NAS for Mac environment
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@Ambarishrh said:
finder replacement for solving the access speed issues on MAC?
Yes, Finder causes issues with large directories when served out from any non-Mac platform on any protocol.
Options to fix it are:
- Use a Mac as your file server (because it creates the needed metadata to make Finder happy)
- Replace Finder with a tool that doesn't require the metadata
- Give up on file sharing and move to SAN + clustered filesystem like SAN-MP so that you are using a Mac-managed HFS+ system.
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@Ambarishrh said:
@scottalanmiller Any recommended finder alternative?
muCommander worked for us in testing but I doubt that people will want to use it if they do this full time. There are lots of commercial ones that are supposed to fix this problem too, but you'd have to trial some and see which ones fix the issue and which ones people like.
Before you do that, though.... are you seeing the Finder bug? Or is this just fixing a hypothetical performance issue?
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@scottalanmiller well they have asked me to look for an alternative for the current seagate black armor, plus as mentioned earlier, on MAC opening one particular folder which is around 1TB is painfully slow, it has loads of images and even listing folder takes time. On Windows it works fine though
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Need to check from this, try those 3 tools and see if it helps
http://computers.tutsplus.com/tutorials/why-a-finder-replacement-is-still-a-good-idea--mac-60841 -
@Ambarishrh said:
@scottalanmiller well they have asked me to look for an alternative for the current seagate black armor, plus as mentioned earlier, on MAC opening one particular folder which is around 1TB is painfully slow, it has loads of images and even listing folder takes time. On Windows it works fine though
A 1TB folder would be expected to be painfully slow. That slowness is 100% on the Mac side and is not from the storage. What they are doing is fundamentally something a Mac can't handle correctly. It's a well known bug that Apple refuses to patch. As you can tell by doing it from Windows, the issue is the Mac itself, not the storage.
That's definitely the Finder bug. So unless they want to completely change how their Macs work, they need to stop using NAS storage completely.
A SAN with a Mac Mini file server in front of it is the popular solution.
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@Ambarishrh said:
Need to check from this, try those 3 tools and see if it helps
http://computers.tutsplus.com/tutorials/why-a-finder-replacement-is-still-a-good-idea--mac-60841I feel like Path Finder is the one that people recommended the most back when we last dealt with this.
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There is also the other option of looking into why a Mac is accessing such a large amount of network storage. Obviously this is something that Apple does not intent Mac users to be doing. Maybe they are choosing the wrong tools for the job.
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I am not sure what an entry SAN pricing is.
We could find replacement for finders, but I believe there are companies who access file servers like this which has more than a TB of data from MAC.
In my company we use Netapp which handles the file sharing well for both MAC and Windows and also does well for heavy files as well. We work on PSD files which the user download via finder. The challenge would be to find a good but not super expensive SAN if thats the way to go
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@Ambarishrh said:
I am not sure what an entry SAN pricing is.
Same as NAS as nearly all entry point NAS and SAN devices are both and what makes them NAS or SAN is how you use them. Try entry point SAN is around $99 but is complete garbage, obviously.
For entry level SAN you want to look at Synology, ReadyNAS and Drobo B800i.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Ambarishrh said:
Need to check from this, try those 3 tools and see if it helps
http://computers.tutsplus.com/tutorials/why-a-finder-replacement-is-still-a-good-idea--mac-60841I feel like Path Finder is the one that people recommended the most back when we last dealt with this.
Seems like its quite a good product, but $40 for that seems bit high
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Ambarishrh said:
I am not sure what an entry SAN pricing is.
Same as NAS as nearly all entry point NAS and SAN devices are both and what makes them NAS or SAN is how you use them. Try entry point SAN is around $99 but is complete garbage, obviously.
For entry level SAN you want to look at Synology, ReadyNAS and Drobo B800i.
Which one do you suggest on Synology model. I am interested in Synology as well
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@Ambarishrh said:
We could find replacement for finders, but I believe there are companies who access file servers like this which has more than a TB of data from MAC.
There are and they all have this problem and are all doing things that Apple has not designed their systems for them to do. Lots of people do reckless, foolish or pointless things in every environment. That other people do it isn't an indicator of something being a good idea.
There is a reason why this discussion comes up so much - because everyone runs into this.
However, the big Apple shops like the ones out here in California like where I am right now, don't use file storage on the LAN like this. The majority of big Apple Mac shops don't run into this issue at all. Only those trying to use Macs as if they were Windows on a Windows style LAN.
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@Ambarishrh said:
Seems like its quite a good product, but $40 for that seems bit high
When your customers are throwing money around willy nilly on Macs, there is no reason to make your add on software cost effective.
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@Ambarishrh said:
In my company we use Netapp which handles the file sharing well for both MAC and Windows and also does well for heavy files as well.
NetApp actually falls over badly under heavy usage. It's specifically fragile at high loads (crashes rather than slowing down.)
NetApp, I believe, has the same Mac issues as everyone else. Likely you are just not dealing with the massive folder structure that this customer is. Remember it is listing size, not storage size, that causes the issue.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Ambarishrh said:
Seems like its quite a good product, but $40 for that seems bit high
When your customers are throwing money around willy nilly on Macs, there is no reason to make your add on software cost effective.
I know that they opted for a MAC due to the belief that they get a good product with less maintenance with an apple product.I always argue with people, if you are ready to spend such an amount, you will get a very good device on windows as well, but its hard to change that belief!
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@Ambarishrh said:
The challenge would be to find a good but not super expensive SAN if thats the way to go
Not a challenge really as every device you are considering as a NAS, plus a few extra, are SANs too. So the selection is just about the same.
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@Ambarishrh said:
I know that they opted for a MAC due to the belief that they get a good product with less maintenance with an apple product.Make sure to point out that they spent so much and now they have to pay extra to get it to work. It is not a great device and the price is really high. And it is a different animal than Windows. They must think differently, in addition to paying more for everything.
If they wanted the best product at the best price, Linux would be the option. Fewest pricy gotchas too.
But the better discussion is the "right tool, for the right job." Never let someone get away talking about quality, this has nothing to do with quality. It has to do with trying to use Mac like it is Windows instead of using it like it is designed to be used. Macs work really well when you follow Apple's suggestions.
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@scottalanmiller said:
A SAN with a Mac Mini file server
I didnt quite understand this part. Do we really need to have a MAC mini for a SAN to optimally work on MAC environment?
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@Ambarishrh said:
Which one do you suggest on Synology model. I am interested in Synology as well
All of the Synology business machines run the same OS and have the same software features. So it just comes down to picking the one with the right selection of drive bays, processing power, form factor and networking for your customer in question.
A good starting point is...
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https://www.synology.com/en-global/knowledgebase/tutorials/468 talks about using ISCSI for MAC to be used with NAS.
