High Capacity Data Storage.

[Cuban]

In the past I have used Gnutella-P2P for file sharing and I've been happy downloading what I wanted to hear or watch, copying it off to MP3 player or DVD-data to watch later, this has produced a large stack of burnt CD/DVDs. Over the Christmas period I starting looking more seriously at tracking down old movies and television programmes I wanted and luckily fell into a good torrent group that has provided me about 20 GB in the past week alone. To maintain my sharing ratio I 'should' be keeping much of this content available for on-going sharing so here is my problem.

Storing data at this rate means I'll probably fill 500 GB drives within 6 months, I can't see a medium term end in the programme content I want, so even allowing for torrents that go out of favor and are not actively tracked I will probably leave them as availible for when they are reseeded at some point in the future.

So here is my problem, do I just invest (!) in a larger computer case and focus on adding to a HDD array with the back-up and recovery problems that will probably create or look at storing off-line with Blu-ray (is DVD is too small?) discs that I copy back into working HDD space as required with the admin overhead that entails. (Been reading about Blu-ray quad drives at 200 GB per disc.)

...or any other ideas?

A small (?) shelf or rack of USB external HDDs that I fill in turn, and then index and turn on/bring online as required?

Evolution of HDD storage capacity vs the increasing size of newly capped programme content, typical one hour broadcast shows were 350 MB (adverts removed) are now pushing 1.3GB when capped in HD. So apart from my personal archive, new material will require more storage following the increase in HD file size.

It was a couple of years ago I had a friend that was the first I knew to need 1TB of storage for his underwater pictures, winning a few awards for his hobby paid for what was rare in those days, now it's probably a common problem?

Can I buy an old Hotmail SAN somewhere?

[MKAsok]

Rent a seedbox. If you're part of a decent P2P community, there should be plenty of info and offers in the forum(s) of whatever particular sites you're using. Seedboxes will also seed back much faster (assuming your tracker has a reasonable amount of leechers), obviating the need to keep files for a very long time.

[LivinLOS]

1.5TB drives.. For 5340 baht.

Simple solution IMO.

[MKAsok]

1.5TB drives.. For 5340 baht.

Simple solution IMO.

That was my initital reaction, but with the amount he says he's going to be seeding, his upload bandwidth is going to be quickly saturated. Won't matter how much HD space he has, he's not going to have enough bandwidth (unless he coughs-up for a huge connection). A seedbox solves both issues.

[Cuban]

Rent a seedbox. If you're part of a decent P2P community, there should be plenty of info and offers in the forum(s)....

Thank you, from zero in the last 15 minutes I have had and education in seedboxes, torrent site user forums are awash with stuff that does seem to take forever to trawl through. Yes, for the site I'm currently copying down does support seedboxes, although I'm not convinced that the cost is worth the 1,500-2,000 Baht a month rental compared to adding 1.5 TB disks a year with some copying off to disk.

The fast uplink is nice but not critical at the moment, I'm likely to change from 2Meg/256k to something better later this year. I also read that seedboxes are having an effect of reducing the enforced 'need to seed'.

In the past I used to manage part of a datacenter, tucked away right in the middle of a rack of 'work' servers (hidden in plain sight) was a small collection of semi-redundant computers that I had set up for SETI signal processing. I even documented their tasks and proceedures within the company's disaster planning as third tier to ensure they weren't found. I need to find a small company with a datacenter :-)

I think adding drives will be the solution for a while to come.

Thank you.

....now if I could find that TORX bit.

[MKAsok]

Yes, for the site I'm currently copying down does support seedboxes, although I'm not convinced that the cost is worth the 1,500-2,000 Baht a month rental compared to adding 1.5 TB disks a year with some copying off to disk.

That's way over the going rate. Anyway, I've PM'd you a list in case you change your mind. Personally I don't bother with seedboxes since I don't deal with particularly high volumes, but I don't think you're realistically going to be able to seed back the amount you're talking about and hit the kind of ratios you're after unless you seed back one or two at a time maximum (there are so few leechers on private trackers and they will automatically leech from other peers with extremely high speeds, i.e. people using their whole bandwidth to seed back one thing, seedboxes, or people with generally insane upload bandwith). Competing with these kinds of seeders is always going to be your main problem. Anyway, good luck.

[Phil Conners]

I'm surprised with the legal situation around Torrents being what it is, that any datacenter will allow something like seedboxes. They could easily get in some serious legal trouble.

[sorensen]

1.5TB drives.. For 5340 baht.

Simple solution IMO.

I have been window shopping for an external hard drive for a while, can you please share a bit more info on the 1.5TB HD?

What brand name do you recommend?

Pantip? Any particular shop?

Edited February 14, 2009 by sorensen

[LivinLOS]

thanni is where I priced it..

[Cuban]

Thanks for the follow on thoughts.

Links that may help people reading with similar wants. USB HDD @ Thanni. JIB Seagate SATA for 5,350 Baht . Another not so cheap supplier.

Futher to our PM conversations on SBs, I'm also now looking at the costs and comparing them to increased upload rates on ADSL or even a cheap SDSL connection.

HTH

[Naam]

i read all postings with great interest. what would be more interesting is why the postings are tolerated. to the best of my knowledge only English and Thai is allowed in this forum

[Cuban]

I was thinking of you the other night, the sausage was lovely.