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Drobo 5D

Redefining Professional Storage. Again.

Redesigned from the ground up to meet the data storage needs of today’s media creators and demanding professionals, Drobo 5D builds on the fully automated functionality of previous Drobos by adding blazing-fast performance. Leveraging cutting-edge Thunderbolt and USB 3.0 connectivity—along with the innovative use of solid state drives (SSDs) —Drobo 5D is the highest-performing personal storage array on the planet.

Not only is Drobo 5D fast, but it’s easy-to-use, expandable, flexible, and protected—exactly what’s expected from a Drobo. You can safely store and edit photos and videos as well as store and back up personal data.

The Drobo 5D is available from $849 US.

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Videos

  • Erik Pounds introduces you to the technology innovation in the new Thunderbolt-powered Drobo 5DErik Pounds introduces you to the technology innovation
    in the new Thunderbolt-powered Drobo 5D
  • Erik Pounds shows you the new features of the Drobo 5D in a chalk talkErik Pounds shows you the new features of the Drobo 5D in a chalk talk

Features

Data Protection and Expandability Made Simple

SDR and DDR on the Drobo 5D

Built on award-winning BeyondRAID technology with single- or dual-drive redundancy, Drobo 5D protects your data without any user interaction, even in the event of multiple drive failures.

Drives can be added or hot-swapped on-the-fly for storage expansion with zero downtime. If you’re running low on space, the lights on the front tell you what to do. Just add a drive in an empty bay or remove a smaller drive and replace it with a larger one.

Power of Thunderbolt & Flexibility of USB

Drobo 5D daisy chained with iMac

Thunderbolt I/O technology provides performance that’s up to 5x faster than the previous-generation Drobos. This allows you to move large amounts of data in a fraction of the time it used to take. Visit the Thunderbolt technology site to learn more about this exciting new way to connect devices.

Drobo 5D is equipped with dual Thunderbolt ports for daisy chaining. Connect up to six Thunderbolt devices and/or a non-Thunderbolt monitor at the end of the chain. With six Drobo 5D arrays in a chain, you can have up to 96 TB of usable capacity. And, the bi-directional 10 Gbps performance of Thunderbolt allows all devices in the chain to achieve maximum throughput.

Drobo is the only storage array that offers Thunderbolt AND USB 3.0. This latest generation of USB also offers high-performance connectivity and is backward compatibility with any computer running compatible versions of Mac OS X or Windows.

Note: Thunderbolt is currently supported only on Mac OS X.

Capacity AND Performance

Inserting mSATA SSD in Drobo 5D

Data-Aware Tiering technology, usually reserved for business-class storage solutions, is also available in this desktop Drobo. It intelligently uses the high-performance flash in SSDs to accelerate performance of the storage array, allowing applications such as Adobe Premiere and Apple Aperture fast access to data. To keep capacity of the Drobo at a maximum, the Drobo Accelerator Bay accepts an industry-standard mSATA SSD, leaving all five 3.5” drives bays available for high-capacity HDDs.

If getting the fastest performance possible is your thing, you can also load up every drive bay with SSDs. Drobo gives you the flexibility to choose.

Power Protecting Your Critical Data

Drobo 5D battery

Drobo doesn’t just protect you from a drive failure, but also from potential data loss after a power outage. Often found only in arrays that cost tens of thousands of dollars, Drobo 5D includes a battery that protects all data in memory, or cache, that is, data on its way to the drives.

When power spontaneously goes away, the battery keeps the Drobo alive long enough for the data to be written to non-volatile storage, ensuring your important information is safe. This battery recharges itself and is designed to last for the life of the product.

Drobo 5D measurements

Designed for You

Drobos have always been space efficient and the Drobo 5D is no exception. It was designed from the ground up to provide very high capacity without taking up a lot of your valuable desk space. It is compact mostly because of Drobo’s unique carrierless drive-bay design, allowing drives to be installed very close to each other. The result is an attractive storage array that’s up to 34% smaller than the leading competition.

Drobo 5D is also significantly quieter than previous-generation Drobos due to its tuned, large, variable-speed cooling fan. You can even configure Drobo to spin down drives when they’re not in use to further reduce noise and save energy.

Specifications

  • Connectivity

    • 2 x Thunderbolt ports; second port for daisy chaining Thunderbolt devices (Mac OS X only)
    • 1 x USB 3.0 port
    • Thunderbolt and USB cables included

    Capacity

    • Up to five (5) 3.5" SATA II / III hard disk drives or solid state drives (sold separately)
      and one (1) mSATA solid state drive
    • Drives of any manufacturer, capacity, spindle speed, and/or cache can be used. No carriers or tools required. Click here for drive recommendations
    • Expandable by adding drives or hot-swapping drives with larger ones. Use the 5-bay Capacity Calculator to estimate available storage in various configurations

    BeyondRAID Features

    • Thin Provisioning
    • Instant Expansion
    • Mixed Drive Size Utilization
    • Automatic Protection Levels
    • Dual Disk Redundancy
    • Virtual Hot Spare
    • Data Aware
    • Drive Re-ordering
  • Management

    • Drive bay indicator lights, capacity gauge, status lights
    • Drobo Dashboard version 2.3 or later

    Operating System Support

    • Mac OS X 10.7.x Lion
    • Mac OS X 10.8.x Mountain Lion
    • Windows 7 SP1 32 and 64 bit
    • Windows 8 32 and 64 bit

    File System Options

    • Mac OS X: HFS+
    • Windows: NTFS

    Hardware Features

    • Carrier-less Drive Bays
    • Power Fail Protection
    • Kensington Lock Port for Security (lock not included)

    Additional Software Features

    • Data-Aware Tiering
    • Drive Spin Down
    • Dim Lights
  • Warranty

    Standard 2-year warranty; extend to 3 years and enhance support with DroboCare

    Size and Weight

    • Desktop Form Factor
    • Width: 5.9 in (150.3 mm)
    • Height: 7.3 in (185.4 mm)
    • Depth: 10.3 in (262.3 mm)
    • Weight: 8.5 lb (without hard drives, power supply, or packaging)

    Power and Cooling

    • External Power Supply: AC Input – 100-240VAC~2A, 50-60Hz; DC Output – 12V, 12.5A, 150W max
    • Single, fixed, variable speed cooling fan

    Box Contents

    • Drobo 5D
    • 2 m (6.6 ft) Thunderbolt cable
    • 2 m (6.6 ft) USB 3.0 cable
    • 1.8 m (6 ft) power cord with power supply
    • Quick Start Card
  • Drobo announces availability of Drobo 5N, designed with one purpose in mind:
    to deliver the best ever experience sharing storage and accessing data!

    Learn more

  • "It's a new Drobo from the ground up and includes USB 3.0 as all as a new and unique reliability feature normally found on much more expensive systems …"

    Read the review »

  • "Go home and come up with a backup system that you’ll actually keep current." advises David Pogue, NY Times

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  • Drobo B1200i Update Combines SSDs with High-Capacity Drives

    Read the article »

  • ZDNet gives Drobo B1200i a 9 point rating out of 10, "Network storage doesn't come much easier than this"

    Read the article »

  • Wall Street Journal asks, "Is Your Stuff Backed Up? Are you Sure? Really Sure?"!

    Read the article »