Drobo freezes 10.7 Lion Server

Okay, so I heard back from Drobo. Here is their response.

Thank you for contacting Drobo Technical Support.

I am very sorry for the inconvenience.

Unfortunately the update to Lion has broken compatibility with iSCSI devices. Until we can get the Dashboard updated, or GlobalSan comes out with a Lion compatible iSCSI connection, I recommend switching to Firewire 800.

MacPro + Lion Server + DroboPro = not compatible right now. I have switched to FW 800 (although cosmetically ugly as I have to use the FW800 port both on the front and back of my MacPro (original Xeon version) for best throughput. But the mount points are stable which is by far the most important thing.

As for Lion Server. I am waiting for my backup to complete before re-installing from scratch. Not sure exactly how this will help although my primary boot disk has been downgraded from RAID-1 to non-RAID bare disk - so perhaps the install will be a little smoother.

Thought you would appreciate the update on the thread.

Cheers

Yep - if you switch the mount point around to appear somewhere else, then you will end up with a new full backup. I think there are some threads on the forums related to making TM recognize your disk and carry on backup up to an old backup location.

If you hold down the ALT key when you click the TM icon in the menubar it will offer you the option to 'Browse Other Time Machine Disks'. Perhaps you can get to your older backups this way.

It's about time they fess up! Lion is been available to developers for how long now?? You figured they would have figured out they were screwed before now?

Oh well I bet it will be months before they fix this.

There is still an issue with Drobo 2's and Firewire no matter hich version of Lion you use. Even with client Lion it freezes. Seems Drobo has a lot of issues to deal with.

Fair enough. I wasn't aware of this happening as well. My 'S' seems to have always remained working after the upgrade, and the 'Pro' seems (okay it is only 20 minutes later ... ) to have stabilized using FW800. I definitely feel for you if you're still having problems. The purpose of buying this device is to take worry away - and when it is not functioning it is not living up to its promise.

I'm not sure if USB is an option for you but I have almost always been able to get USB working with most Drobos - is this not functional also?

The other thing I was concerned about was partition compatibility between ISCSI, FW800 and USB. That is something to check if you switch also. But at least if USB works you can use Lion.

Yeah I have switched my lil Mac Mini back to Snow Leopard and am using USB as well currently to be doubly sure. I am beginning to thing that the Drobo 2 shipped with only USB1 the speed that my Time Machine backups occur at now.

It's quite demoralising that I have no confidence in their product at the moment after recommending to many people as the easiest solution to storage needs. What's more they from what I have seen have not made any public statements on these issues that we are all having. The KB articles don't address the problems and instead of being buried deep in support they should be front page of their site.

My OS 10.7 (client, not server) has been causing my Drobo to freeze all the time, even while in the middle of making copies or backing up files. The Drobos will still appear on the desktop but all of a sudden nothing can be copied to them. I had to switch my 2 Drobo Pros to firewire 800 instead of iSCSI, and it still freezes a lot!!! Please Drobo or Apple, fix this!

MacPro + Lion Server + DroboPro = not compatible right now. I have switched to FW 800 (although cosmetically ugly as I have to use the FW800 port both on the front and back of my MacPro (original Xeon version) for best throughput. But the mount points are stable which is by far the most important thing.

What do you mean you have to connect both Firewire 800 ports of your Mac Pro? Are you actually using two FW800 connections combined to the Drobo? Does this work? Will it enhance throughput vs. one connection?

Please let me know, this sounds interesting.

I have had freezes about every two days with a Drobo (Gen 2, FW800), Mac Mini, and Lion (client) using the FW800 interface. I have not tried swapping to the USB2 interface.

Hey crypto, I know what you are thinking but it is not the case. I have two Drobo units, and each it attached to its own FW800 port (one front and one rear) on the Mac Pro. The reason to do this is to try and eliminate daisy-chain where 2 devices are sharing 800. Instead having each device with its own dedicated 800. This seems to work OK. Although I have had a hang-up today.

It would be fantastic if it was possible to bond two FW800 ports for 1600 but that's only possible with ethernet ports as far as I am aware. If anyone has heard of FW800 bonding that would be very cool. :-)

Yes - FW800 seems to still freeze but not every minute like ISCSI. I have had a couple of hang-ups in the last day or so.

I believe I am going to switch to USB to see if that even works and will be supplying the diag and open a new ticket for FW800.

Very disappointed with this so far. MacPro rev1 has been around for years, Lion itself has been seeded for ages, and Drobo has also been around for years. The fact this is so broken is really concerning. I hope they can get this fixed fast. And I wish they were transparent about this - it would not hurt sales to be honest. It would show a level of maturity and responsibility.

Fingers drossed they can sort this out.

USB seems to work but it is painfully slow.

Totally agree anguz. Somebody really dropped the ball on this be it Apple or Drobo to have not piced this up in the late seeds of Lion. They do need to come clean to give people confidence back in the product.

Same problem here have 2 x 2nd generation Drobo's on a iMac and Mac mini with Lion and both display the same problems drobo works for a while then dissapears or comes up with error message and after that lions becomes unstable and needs restart after restart Drobo does not show up untill drobo is also restarted

I have 3 Drobos. The Drobo S upgraded to Lion just fine.

My Drobo FS is a mess after the Lion-friendly firmware update. Now it is unstable in Snow Leopard and Lion. Currently it is doing a relayout of the drives and I have taken it off the network. If I put it on the network, it seems to lock up after about an hour.

I have a Drobo gen2 FW 800. It is on a Snow Leopard Server and I am not updating that server to Lion till this is all sorted out.