Drobo 5C 10TB: 5-Drive Direct Attached Storage (DAS) Array with Seagate HDDs - USB 3.0 port, type C 10TB (DDR4A21-10TB)

This is by far the best unit Drobo has created for the home/small business market. One thing to be careful of, especially if you're going to load it up with high capacity drives (8TB, 10TB, 12TB or more)... be sure you buy drives that are intended for such heavy-duty use. If you're having any kind of problem with your Drobo, you should check the level of drive you've installed. These drives take the high-end drives. As an example, for the five 10TB drives I installed, they were $320 apiece. If you put the cheap drive in there, they'll fail much faster as they're not intended for high-demand use that you'll get with a RAID implementation like this.I use mine as direct attached storage and not only is the transfer rate really fast, the unit runs flawlessly. I run a small business and this is one of several Drobos throughout the office. This one serves as our TimeMachine backup unit, so it runs 24/7 and has never given us even the slightest hiccup, even with a single 36TB volume.

4/29/2020 - The Saga ContinuesOn 3/30/20 I sent an email to Drobo regarding my malfunctioning unit since there had been no response to my message sent on their web site. I got an email the next day detailing what I needed to do to trouble shoot the unit. I promptly went through the steps suggested (I had already done most of them) and emailed them the results.On 4/8/20 I got an email that said my trouble shooting results indicated they would need to replace my Drobo.On 4/10/20 they acknowledged receiving the tracking number for the Drobo I sent to them for a replacement.On 4/18/20 I received an email from them saying the case was "closed" but that it could be reopened within 14 days. I incorrectly assumed that this meant my replacement Drobo was on its way.On 4/23/20 having not received any tracking information or other indication the Drobo was on its way, I contacted them again.On 4/29/20 they sent me an email saying the unit I sent them was on the bench getting checked out.On 5/6/20 my repaired Drobo was delivered by Fedex.I like the Drobo when it works but product support is PATHETIC. I doubt I'll ever buy another one but rather rely on other means to back up my important data.---------------------------------------------------------------------This is an update of my previous review and is being made on 4/6/20. I purchased this unit in 2018 and in April 2020 and within the 2 year warranty period it stopped working. I contacted the makers of the unit last week and got an email the next day detailing what I needed to do to troubleshoot it. I had already done most of the suggested things but I did them all over with the addition of the additional few things they suggested. I've now sent them two emails detailing the results of my troubleshooting and have received no response.My previous review from shortly after I bought the unit is below.---------------------------------------------------------------------My old Drobo which saved my information during two incidents where my iMac malfunctioned quit working. It had functioned great for quite a few years (I definitely got my money's worth out of it) so I decided to get another one to replace it. My new Drobo 5C is finally working as it should but the process was tedious. There is no phone number for technical support and, of course, no useful printed manual with the device. Technical support is via email at their convenience and my experience was that the person didn't really understand what the issue was though I explained it as well as I could. It is finally working due in large part to the great amount of time spent by me fiddling with it.I wouldn't say don't get one but if you're not at least a little familiar with troubleshooting computers, good luck if it doesn't work right.

The unboxing and ease of use remind me of Apple products. The ability to dim the outer LEDs on a customizable ten-point scale is a nice touch. I've also been very impressed with the speed. My observed speeds are as below, using a Drobo 5C connected directly to a retina iMac (which supports USB 3), loaded with four 3 TB Western Digital Red and one 1.5 TB Western Digital Green drives:Backing up a FireWire 400 drive to Drobo 5C: ~20-30 MB/sBacking up a USB 2.0 drive to Drobo 5C:~30-40 MB/s (this one was interesting, as FireWire has usually had better speeds in general for me)Backing up a USB 3.0 drive to Drobo 5C: ~80-90 MB/sTransferring directly between Drobo 5C and iMac: 90-170 MB/s, with speeds mostly sustaining in the 130-150 range(I hope that those speeds help set people's expectations as to what speeds might be like when backing up from other hard drives)I bought the Drobo intending for it to be more of a storage and retrieval archive, rather than a drive used for actively processing data. Just to experiment, I put my Aperture photo library on the Drobo and it was very fast - a bit faster than when I've used it on an external USB 3 drive, and worlds faster than when I had my library on a FireWire 400 drive. I am now rethinking my intended usage, and may process media files directly off of it.I have yet to experience a drive failure, so I can't vouch for the ease of that process, but I have confidence that the process will be pretty painless. Setup and usage has been largely flawless so far; the experience makes me want to get a Drobo 5N for the family to use...

Me encanta mi nuevo Drobo, excelente para las fotos y videos que necesitaba almacenar ya que constantemente los fosfatos externos me fallan.

Reliable storage that you just set up and forget.

Paring this drive with 5 x Seagate Iron Wolf Drives has been the best decision for my commercial Photography backup solution. I have looked at many setups and found this to not only be a very great price but also since using it, a very simple, secure and a solid archive solution. I have it set to two drive redundancy which lowers the amount of useable space however adds an extra layer of protection to my onsite storage in conjunction with my offsite and cloud backups. I found this drive to be great for the purpose of simply backing up and storing my files without fuss, I do not work of this drive so the speed is never an issue. I found the app & time machine volume features very intuitive and effective to use. I highly recommend this product!For my uses I didn't see the need to run the Drobo 5D3 or opt for a NAS solution, it saved both money which I put into higher capacity drives - if your simply just wanting to store files, have the option to upgrade size easily and know the health status of your backup then this is for you.One tip: If using the newer version of the MacBook Pro with USB C, I highly recommend ordering a USB C male to male cable rated for high-speed transfers as you will get the most out of this unit in terms of the speed it's capable of.Definitely recommend!

No lo he podido usar... me reporta problemas con los discos....

Major problems with this unit. There's a reason IT pros hate Drobo, and I found it.1) Unit only connected intermittently. Most of the time, it couldn't be detected by its own software. Troubleshooting steps on Drobo's website and phone support did not help - the connection was essentially random. Sometimes it's there, sometimes it's not.2) Max file transfer rates and benchmarks peaked at 40MB/sec when it was working and were generally slower. This is on the lines of USB-2 and a single drive from circa 2001, not a 5-drive Ironwolf array from 2017 on USB-C.3) Could not register product as serial number was already registered. This was the one problem technical support could actually help with. Took them 24 hours to turn it around, though.4) The first time it built the array, it froze up and had to be hard-reset. This shouldn't happen on an initial build with brand-new drives.5) This is more of a nitpick, but drives are hard to extract from the unit and it's hard to gauge when one has been pushed in properly. The retention clips don't fully close, and the springs at the back have insufficient force to push the drive forward when they're released. Removing drives from the unit without damaging them took effort.If price is a factor, I would recommend a simple RAID or JBOD DAS that will do a better job for less than half the cost. If features and data protection are a priority, there are other manufacturers making better-quality and higher-regarded units.