Not sure how to handle THIS much music for a DJ customer.

[thecomputerguy]

I have a DJ customer who has about 1TB of music and his main computer is a new MacBook with a 750GB hard drive in it. Obviously the data has be on some sort of external.

Im old fashioned when it comes to backups, so I like to have backups of backups.

Right now I have his music sitting on a 2TB WD external that backs up to a 4TB Thunderbolt drive in a RAID 1 (totalling 2TB) (ONLY WHEN HE IS HOME AND PLUGS IT IN)

My concern is that if he takes his external with him, and en route to his DJ job he drops his drive and it breaks he is SERIOUSLY F'd since his backup will be at home, and he wouldn't know how to restore his data anyways.

He already complains about the clunkiness of having to lug around a drive, a usb cable, and a power cable, and wants to start using drives with no power requirement ... laptop externals. I think he is moving in a direction that will ultimately result in some sort of failure.

Has anyone come across a better method for doing what I am trying to do for this guy?

 

[Markverhyden]

Why are you using USB? You should be using Thunderbolt.

 

[thecomputerguy]

There is no way he will want to lug around a two drive thunderbolt. Not to mention if he drops that drive its still just as susceptible to failure as a single USB drive, and if he has to recover he is still going to need me. The concern isn't speed ... its portability and reliability.

His Thunderbolt port a lot of the times is used by a display as well.

 

[nlinecomputers]

There is no way he will want to lug around a two drive thunderbolt. Not to mention if he drops that drive its still just as unacceptable to failure as a single USB drive, and if he has to recover he is still going to need me. The concern isn't speed ... its portability and reliability.

His Thunderbolt port a lot of the times is used by a display as well.

They don't make Thunderbolt units as single drives?

I don't see why having a USB3 drive would be an issue? If he drops it, so what? He will call you to get it replaced and re-setup the sync. You can't prevent stupid. I assume you are using some kind of sync to his external raid and the drives he hauls around.

 

[Markverhyden]

On the whole packaging thing. Zero Halliburton has been the standard for years with metal protective carry cases. I've had camera cases from them years ago.

Look to see if you have a local electronic hobbiest place. We have one, called You Do It Electronics, and they have a wide variety of protective cases with foam. That can be cut and adjusted as needed.

LaCie has a 3TB drive. But it has separate power supply since it is a full size drive.

 

[smashedbotatos]

So he knows he has over 1 GB of data to store, and buys a Macbook with a 750 GB drive?

Thunderbolt drive is the best option. Unless you find a way to upgrade his Macbook's internal drive. Pop a 2TB disk in it, unless it is a Macbook Air. Then he is stuck with carrying around an external drive.

Have him get a NAS for home. Even if you custom build one, or get a synology. Some where to backup to multiple disks.

 

[FremontPC]

Is he using FLAC?

Check Amazon and the Egg on 2TB WD (1.5 TB offered as well) 2.5. Slip it into a USB3 enclosure for him and if his budget allows, build him a couple more for fallback.

 

[Krynn72]

I''ve had a similar customer. Not much you can do really. This guy we work with has been back three times due to his drives getting damaged "in the field."

You should suggest he keeps a "failsafe" amount of music on the laptop itself. That way if he/drunk partiers (thats how our guy keeps losing his drives lol) do damage the external, he's got something else to work with.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

Depending what he's spending why not look at some type of cloud based solution like dtopbox etc.

 

[FremontPC]

"...some type of cloud based solution like dtopbox etc."

Good point, does he always have the 'net on tap?

 

[Markverhyden]

A business like that should not depend on the 'net.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

Ok. Well if he knew he always had network connection, instead of cloud, what about the idea of a NAS device? That is I know I've seen some that claim to offer access to them via the cloud, maybe something like a 4 tb NAS device with all of his music backed up on it that he can access when he has network? For network, maybe something like a verizon mifi card so he's not as dependent on if there is wifi or not.

I guess if you wanted to you could have him still carry the external, but everything backed up on a NAS in case of failure then at least his files are still on a local network someplace.

 

[codegreen]

Why not have an extra portable drive or two in sync? If he drops one, he just plugs in the spare.

 

[Mokester]

Gah...this is why I hate the fact that they did away with the internal DVD drive...it was great as you could just buy a DVD carrier and plop in another HDD into your mac...I've done that on my 09 macbook and it works like a dream for what I used it for at the time.

I'd second a carry case...and two HDD not in raid...in case one goes down, there is a spare...maybe asking for that and retreating to keeping the external...something along the lines of, "this is what I'd really recommend...but one external is the bare minimum you should be carrying"

 

[pceinc]

Why not have an extra portable drive or two in sync? If he drops one, he just plugs in the spare.

This what I would do. Switch him to USB laptop drives and get him a Pelican case for transport.

Also, what is his plan if he gets on site for a gig and the laptop does not boot? Ya know, because those drives fail too.

 

[smashedbotatos]

Rugged 2TB Thunderbolt portable external drive.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA0ZX1AU6149

 

[Markverhyden]

Forgot to mention on the dropped drive thing. OS X has RAID utilities in Disk Utilities. You can setup two drives as mirrors. One get dropped goes down you still have the other. And because it's mirrored it's always updated.

 

[Rosco]

I remember chris barr(the wisetechnician) talking about a service that syncs all your music between your apple devices. I am totally spacing on the name but will flip through the videos and see if i can find the name. This might be a good backup to the external hard drive.

Like others have said you can not hep if he drops and breaks it in the field. Its not your fault if he drops it and can not restore it right a way.

 

[300DDR]

...it's called iTunes Match.

I thought of another potential idea, SD cards. He could keep them organized by genres or sets. Get 10-20 64GB SD cards and swap them in/out of the built in SD card slot on MBP.

*And use a second SD card reader on USB port so he can keep one card in/playing and swap the other out (like, "switching records on a turntable").