Subscriber Discussion

Do You Use RAID Or No RAID For Video Storage?

U
Undisclosed #1
Jun 13, 2017

Need help determining if we should use RAID or not in our QSR environment with a maximum of 35 camera's?  What is the industry standard?  Are integrators recommending RAID?

JH
John Honovich
Jun 13, 2017
IPVM

Here are our most recent stats on storage redundancy / RAID from 2 years ago:

In terms of your case, it depends how important / impactful losing video would be and how much you are willing to pay.

Have you decided what VMS or NVR you are going to use? Some have RAID built-in which would make it easier, others would require purchasing a different unit.

 

UI
Undisclosed Integrator #2
Jun 13, 2017

Even though the quantities of cameras are low, I strongly suggest to implement RAiD 6 or 5. 

Video evidence is critical, thus don't take any chances by losing video when you need it.

Hard drives these days are cost effective.

Hope this helps.

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UI
Undisclosed Integrator #3
Jun 13, 2017

RAID for me, always.

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U
Undisclosed #4
Jun 13, 2017

100% of the time. 

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UM
Undisclosed Manufacturer #5
Jun 14, 2017

"don't want to take any chances" 

If a raid array fails due to too many hdd failing or the controller/hardware issue, you risk losing all data vs without raid you risk losing thr data only on that drive. 

I have seen too many times over the years customers losing lots of data. 

Don't assume that raid = full data safety. There is still a risk. It is a different risk and maybe acceptable to mitigate the risk of 1 drive falling, or 2 with raid 6, etc.

But there is still a risk added from using raid and you don't mitigate all risk of losing video.... 

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UM
Undisclosed Manufacturer #6
Jun 14, 2017

it all boils down to how critical the data is in which case Raid 0 is the option if not Raid 5 would do considering the number of cameras. Its better to have something rather than nothing.

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JH
John Honovich
Jun 14, 2017
IPVM

#1 is asking about a QSR (quick serve restaurant). In my experience, QSR are often on tight budgets for spending for video surveillance and RAID is still at least somewhat a 'premium' offering for video surveillance storage. To that end, it is worth #1 learning what the cost premium is for whatever system they are considering.

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UM
Undisclosed Manufacturer #10
Jun 14, 2017

Answer: 1 drive (at cost)

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JH
John Honovich
Jun 14, 2017
IPVM

Answer: 1 drive (at cost)

No, it depends what VMS or NVR platform they are using. Some hardware (especially low-cost, high-volume NVRs) simply does not support RAID at all, requiring switching to a potentially far more expensive option.

I am not arguing against RAID, I am simply stating the reality of a market which supports $100 NVR sales to tens of thousands of dollar recorders.

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Hans Kahler
Jun 14, 2017
Eagle Eye Networks

Ultimately it's a business decision and different customers place different values on their data.  You can explain the benefits of RAID, and the costs vs standard storage - then let the customer decide.  I wouldn't risk losing the job by pricing it too high because you think the customer needs RAID when they don't.  

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U
Undisclosed #7
Jun 14, 2017

It's not critical but it is important important, that is the color of grey. Have you considered onboard or cloud storage as secondary investment options?

Avatar
Jeffrey Hinckley
Jun 14, 2017

I normally use RAID5 with hot spare, but it is equally important, if you use RAID, to protect the system from loss of power, if you go this route.  A hard crash may corrupt your data.  Use a UPS and program the server to safe shutdown at 25 percent power.  This is critical.  Consider a cache vault solution or battery add on to the RAID card.  Most default configurations will not have this.  I have been bitten several times where an investment was made for RAID, and the installing techs did not configure the UPS, RAID battery not included.  Single drive JBOD are usually OK after crash.  In most cases, a Minuteman Pro1000 works fine, and if price was an option, I would choose UPS with safe OS shutdown over a cache vault/RAID bettery.

A major reason I prefer RAID is increased R/W speed to a single virtual drive, rather than a cluster of seperate drives (system only does RW to one at a time).  

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UM
Undisclosed Manufacturer #8
Jun 14, 2017

A slight slant to the RAID question is allowing for the actual storage available after the RAID headroom is allowed for.  I have seen projects lost because of poorly written specs conveying that, for example, 24 TB HDD of storage be provided.  One dealer quotes a 24 TB HDD array, figuring that is what the spec called for, and another a 30 TB array, figuring that's how much you need to provide 24 TB of available storage.

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UM
Undisclosed Manufacturer #9
Jun 14, 2017

Ahh, the great philosophical question. I don't believe there is an "always" answer.

I think RAID 5 is too risky for video surveillance's high writes, and if a project is critical enough to require RAID, then go all the way with RAID 6.

But does every job need a RAID? Consider this- you have a 16-bay chassis using RAID 6. You loose two drives and you're ok... for now. But the array is rarely monitored. (Remember, this is just video that expires every month, and CCTV is the redheaded step-child of technology. It's not storing a financial database critical for everyday operations, so not as much money and time is invested monitoring and maintaining it.) So the 3rd drive goes, and boom, everything is gone.

Not look at it if you hadn't implemented RAID. 2 drives go, you've lost 1/8 of your video and retention time is reduced by 1/8. Then the 3rd drive goes......and you still have 13/16, or just over 81% of you video and retention time. And there's only a 19% chance video you might have needed during that time period was on that drive. And you can loose another drive, and another, and still have video recording until hopefully someone notices soon. And considering 90% of time time video needed is within then last several days of occurrence, chances are pretty high you'll still get what you need most of the time.

Again, it's based on each client's needs, and I don't think there is an "always" answer.

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Danny Vallejo
Jun 14, 2017

These days I've always seen NVRs to use RAID. At least RAID 5 and many times RAID 6. It does cost you storage since one drive on RAID5 is used for parity. Always at least use a mirror on the boot drive. This enables you to continue booting if one drive fails. The Operating system is definitely critical enough to mirror. With storage in the industry most are going with RAID 6. With 35 cameras I would expect reliability to be a necessity. 

With a couple of cameras many times people go with a single drive or mirrored but with 35 cameras you're in 24TB plus range so RAID is a must in my opinion. The best part about this is if a drive fails you can have an alert sent to you and the drive should be hot swappable. Meaning, you can just remove the failed drive while the server is still running and replace it with another. All of your video will still be there. Without RAID any video on a single drive will be gone. This method was used many years ago when drives were more expensive. It was called JBOD or just a bunch of disks. Drives were smaller so to achieve more storage RAID was not an option. With costs these days there is no reason not to use RAID.

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Jared Beagley
Jul 06, 2017
Seagate Technology

First you have to ask yourself what the need for RAID in your particular situation actually is. Is it to provide redundancy so that downtime in a system is as low as possible, or or is it just to make sure the target data is secure and backed up? You just have to weigh what the goal is versus what is the most cost-effective way to achieve said goal. A lot of people assume RAID = my data is safe. This is not true. Any good online hive of techies will tell you one of their gospel truths, and I'm sure you could find it here as well if you stumble upon a relevant enough thread: RAID is not a backup.

Just for emphasis and dramatic effect:

RAID is not a backup.

So if your primary concern is just making sure data is not lost, then you may want to look more into how the data is being backed up, instead of RAID. We've seen a lot of small businesses will actually use a NAS device in RAID, then back that up either to external drives, or cloud storage solutions through a 3rd party, or some combination of both. Effective? Yes. However, cost does come into play, as the amount of drives you need for the actual amount of storage you're getting can get quite high depending on which RAID array you go for. If you're only looking at a storage pool of, say, 16TB of data, then paying for 4x8TB disks to get that kind of storage with redundancy isn't astronomical, however if the system in question is targeting a storage pool with much greater needs for a storage pool...Well the cost could get out of hand for what the goal is.

The primary backup consensus seems to be the 3-2-1 rule: Have 3 copies of your data, 2 stored on different mediums in the same system (this could include a redundancy-focused RAID) and 1 stored off-site in case of disaster/theft/environmental issues. RAID can be very useful in creating redundant copies of data in case a drive (or several drives, depending on which RAID array is utilized) fails, and in minimizing costly downtime for a system or business, but it should never be seen as the end-all solution for protecting your important data.

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