Back-up: RAID 0 to RAID 1?

[BLev]

Hello,
I have a question for those who are more knowledgeable about backing up RAID 0 drives than I am.
Background: I am using a Mac Studio M2 w/ current OS. My images are currently on a 10TB Western Digital External USB drive. The drive is old and slow (5400 RPM). This is my current "working drive" and my various LR Catalogs (stored on an SSD) access this 10TB drive when working on images. The drive is aging, so it will be replaced regardless of the answer to my question. This 10 TB drive is being backed up to a Sabrent Dual-bay box with a pair of 12TB 7200 RPM drives. This box is set to RAID 1 for redundant back-up... This is my primary working system and, and with the exception of the older 10TB WD, I like it.

I decided to purchase a second Sabrent Dual Bay drive to serve as my new "working drive." The drive box has served me well, and I appreciate the internal fan to keep things cool during long sessions. I have four options with these boxes... RAID 0 (optimized for speed), RAID 1 (redundant back-up), stacked drives (essentially two drives treated as one big... additive.. storage, or separate drives... each drive in the box shows as a separate entity.

My initial plan... desire, is to put a pair of 6TB 7200 drives into the new Sabrent Box, set it to RAID 0 and get 12TB of fast use. As I said, this would be my working driving. I would then use my second Sabrent Box (set to RAID1) to provide me with redundant back-ups. I use Carbon Copy Cloner to backup my drives.

Are there issues backing up a RAID 0 drive, give the way data is dispersed, to a RAID 1?

thanks and regards,
Bruce

[BobShaw]

Raid provides no backup. Zero, zip, nada. So no point in have a backup drive with raid. Much better to have two separate single drive disks and rotate them every say two weeks or whatever suits you. You Mac does backup using Time Machine. I use that to backup everything, meaning the OS, Applications, Users, passwords and Data. All of my data is on a LaCie Big 10TB drive and the backups are just Seagate 10 and 12TB drives. Backus are automatic every hour. If my computer fails or ages I can just buy a new computer and restore everything to it the same day.

[BLev]

Actually a RAID 1 is a back-up... read the following:
"RAID 1, also known as disk mirroring, is a RAID level that provides data redundancy by writing the same data to multiple drives. This configuration enhances reliability and fault tolerance, ensuring data is still accessible if one drive fails. While it doesn't significantly improve performance, it's ideal for applications where data integrity and availability are paramount. "

As I described in the original post, I am using a RAID 1 for my back-up to ensure data protection. This backs up my working drive, and thus I always have 3 copies of my data on my desktop. A RAID 0 is not a backup drive, but it enhances the speed of data movement through applications. This is especially noticeable when working with large files or video files. The question still remains, are there any issues when trying to back up a RAID 0 drive to a RAID 1 drive?

regards,
Bruce

[BobShaw]

Actually a RAID 1 is a back-up... read the following:
"RAID 1, also known as disk mirroring, is a RAID level that provides data redundancy by writing the same data to multiple drives.

Redundancy is not backup. If the original is changed or deleted then the mirror is changed or deleted. If change or deletion was a mistake then you are screwed.
A backup is a snapshot in time that you can "go back to". As such it can never be live. In the case of a deleted file you go to the back up disk and drag it back back to replace the missing one and no harm done.

Redundancy means that you have more than one disk doing exactly the same thing, so if you have a website taking payments and a disk fails then the website keeps running on the redundant disk until you replace the faulty one.

[BLev]

I feel like this is a discussion of semantics that has not answered the primary question I am asking.

Thank you,
bruce

[mcbroomf]

Are there issues backing up a RAID 0 drive, give the way data is dispersed, to a RAID 1?

No issues.  I don't use Raid 1 but I use raids 5 and 6 on my 2 NAS systems and back up my Raid 0 working volume to them regularly.

[BLev]

Thank you mcbroomf,

This is what I thought, but I just wanted to hear from others before I begin shifting my workflow around.

regards,
bruce

[degrub]

Actually a RAID 1 is a back-up... read the following:
"RAID 1, also known as disk mirroring, is a RAID level that provides data redundancy by writing the same data to multiple drives. This configuration enhances reliability and fault tolerance, ensuring data is still accessible if one drive fails. While it doesn't significantly improve performance, it's ideal for applications where data integrity and availability are paramount. "

As I described in the original post, I am using a RAID 1 for my back-up to ensure data protection. This backs up my working drive, and thus I always have 3 copies of my data on my desktop. A RAID 0 is not a backup drive, but it enhances the speed of data movement through applications. This is especially noticeable when working with large files or video files. The question still remains, are there any issues when trying to back up a RAID 0 drive to a RAID 1 drive?

regards,
Bruce

Except for the case where the box controller fails and one is not able to just remove the drive and plug it in to a generic SATA port or SATA/USB etc interface and access the files.
Proprietary controllers are a single point of failure that defeats the idea of redundancy/backup that many anticipate. If there is an error in a WRITE , then both drives are affected. The fact that you have 3 copies of the data is great. Just don't count the RAID 1 box as two unless either drive can be mounted on another system without requiring the box controller to work. Just my experience.

[BLev]

There is nothing proprietary about the Sabrent Dual Bay box. It simply has the hardware necessary to write the data from my computer to the drives. When using RAID 1, I can take either of my drives out and put them into any other device that can access data on a 3.5" SATA drive.
Having owned a DROBO 4 bay drive from close to their point of origin, I understand the pitfalls of a proprietary drive. In fact, I have held onto an old MacBook simply to use this DROBO for when I need to look for something that I cannot find.
I also have a LaCie 2Big drive that is TB-3 compatible, unfortunately... mine is not swappable without breaking into the box. This drive has been finicky for me, so it is now out of circulation.

Everyone has an opinion about the "best" way to back up data, yet none of the methods are perfect.
As state, I've purchased two of the Sabrent boxes... one as a worker the other as a back-up. I will relegate my current working drive to be my "remote" backup that will be stored offsite.

cheers,
bruce

[BobShaw]

I feel like this is a discussion of semantics that has not answered the primary question I am asking.

If you think that the difference between redundancy and backup is semantics then good luck. There are probably a dozen ways that you can lose all of your data.

[BLev]

Thanks,
I love it when my intelligence is underestimated on forum's...
Even though I have supported this community for its content for years, I haven't made a post for about 15 years... now I remember why.

cheers,
bruce