comp.arch.storage Google Group

Re: New to NAS, have idea, looking for software to do it.

scottdotl...@scottlowedot.org (Scott Lowe) — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 03:45:59 UT

Stuff like this is relatively common in the virtualization world; think
of the LeftHand VSA or similar. Unfortunately, most of the software
that might allow you to do this in a physical world are really more
oriented toward server infrastructure and not desktop infrastructure.
So, is it possible? Probably. Is it recommended? Not necessarily.

Re: WD1200JB Issues

billt...@metrocast.net (Bill Todd) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 05:15:31 UT

...
Restore the data from your backups, obviously. If you don't have any,
try a professional data restoration service if that's economically
justified.
Of course, if you're not going to give the drive to professionals there
are folk remedies you could try that may be as likely to destroy the
data permanently as to recover it - but if you consider this a hobby

WD1200JB Issues

a12v...@hotmail.com (a12vman) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 02:41:36 UT

This IDE Drive is no longer recognized in Windows 2003 Server via USB. I
tried connecting it directly to the IDE Controller on my PC, sometimes it
locks up during BIOS IDE Detect, and sometimes it is recognize correctly.
Win2003 boot process hangs near 50% if this drive is connected to the
Onboard IDE. If I try to connect it via USB after windows starts I get

Re: New to NAS, have idea, looking for software to do it.

billt...@metrocast.net (Bill Todd) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:24:58 UT

...
Well, yes and no. In the '90s there was a Berkeley project called
'Network of Workstations' that focused on networking commodity PCs into
a high-performance compute cluster, and it included mechanisms (such as
the Zebra file system, IIRC) for sharing their storage in the manner
which you describe. And some more recent distributed file systems could

Re: New to NAS, have idea, looking for software to do it.

da...@westcontrol.removethisbit.com (David Brown) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 09:08:20 UT

I don't know if doing something like this would be /practical/, but it
might be fun!
When you say "iSCSI", I guess you are thinking of having each machine
host an iSCSI target serving out a section of the local hard disk. The
severer would make use of these distributed chunks as volumes on a big

Re: New to NAS, have idea, looking for software to do it.

caly...@fly.srk.fer.hr.invalid — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 01:06:33 UT

Bob Meyers <oregon...@gmail.com> kenjka:
DFS (Distributed File System), but I don't know how it will work with your
scenario... Someone before me pointed that these drives in workstations are
desktop class, so reliability is very low...
There is also DataCore software you could try to investigate, but it's much

Re: New to NAS, have idea, looking for software to do it.

robertwess...@yahoo.com (robertwessel2@yahoo.com) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 23:58:36 UT

Certainly you can put an iSCSI host on each workstation with spare
disk space, and then mount each of those LUNs on a server, and then
put a volume on top of those. Basically this would be pretty trivial
(if a bit tedious) to set up, the main limit you're going to run into
is the maximum number of partitions you can put in a single volume.

New to NAS, have idea, looking for software to do it.

oregon...@gmail.com (Bob Meyers) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 23:45:11 UT

I am a smalltime consultant with several clients having similar
scenarios. Typically they have less than 100 Windows workstations and
anywhere from 1 to 10 servers. Some servers are virtual hosts - just
getting started in the virtual world.
My idea is this: If I have up to 100 PC's, often each one has many GB

IBM Green Storage Reduce Overall Costs...Drive Green Benefits

thisisre...@gmail.com (Bhabhi) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 09:02:33 UT

Just came across this IBM Webcast Green Storage Reduce Overall
Costs...Drive Green Benefits at
[link]
It discuss the techniques, from storage virtualization, to
deduplication, through tiered storage, which help stem information
explosion and drive green benefits.

Micro SD card / MSP430 interface: write problem

christophe.brail...@free.fr (Christophe Braillon) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 16:42:58 UT

Hi everyone,
I have interfaced a Micro SD card to a MSP430 microcontroller using the
SPI mode. Everything worked perfectly fine but I recently had problems
when writing too often into my files.
Here is my setup. As I said the card (SDHC 4Go) is directly connected to
the microcontroller via its USCI (SPI) peripheral. I have written the

ReadyNAS NVX and Linux encryption

sdfdfhj321sdf...@gmail (Kur) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 08:54:37 UT

Before I buy such one I really need to be sure that I can have encryption on
this device. I want to use it to store my personal backup at a remote side.
Is it possible to do a rsync (with SSH) from my CentOS box to the ReadyNAS
box where I store my files on an encrypted partition or alike? Note that I

Re: Automating Image Backups of Windows Boot Devices

ma...@storagecraft.com.no.spam (Maxim S. Shatskih) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 10:32:28 UT

Note the above: "even on volumes other then SystemRoot". Separate partition will not solve all your problems.
With modern Windows, snapshots (i.e. VSS) are the _only reliable_ mean of backup. And, with VSS, no need to reboot the server, causing downtime.
There are products like ShadowProtect IT Edition which even do not require _installation_ on the server, not to say reboot. You insert the CD, you ensure that the backup storage is connected and OK, and you run an app off the CD which does not require installation. Done.

Re: Automating Image Backups of Windows Boot Devices

persistent...@spamarrest.com (W) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 05:26:26 UT

<Do you know that with modern (Vista+) OS you will _nearly inevitably_ have
some exclusively locked files, even on volumes other <them SystemRoot. The
VolSnap.sys driver opens some files in the \System Volume Information\{guid}
directory immediately at <volume mount and hold them open forever.
That's exactly why we like to boot from a different partition (or boot CD)

Re: Automating Image Backups of Windows Boot Devices

ma...@storagecraft.com.no.spam (Maxim S. Shatskih) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 15:20:46 UT

Not in my experience. OS itself, NTDS, Ex's EDB databases - all is fine if using VSS even under heavy load.
I routinely "reinstall" Windows by restoring the image backup, Windows - with its registry - works fine after it.
Do you know that with modern (Vista+) OS you will _nearly inevitably_ have some exclusively locked files, even on volumes other them SystemRoot. The VolSnap.sys driver opens some files in the \System Volume Information\{guid} directory immediately at volume mount and hold them open forever.

Re: Automating Image Backups of Windows Boot Devices

robertwess...@yahoo.com (robertwessel2@yahoo.com) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 05:24:30 UT

Please don't top-post.
You could install whatever's on the bootable CD onto the "backup OS"
partition.