LaCie Unveils Three New Thunderbolt 2 Storage Solutions for 4K Video Editing

Monday April 7, 2014 3:01 AM PDT by Richard Padilla
LaCie unveiled three new and updated Thunderbolt 2 storage solutions at the annual NAB trade show this weekend, with the 8big Rack, 5big and 2big geared towards 4K video editing and other professional media uses.

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The LaCie 8big Rack is the company’s first Thunderbolt 2 rackmount storage solution, featuring up to eight 6TB 7200RPM hard drives and delivering speeds of up to 1330 MB/s. The 8big Rack also features easy access to components and tool-free maintenance of the included power supplies units, fans, and disks, all while offering a cooling system with three fans that conducts heat away from vital components. The 8big Rack will be offered in 4-disk (12TB) or 8-disk (24TB and 48TB) configurations.

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Meanwhile, the new LaCie 5big is up to two times faster than the previous version, featuring multiple 6TB 7200RPM hard disks with speeds of up to 1050 MB/s by way of Thunderbolt 2. Three separate LaCie 5bigs can be connected to a Mac Pro to create a single high-storage workstation, with every device featuring two Thunderbolt ports to daisy chain up to six Thunderbolt devices. An innovative cooling system that composes of a heat-dissipating aluminum enclosure, heat exhausts and a Noctua cooling fan is also included, as the new 5big will be offered in 10, 20, or 30TB capacities.

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Finally, LaCie has also refreshed its 2big, with the device sporting a new design, speeds of up to 420 MB/s with the included Thunderbolt 2 technology, and fast performance with USB 3.0 support. The device also offers the ability to hot-swap disks through an easy access panel on the front, while status LEDs on the side allow users to track disk health and RAID build status. The LaCie 2big will be offered in 6, 8, or 12TB capacities.


According to LaCie, all three storage devices are expected to be available this quarter through the LaCie online store and the company’s resellers, with pricing yet to be determined. The company announced its Little Big Disk Thunderbolt 2 external hard drive this past January at CES, which is available in a 1TB SSD capacity.
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sputnikv
53 months ago

If the external boxes still require separate power supplies then it's no deal.

I'm also wary of the cost though; are they really only offering 6tb disks, or will you be able to buy them diskless and supply your own? I mean, part of the whole point of RAID is that you can use much more affordable disks to form a high capacity volume with redundancy; I know they're gearing it towards 4k video editing, but it seems strange to limit themselves to that market only when there are plenty of people who just want a decent Thunderbolt enclosure they can pop disks into.


Lastly; who's idea was it to stick such an obnoxious LED on the front? I absolutely hate having LEDs on all my devices, especially big distracting ones; while a discreet LED for checking if a device is on makes sense, anything else turns me away from a product very quickly. I've made the mistake of not looking at LEDs in the past, and now go out of my way to buy products either without them, or with sensible ones.


no professional wants a storage solution that doesn't have its own power supply, much less a potentially volatile RAID array. your gripes about the LED tells me that you're not the professional these products are intended for
Rating: 6 Votes
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Lone Deranger
53 months ago
Good to see Thunderbolt getting more and more support.

Still wary of LaCie products though. Too many bad experiences with them in the past. :(
Rating: 5 Votes
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RightMACatU
53 months ago
"Bob, I'd like to bid $14,999 for this product"
Rating: 3 Votes
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FreakinEurekan
53 months ago

Wait, what? You think you're going to bus power multiple desktop-class drives off Thunderbolt? Nope. Perhaps you should re-review the spec. Or am I misreading your statement?


I inferred that he's wanting an internal power supply, rather than an external brick. I can understand that, all the bricks get to be a bit of a hassle in cable management.
Rating: 3 Votes
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puckhead193
53 months ago

no professional wants a storage solution that doesn't have its own power supply, much less a potentially volatile RAID array. your gripes about the LED tells me that you're not the professional these products are intended for


Why do they have that ugly blue button on the front? They make nice looking drives except they ruin it with the ugly blue button. G-Tech makes better looking drives.. Although I suppose no one cares about the looks of a drive.. just as long as they do what they are suppose to do. :)


Nothing is more annoying then the G-tech drives. The white LED is annoying. I understand that it should be lit when it's on. But the flashing drives me nuts! I have to tape something over it.

So these will cost only an arm and part of a leg? :confused:
Rating: 2 Votes
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everything-i
53 months ago

no professional wants a storage solution that doesn't have its own power supply, much less a potentially volatile RAID array. your gripes about the LED tells me that you're not the professional these products are intended for


I'll second that, in fact more than that they also need to have some UPS as well to shut down gracefully if the power goes out.
Rating: 1 Votes
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jimthing
53 months ago

You probably have more authority than I do if you see that many. I was only talking about a few home computers of family and friends, whatever complaints I've seen on MacRumors, and the recalled iMacs. There's also that questionable failure rate statistics graph out there. All I know for sure is that Hitachi has always worked for me, so I'm sticking with that :)


This is not really the point. You should ALWAYS backup to a SEPARATE unit first, before doing a project. As any HDD or even multiple HDDs in a single storage unit can fail at ANY time, regardless of HDDs brand/enterprise vs. standard HDDs/RAID level used/storage device model or brand. :rolleyes:

To repeat a tired phrase: RAID is not backup.


Anyway, the really interesting part of this announcement (apart from the 5Big now presumably having a proper RAID controller, thus being able to offer RAID 5 compared to the previous version: although a 6-drive unit would've made more sense, hence why I use Pegasus R6's), is the use of 6TB HDDs — wowser! :)
Rating: 1 Votes
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SlCKB0Y
53 months ago

You probably have more authority than I do if you see that many. I was only talking about a few home computers of family and friends, whatever complaints I've seen on MacRumors, and the recalled iMacs. There's also that questionable failure rate statistics graph out there. All I know for sure is that Hitachi has always worked for me, so I'm sticking with that :)


Well I work in a datacenter, we have over a thousand physical servers, each one containing 4 - 12 drives plus we have numerous SANs.

In that environment over the years I have seen many WD drives fail but not as many Seagate. Having said that though, servers are always powered on with drives being accessed constantly.

The real damage is done to drives when spinning up when cold (something our drives barely ever do) so quite possibly your observations with Seagate failures are just as valid, just different circumstances.
Rating: 1 Votes
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campyguy
53 months ago

Nothing is more annoying then the G-tech drives. The white LED is annoying. I understand that it should be lit when it's on. But the flashing drives me nuts! I have to tape something over it.


My favorite tech accessory is a roll of black electrical tape.

I use it with my 2TB G-RAID, my SURFBoard SB6141 modem, my 4th-Gen Airport Extreme, and my 1st-Gen Airport Express.

Best 79¢ tech investment I've ever made!

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But do pro video editors really trust their data on Seagate hard drives? LaCie is owned by Seagate. I've never seen a Seagate hard drive live for more than 3 years, and the one LaCie-branded external hard drive I bought died early too; always avoiding them.


The warranties are listed as 3 years, so there you go. I've had drives of the three remaining major manufacturers go out on me within the warranty periods, and I've used the warranties to get back on track. Restore from my backup, and I'm good to go.

My old G-RAID is out of warranty, but it's still chugging along. I keep a backup handy, tho'. ;)
Rating: 1 Votes
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larrylaffer
53 months ago

these are marketed as solutions for 4k video editing. i shouldn't have to tell you how small that demographic currently is


I'm pretty sure the every-big-budget-movie-that-has-come-out-since-2011 community is more than just a "small demographic", especially financially.
Rating: 1 Votes
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