So… Back on march 30th I posted an entry on my storage solution. I had built a computer and had added a basic RAID configuration to it:

I finally got my RAID solution in place. I went cheap and got two 500GB hard drives ($145 each) and a HighPoint RocketRAID 1740 RAID 0/1/5 4 channel SATA 3.0 GBps card ($110).

So… With this configuration I get 500GB of storage (430GB or so after formatting). This was great for a while. However, recently I realized I needed more. All of my personal “stuff” that’s somewhat irreplaceable doesn’t take up much room. Add my ripped CDs in and you get about 100GB. I have another 25-50GB of random things (disk images for linux installs, video rips (which I haven’t in the past kept for very long so I was okay with not backing them up)). So I wasn’t exactly out of room but I was using a fair bit. However, I also wanted to snag a relation’s (who will remain unnamed) music collection. It’s 499GB. That’s 272 days worth of music if played continuously. We follow a strict rule to ensure compliance with copyright law: we don’t tell anyone.

Whoops.

Anyway — I needed more storage so I picked up some hard drives from Fry’s online (why is their online store called “Outpost”? It makes no sense). They were cheap! $89 per 500GB drive. They came with free shipping and I shipped them to Virginia when I was there on travel to save on state sales tax. When I got back, I copied my existing data to a 500GB external drive, added the new drives, prayed a quick prayer that my system wouldn’t overheat and started it up. I reconfigured the RAID array from a 2 x 500GB RAID 1 array to a 4 X 500GB RAID 5 array. This gives me 1.5TB (1.4 TB or so formatted). It’s nice. I’ve loaded everything on there and since I have so much extra breathing room I’ve immediately started piling on stuff that I previously had kept on local hard drives. Here’s my usage currently:

It’s nice to have some room…