Drobo Update: a replacement is coming!
I’ve been working with drobo support for roughly two weeks now. They’ve been responsive, but all of the steps required to complete the tests have been frustrating. Partly because they seem unnecessary, partly because I needed to go back through and do a bunch of backup updates before monkeying with stuff, and partly because I was so obsessive about my wiring that changing wires and moving stuff is a chore.
But by far the biggest hassle was that each test required me to delete and re-copy massive amounts of data to/from the drobo. I would have to clear the drobo, delete my entire iTunes library, copy terabytes worth of data back to the drobo, and then observe behaviors during the copies and when adding files back to iTunes. That makes each test a several day process.
Anyway, I tested the firewire cable (which seemed silly given that I had already reported that changing from FW to USB resulted in the same random latency issues). That proved unsuccessful, so it was on to lugging out the old Mac Mini and hooking up the drobo to that. This too proved to be a waste of time. I also created several diagnostic files during some tests and sent those files along to support.
At this point it is unclear what the problem is, so they are sending me a new unit. I’m really hoping it solves it, but I’m not holding my breath. It will arrive in the next few days, but as long as I keep the drives in the same sequence I should be able to bypass copying all 3TBs again (at least I hope).
