pro into the vacated Verbatim enclosure that donated its Western Digital WD3200BEVT to my laptop was enough for a while.  But this wouldn’t be enough for long:  Time Machine currently takes up 103 GB to store a month and a half worth of my system backups.

Since I already had a 160 GB Maxtor OneTouch Mini 4 USB drive sitting around half full for Windows backups, I decided to swap the disk drive units between enclosures to get an extra 40 GB for Time Machine.  It turns out the Maxtor used a Seagate ST9160821AS drive, by the way.

Why not leave the drives in place and just use the Maxtor for Time Machine?  Three reasons:

1. FireWire is substantially faster than USB 2.0 (as I’ll show in a future post)
2. My MacBook has just one USB port that would work with the Maxtor, and I like to leave the Time Machine drive plugged in when I’m home, which would leave me with a hub (which I don’t have) or only a single USB port for everything else
3. I’m a nut and love to rip things apart and tinker with them

Most people will probably want to just go out and buy a bigger disk.

Moving Your Time Machine Data

Let’s say you have an old (full) Time Machine disk and a new (empty) one and you’d like to preserve your old backups.  Here’s how to move the Time Machine data without losing anything:

1. Turn off Time Machine with the big switch in the Time Machine System Preferences panel.
2. Eject the old Time Machine disk, unplug it, and re-insert it to force it to re-mount as a regular drive.
3. Use Disk Utility to wipe the new drive completely.  Give it a single partition (I chose MBR since it’s a removable drive, but it shouldn’t matter Apple recommends using GUID partition maps to avoid Time Machine trouble!) and a new empty filesystem.  Time Machine requires the filesystem to be of the type, “Mac OS Extended (Journaled)”.


OS X's Disk Utility has the ability to do a block copy of data between different-sized disks

4. Give the new drive a unique name so you can keep them straight when you’re copying.  I recommend calling it “New Time Machine Drive” or something equally unambiguous.  I called mine “Verbatim 160″ (even though it was still in the Maxtor case), while my old drive was called “Verbatim”.
5. Plug both drives into your Mac.  You should see both in the Disk Utility sidebar. See my example at right, showing both “Verbatim” and “Verbatim 160″.
6. Select the “Restore” tab in Disk Utility. This built-in OS X application can create a perfect block copy of your Time Machine drive, no third-party tools required.
7. Drag your old drive from the sidebar to the “Source” box.
8. Drag your new drive from the sidebar to the “Destination” box.
9. Click “Restore” and observe the warning – this will copy all data from your old Time Machine volume to the new drive, destroying its contents!
10. Wait a long while (mine took 4 hours) as the copy and verification progresses.


Aah, that's better - 50 GB of breathing room!

11. Once it’s done, unplug the old drive and turn Time Machine back on.  Make sure that it located the data on the new drive by clicking the Enter Time Machine item in the dock and looking at your old data.
12. Consider telling Spotlight not to index this new drive or at least the “Backups.backupdb” folder.
13. Once you’re satisfied that the new drive is working, you may want to use the old drive for something else.  If so, turn Time Machine off again, plug in only the old drive, and erase it with Disk Utility.  Don’t switch back and forth between the two Time Machine drives or you will become hopelessly confused!

So there you have it!  Move your Time Machine backup data with ease, using only OS X’s Disk Utility! This tool is amazingly good, making me wonder why anyone would need a third-party product.

Update: See Rolfje’s blog for streamlined Time Machine migration steps.

Problems

If the Restore process reports “Could not restore – operation not permitted“, you have to eject the Time Machine drive and re-mount it after you turn off Time Machine (see step 2).

If it still doesn’t work, try a reboot.

If it still still doesn’t work, try checking the “Erase destination” box in Disk Utility. This forces a block-level copy rather than just copying files.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2008. | How To Move OS X Time Machine Backups To A New Disk
This post was categorized as Apple. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Exclude and Ignore

Out of the box, Time Machine will copy everything on your local drives to whichever drive you designate.  This is probably preferable to forcing the user to select what to back up, but Apple ought to have set some reasonable defaults in the “Do not back up” list, since the same set are likely to be relevant for most people.

Excluding files is simple:  Go to the Time Machine preference panel and click “Options”.  The “Do not back up” list will drop down, and you can add items to it by clicking the “+” button or simply dragging and dropping them there.

Here are my suggestions for what to exclude:

• Just about everything Ryan Block suggests
• Other apps: EyeTV Archive, TiVo Recordings, Roxio Converted Items
• /System – When you click this, OS X will ask if you also want to exclude other system stuff – say yes.  Since the Leopard boot CD (which you have if you use Time Machine) can automatically restore everything after you reinstall the OS, you really don’t need this.

Hide From the Spotlight

The next inexplicable decision Apple made was to allow Spotlight to index your Time Machine drive.  I can see why some people might want to be able to search their backup using Spotlight, but this is confusing at best.

Let’s say I’m Joe Average and I want to locate last year’s tax return, but I deleted it from my disk.  When I use Spotlight to find it, one of two things is going to happen, and both are confusing to Joe:

1. If I don’t have my Time Machine drive connected, I won’t find it.  Even though it still exists, I will give up and assume it’s lost.  Imagine my surprise, then, when I run across it another day (when I do happen to have my Time Machine drive connected) and am searching in Spotlight for something else!
2. If I do have my drive connected, I will find the tax return and OS X will let me open it.  But it’s read-only, so I won’t be able to save it.  This will be a double head-scratcher since the Save As dialog box will point to a read-only copy of my whole disk!  So I’ll be totally puzzled at not being able to save anywhere until I figure out that I’m looking at my backup!

So indexing a Time Machine volume is just plain confusing.  The best case scenario is that Spotlight finds 8,000 different copies of everything you search for and you are smart enough to know which is the real current version.

I say shut it off.  Go into Spotlight’s preferences window, click “Privacy” (which, by the way, is totally the wrong name), and you can exclude your Time Machine disk.  Oddly, Spotlight wouldn’t let me exclude just “Backups.backupdb” – I had to ignore the whole disk.  This was no problem for me, since I have a disk dedicated to Time Machine, but this might prevent Joe from following my advice.

By the way, my understanding is that Time Machine does not use Spotlight data itself.  It uses FSEvents, which is a separate daemon, so you can safely shut Spotlight off entirely if you want and still be able to use Time Machine.

Update:

Shortly after I wrote this piece, Apple posted two video tutorials on how to restrict Time Machine and Spotlight.  While they don’t advocate removing anything in particular, they do show how to do it in elegant fashion!

• Restrict Time Machine
• Restrict Spotlight

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2008. | Tuning Time Machine
This post was categorized as Apple, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Data Robotics today introduced the second generation of what I think of as a personal storage array, but although the Drobo 2 offers great enhancements, making it a top choice for those needing massive and protected storage on a single computer, it’s still not what I’m looking for in a home storage device.

First, the good bits.  Drobo 2 adds FireWire 800 (and 400) for quicker storage access – the company claims it’s twice as fast, and I’d believe it.  They also beefed up the internal CPU and tightened the firmware to speed up USB transfer rates and added a larger, quieter fan to keep it quiet.  And the price remains the same at US$499.

There’s a lot to love here, just as with the first-generation device.  Drobo is a fully virtualized device with next-generation storage capabilities like thin provisioning, sub-disk RAID that can tolerate multiple drive failures (once the array has reconfigured after the first failure), and on-the-fly drive swapping and upgrades.  When attached to a PC or Mac, it appears as a single massive storage volume, and all of the technical bits just work in the background to keep your data protected.

I can’t imagine a better Time Machine backup device.  And now that FireWire 800 is available with its faster speeds, the Drobo makes a lot of sense as a budget array for video editing and other pro applications.

What’s not to love?  First, a Drobo still can’t be shared between computers without an add-on like the company’s aptly-named DroboShare NAS unit.  Although home users generally don’t need to partition their storage, pros might want to create separate volumes for Time Machine, Video, and Photos.  And many might want to share the device between multiple computers, perhaps using FireWire for their Mac and USB for a PC or DroboShare.  I suppose you could buy two, but $500 for a bare unit with no drives is a pretty penny!

But the device just can’t do this – if you want to share it, you have to dedicate it all to the DroboShare, which uses USB and presents SMB shares over gigabit Ethernet.  Actually, the DroboShare is an awfully nice NAS in its own right, supporting DLNA/UPnP for media streaming, and the company recently announced an SDK to allow additional applications to be added.

So all in all, Drobo 2 is a nice upgrade but not much of a revolution.  If you’re looking for massive, protected storage for a single computer at home, and have upwards of $700 to spend on it, you can’t make a better choice.  And FireWire makes it even more attractive to Mac users.  But I still wish Drobo could take all these Maxtor drives off my desk, offering speedy storage to both of my computers and my network devices.

PS: Data Robotics is currently offering the original Drobo at $349 to clear them out.  If you wanted one before, this price might get you off the couch!

[Engadget], [Blocks & Files]

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2008. | Drobo 2: Apple Doesn’t Fall Far From the Tree
This post was categorized as Enterprise storage, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

What Is Drobo?

First, let’s talk about what Drobo’s current product is and isn’t. It is basically an external USB drive enclosure for a single PC – think about your basic Western Digital MyBook or Seagate FreeAgent and you’re almost there. But it doesn’t come with any hard disks; instead, it has slots for four that you add yourself, so adjust your thinking accordingly.

OK, you say, I’ve got that. A shiny 4-slot RAID enclosure, right? Well not so fast. It doesn’t use any of the common RAID levels, and proudly so. Instead, it uses virtualization and what looks to be automated block-based data mirroring to protect the data. It appears to protect data “on write”, meaning it is ready to run quicker when you add or replace a disk. Instead of running through a time-consuming RAID rebuild, it would just copy the blocks needing protection to the new disk.

Yeah, I said virtualization, but that’s not the only enterprise storage buzzword you’ll find in this little device! It’s also got thin provisioning! No kidding – in order to deal with the fact that operating systems don’t like to see their disks grow, the Drobo just tells the OS that it always has 2 TB available, regardless of the number or size of the disks installed. This might prove disconcerting to users, though…

Data Protection

This alternative approach to data protection can lead to some strange capacity situations. Basically, the device reserves an amount of space equal to the largest drive for data protection. Note: the following examples use the weird disk industry capacity numbers, not the actual usable numbers…

Put in three 500 GB drives and you’ve got 1 TB to use (500+500+500-500). Add another and you’ve got 1.5 TB (500+500+500+500-500).

Swap one of those half-terabyte drives out for a 1 TB unit and the Drobo “reserves” half of the big drive and treats it like a 500 gigger, so you still have 1.5 TB available (500+500+500+1000-1000). This can lead to some weird situations when really large drives are mixed with small ones – A 100 GB drive and a 1 TB drive equals 100 GB of space (100+1000-1000), potentially confusing customers who just spent some big bucks on a giant disk!

This guy would be better served capacity-wise by popping out that little 100 GB disk and just using the terabyte unit, which would give 500 GB of usable space. That’s right, the unit also allows you to use a single drive, and configures it to “protect” itself! Of course, the engineer in me wonders about the logic in mirroring blocks to the same drive – protection from drive failure, of course, would be lacking, but also think of the seeking as the drive churns to write every I/O twice!

Try out the online “Drobolator” to see how it works for yourself…

Drobo Grows Up

But I digress. Just put two or more drives of similar sizes in your Drobo and be done with it. One really nice thing about the device is that you can mix and match drives as needed, swapping out big and small depending on what you have available. Mixing drive types and sizes would disagree with most RAID controllers, but the Drobo eats them up, allocating as effectively as possible.

This is probably the nicest aspect of the device. You just leave it on and connected and in use and add and remove drives according to your needs and resources. Drobo handles all the setup and configuration – just slide the drive in and you’re done. Once you’ve initially formatted the 2 TB (thin provisioned) drive, you never have to do any more configuration. Data migration is unneeded too, since Drobo’s data protection system keeps the information continually available. Start with the old 160 GB drives you have today and swap them out for 500 GB or 1 TB drives next year and everything just works.

One of the best sources for big cheap drives is likely to be those selfsame MyBook and FreeAgent external disks I mentioned above. These often go on sale at big-box retailers for well below the cost of a bare drive, and most use the best SATA drives offered by their manufacturers. The MyBook Premium ES I have, for example, included Western Digital’s impressive 500 GB Caviar SE16 drive mechanism. Purchased at Best Buy for $139, it was far cheaper than the drive alone would have been at the time. While the old Maxtor Personal Storage 3200 used a PATA drive (I checked…), the newer ones apparently switched to SATA, too, and were on sale for $79 for 500 GB last week!

I’ll Buy One When…

Despite my interest in the device, I don’t have a Drobo myself, and probably wouldn’t buy one at this point since it doesn’t really meet my needs. First, Drobo is a USB-only device for PCs and Macs. Although I bet the Linux EXT3 filesystem used by my Linksys NSLU2 home server would work, it’s not explicitly supported by the company. If it was a NAS device, serving storage over Ethernet, I would be much more interested in adding it next to the Slug.

But I’m not a typical end user – most people use a home desktop as a standalone device and would be pleased with an easy to use USB device with massive storage. One issue for these folks is that many use a laptop as their only system, moving around the house, and the chunky Drobo wouldn’t be a good solution for them.

But if you’re a Mac desktop user, Drobo looks like an awesome choice. Add Leopard’s innovative Time Machine to a Drobo and never lose data again!

One device that I would love to hook a Drobo to is my TiVo Series 3. It would be brilliant to have a super-reliable, upgradable storage system to hold video content with no management needed. But the device lets me down here again since the TiVo needs eSATA not USB storage.

Maybe Drobo 2 will add eSATA? NAS? Coffee making?

Oh, and if you were wondering what Geoff Barrall of BlueArc did for his next act, look no further than Data Robotics! Quite a change – enterprise NAS to consumer storage… Who’s your marketing genius, Geoff?

Note: Some of these links include affiliate codes that help pay for this blog. For example, buying an Amazon Kindle with this link sends a few bucks my way! But I don't write this blog to make money, and am happy to link to sites and stores that don't pay anything. I like Amazon and buy tons from them, but you're free to buy whatever and wherever you want.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2007. | Why I Like Drobo
This post was categorized as Enterprise storage, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.