[Tig] ZFS coming to OS-X

[Bob Friesenhahn]

ZDNet has an article about ZFS coming in the next release of Apple's 
OS-X "Snow Leopard" server edition.  See 
"http://blogs.zdnet.com/storage/?p=335&tag=nl.e539".  Note that it is 
not yet clear if this will be offered outside of the expensive server 
version since it only appears in the spec sheet for the server 
version.

Meanwhile I am using a ZFS mirror across two cheap USB drives (500GB 
each) and it is working great for nightly backups.  I can even 
double-check data integrity afterward.  This is a great way to 
transport valuable data (e.g. your DI files) using cheap drives 
without springing for special RAID hardware.  I was worried that ZFS 
on USB would be unusually slow but I was happy to see that the data 
transfer rates were at least as good as Windows NTFS formatted with 
64K blocks.  If you need a RAID-5 array then use duct tape to strap 
four or five USB/eSATA drives together. :-)

The main issue with transport is you need compatible versions of ZFS 
on both machines (older works with newer but newer does not always 
work with older). It seems that many cheap USB bridge devices don't 
work very well so it is safest to use hard-wired USB ports.

Bob
======================================
Bob Friesenhahn
bfriesen at simple.dallas.tx.us, http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/
GraphicsMagick Maintainer,    http://www.GraphicsMagick.org/