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2 x G5s over 10gb Ethernet with SATA RAID
I’m getting sick of not being able to work during AE and Shake renders so I’m looking to get a Quad G5 to run alongside my Dual 2.5 G5. I’ve currently got an 8-drive SATA RAID hooked up to my G5. Ideally I want to be able to share projects and work on files simultaneously across both computers. Since I’ve already invested the $$$ into the SATA RAID it would be great to be able to share it between both computers – instead of having to invest in Xserve/XSan/Fibre Channel etc.
I was looking at the new 10gb Ethernet NICs from http://www.small-tree.com. They would be more than fast enough to stream uncompressed 1080i between the two computers. My questions are –
1. Can you directly connect two computers over 10gbE – or do you need to go through a switch/server?
2. Would there be any problems using the SATA RAID as shared storage under this configuration?Thanks in advance
dan graetz -
1 Reply
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Sorry Dan I don’t have time to fully answer right now, but the short answer is NO. If you want to share files and projects off of one RAID between two or more Mac’s you need SAN software and probably a switch and server. If you want to divide the RAID in half and not share the same files/projects between the Mac’s, then you could get away without the SAN, but you may still want a switch and server to go it correctly. You’ll probably corrupt the drive if you allow two or more Mac’s to access the same files without SAN software or a server setting permissions to only one or the other computers access.
I’d post again on our Xserve forum and see what cost effective (well its expensive no matter what) solutions they might have to offer. ProMax is also a good resource (there forum is worth posting to as well). I’m not big on Ethernet solutions for video as they’ve been unreliable, speed-wise, in the past. However, I’m a little out of date on the latest info with them, so its worth looking into. Fibre connections on the other hand has been rock solid in my experience.
Tony!
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