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Orico 5 bay RAID external enclosure


apogee

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I got XPE running on a Dell Inspiron 15 i7/8GB laptop and excited about at long last being able to get a Plex setup which transcodes without issues, better than many commercial NAS with underpowered CPU's.

 

I've seen XPE running on laptop with an external USB HD. Will it also work with an external USB multibay enclosure like:

 

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?mai ... &cPath=177

 

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?mai ... &cPath=177

 

The Orico enclosures come in both USB 3.0 only as well as USB 3.0 with hardware RAID 0/1/5/10 set via DIP switches at the back.

 

The RAID version is only slightly more expensive, but I don't know if it'll confuse XPE's software RAID.

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I got XPE running on a Dell Inspiron 15 i7/8GB laptop and excited about at long last being able to get a Plex setup which transcodes without issues, better than many commercial NAS with underpowered CPU's.

 

I've seen XPE running on laptop with an external USB HD. Will it also work with an external USB multibay enclosure like:

 

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?mai ... &cPath=177

 

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?mai ... &cPath=177

 

The Orico enclosures come in both USB 3.0 only as well as USB 3.0 with hardware RAID 0/1/5/10 set via DIP switches at the back.

 

The RAID version is only slightly more expensive, but I don't know if it'll confuse XPE's software RAID.

 

Do you want to use RAID volumes? USB connected drives cannot be made part of any Synology RAID volume. They are only accessible as usbshare?(-?) in Shared Folders.

 

An enclosure with built in RAID support will make the drives in it appear as one large hard drive to the OS (DSM), so there will be no confusion with Synology RAID volumes. But this RAID enclosure is connected via USB, so there is no option for it to work with Synology RAID volumes.

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Thank you for clarifying that USB connected drives cannot be part of a Synology RAID volume.

 

Some external multi-bay enclosures also have an eSATA connection (RAID or JBOD).

 

Through eSATA, can Synology RAID be enabled? I presume an eSATA enclosure would not be different from Synology's own expansion units, like the DX513?

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Correct, using an eSATA connection will allow the drives connected to be part of a Synology RAID volume.

 

But you are doing this on a laptop. I've been using Dell Latitudes and their eSATA ports are not port multiplier capable. You will only see one drive from the enclosure. I've tried one eSATA ExpressCard adapter with port multiplier capability but then Xpenology does not have the right driver for the adapter. It works fine under Windows 7. I gave up and am only running 2 identical hard drives in SHR, one in a SATA bay adapter in lieu of the optical drive.

 

So if you want to use your existing laptop and more than two drives, an enclosure with built in RAID is the only option. You can have it connect via USB or eSATA. I'd prefer eSATA (This is for future proofing, in case you want to move away from using a laptop for Xpenology).

 

Have you looked at the enclosures from Mediasonic? They have eSATA/USB/Firewire in different combinations, will auto wake up/sleep with the host, and can do RAID/JBOD. I've tested a couple bought from eBay and they are cool, but I have not used them extensively to say how well they work 24X7.

 

Edit: I noticed humancaviar says he used a StarTech ECESAT32 on a Lenovo x220 to connect to a Mediasonic ProBox HF2-SU3S2 (I have the same one). His guide came out one year after my attempt. He was using Nanoboot but under ESXi. I think the ESXi driver for the eSATA controller allowed Nanoboot to see all the drives connected?

 

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=4459&p=26606&hilit=expresscard+sata#p26606

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Thank you for your reply.

 

Given the lack of eSATA port multiplier feature with most laptops, it seems that a desktop would be more appropriate to run xpeonology.

 

I'm not familiar with virtual box and Exsi, but from other threads, it seems that xpeonology can be installed on either.

 

Does that mean both Windows 8 and xpeonology can be on the same hardware simultaneously, with an eSATA external box?

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