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OWC ThunderBay 4 RAID 5 Edition
20.0TB 4-bay external drive
Dual Thunderbolt 2 | RAID 5 | 4 Drive Bays | Mac
Performance + Redundancy
Fits both 2.5" and 3.5" drives
User configurable in RAID 0, 1, 4, 5 & 1+0
Up to 597MB/s read / 566MB/s write RAID 5 performance 1
Exponentially faster rebuild times than hardware RAID
Experience the first and only software RAID 5 technology developed for the Mac with the SoftRAID XT. Empower your workflow with up to 35% faster RAID 5 performance and exponentially faster rebuild times than comparable hardware based RAID arrays.
Activate advanced features, such as drive monitoring, e-mail notifications, and more when you install the included SoftRAID XT for macOS.
Conventional wisdom turned on its head.
Hardware RAID has long been thought to be superior to software RAID, but we've now combined the massive performance and capacity of ThunderBay 4 with a robust, proven software RAID engine to provide breathtaking performance, flexibility, and reliability.
Software RAID + ThunderBay = WHOA!
Over a year ago, OWC partnered with SoftRAID to bring enhanced storage capabilities to the Mac, and we're now seeing that dream become a reality. SoftRAID 5 XT combines advanced RAID modes, fast performance, monitoring, e-mail notification, and fast rebuild capabilities that only software RAID can deliver.
OWC award-winning U.S. based support for both the ThunderBay 4 drive and SoftRAID software is included with your purchase.
SoftRAID XT lets you easily setup drive monitoring and e-mail notifications to keep you informed about your ThunderBay's performance and drive health. Helping you to maintain mission critical workflows.
Better than Hardware RAID Performance
ThunderBay 4 and the SoftRAID engine offers faster performance than many competing 4 or even 5-bay hardware RAID external drives – benefiting from modern processors that are both fast and designed for exceptionally high-performance RAID management with no real-world impact on apps or tasks.
Flexible + Robust
SoftRAID 5 XT is extremely flexible and can easily be updated, reconfigured and used across multiple enclosures to provide an amazing amount of robust options to empower you to make the most of your ThunderBay workflow.
Backed by OWC
Should you ever have a question or troubleshooting need, you can rely on OWC's award-winning U.S. based support for both the ThunderBay 4 drive and SoftRAID 5 XT software.
Empower your workflow with RAID 5 performance and up to 40TB capacity.
Edit, view, stream, and produce more with ThunderBay in your 2K, 4K, and audio production workflow.
The RAID 5 Advantage
RAID 5 merges the four drives inside ThunderBay together for exponential performance gains over a single drive, the combined capacity of three of the drives, and data redundancy that allows the array to still work even if one drive were to fail!
Edit, Experiment, Create, Design
With ThunderBay's performance capabilities you can complete projects faster, have more time to experiment, and push your creations to the next level.
Enhance editing capabilities in video apps like Apple Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premiere, and Avid Media Composer. Empower greater audio production capabilities in audio apps like Avid Pro Tools and Logic Pro X. Edit large photos in apps like Adobe Photoshop, and browse large photo libraries in apps like Apple Aperture and Adobe Lightroom. Simply put, you can do more with a ThunderBay 4 enhanced workflow, and with a RAID 5 array you get data redundancy on top of great performance!
Certified and Tested
Each ThunderBay undergoes OWC's multi-hour drive "burn-in" performance certification procedure prior to shipping. This ensures your ThunderBay arrives operating properly and ready for demanding use.
4 drive bays plus so much more.
Time-Tested Cooling Built on OWC's time-tested enclosure cooling technology, ThunderBay utilizes an open "flow-thru" vented design with an oversized 92 mm, low-turbulence, noise-quieting fan to keep the drives running cool and reliably.Multi-Drive Daisy-chain up to six ThunderBays for massive storage capabilities and increased performance, or connect multiple ThunderBays to multiple Thunderbolt 2 ports to achieve exponential speed capabilities.Vibration Dampened ThunderBay's drive isolating design reduces sonic resonance, and is aided by over-sized, rugged, vibration-absorbing, non-skid feet.DisplayPort 1.2 Support Dual Thunderbolt ports let you connect the display of your choice that your computer can support, including 4K displays.OWC Thunderbolt Cable ThunderBay comes with an OWC one-meter certified Thunderbolt cable, with other lengths from 0.5 meter to 30 meters available separately.
1. Read and write speeds of sequential, incompressible data.
1GB = 1,000,000,000 bytes. Total accessible capacity varies depending upon operating environment (typically 5-10% less). The actual total capacity will depend on your own defined file settings/preferences.
In terms of standard gigabytes, 1GiB ≈ 1.074GB and refers to the actual formatted capacity of shown under Mac OS 10.5 or earlier and Microsoft Windows OS.
Specific application environments such as temperature and duty cycle will affect the overall reliability rates.
*1GB = 1,000,000,000 bytes. Total accessible capacity varies depending upon operating environment (typically 5-10% less).
The actual total capacity will depend on your own defined file settings/preferences.
**OWC reserves the right to replace or upgrade to equivalent or better components.
Drive Rotation Speed
7200 RPM
Drive Cache Size
32MB per drive, 128MB total for the solution
Port Configuration
Thunderbolt – (2) Thunderbolt 2 ports
Format
Comes pre-formatted for SoftRAID and configured as a RAID 5 volume.*
*If utilizing on a Mac with OS X 10.8.5 or earlier, the SoftRAID software must be installed prior.
Max Data Transfer Rate
Thunderbolt 2 – 20Gb/sec
Port/Interface Bootability
It can be used as a Thunderbolt startup drive on Macs running Mac OS X.
System Requirements
Any Mac with a Thunderbolt port running OS X 10.9 or later.
Boot Camp is not supported. The Thunderbolt certification process does not include Macs running Windows through Boot Camp.
Software Included
SoftRAID XT
Power Supply
Internal UL Listed U.S./International Auto Switching 100 ~ 240v, 50/60Hz input, 12 Volt 16.66 Amp output Power Supply (power cords for International use sold separately).
Includes OWC's award-winning U.S. based support for both the ThunderBay 4 drive and SoftRAID software.
Warranty
3 Year OWC Solution Limited Warranty
The best warranty is one you never have to use, but should the need occur – OWC is proud to provide a superior level of support and
warranty coverage to our customers. Even when not used, we understand the peace of mind afforded by a longer warranty period. OWC's industry
leading coverage is a testament to our confidence in the reliability of the solutions that we offer. OWC solutions are engineered to demanding
quality standards in order to deliver the most reliable, highest performance available on the market in each storage category.
Note: Do not disassemble or otherwise open your OWC solution prior to the conclusion of the 3 Year OWC Solution Limited Warranty period. Doing so will void the
remainder of the OWC warranty.
Manufacturer provided specifications for Other World Computing p/n TB2SRT20.0S UPC#: 812437020588
Software
SoftRAID 5 for ThunderBay
OWC has partnered with SoftRAID to bring software RAID 5 to the Mac. SoftRAID combines advanced RAID modes,
fast performance, monitoring, e-mail notification, and fast rebuild capabilities that only software RAID can
deliver. ThunderBay 4 models with drives come preconfigured in RAID 5, and are plug and play ready with OS X 10.9 or later.
Advanced features such as drive notification and monitoring require SoftRAID installation.
Benchmarks
Click any of the benchmarks below to view the results.
Reviewer: TrinityProductionsLocation: Tracy, CAAge: 55-65Experience Level: IT ProfessionalOwned Product: less than a month
Rating: 5/5OMG ! Faaaasssttt !October 24, 2018This thing even though only Thunderbot 2 I can edit and render video in final cut X as fast as my SSD (almost) but I was blown away by how fluid the video is bringing it on on a TB2 connection. The drive sits right behind my computer as is quiet no issues there at all. software to set up was a breeze. Makes me wish I had TB3 ! I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from 32TB OWC ThunderBay 4, four-drive HDD with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: tonyLLocation: AZAge: Over 65Experience Level: Home UserOwned Product: less than a month
Rating: 4/5Nice unit PriceyDecember 15, 2017Ordered with out drives. Easy to set up, loaded four 5tb drives in raid5 working great for the last 3 weeks of heavy use. Will add a second one but will wait for a sale. I think the fan could be quitter I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from OWC ThunderBay 4, four-bay drive enclosure with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: ChasmanLocation: Los Angeles, CAAge: 55-65Experience Level: IT ProfessionalOwned Product: less than a month
Rating: 5/5Powerful & deceptively easy to setupNovember 27, 2017Need storage? This is the unit for your Mac. You know GOOD & WELL you are not using your Thunderbolt ports to their full advantage. [Yes, I'm talking to you!] Securely packaged, the setup was quick and simple. Connected to the iMac popped in drives (I'm using 4 6Tb Seagate drives) and read the SoftRaid number off of the unit, installed and let it do its thing. You basically have 18TB of storage and a hot spare to work with (in user language, not techspeak) It is fast, comprehensive and quiet. I operate this unit in my bedroom and I can't hear it at night. A heavy durable metal unit that looks and feels like it will last you for more than the life of your computer. Next upgrade will be to 12Tb units to triple my storage. I had a mini-cluster of WD drives I had been storing data on that I moved to this unit after one flaked on me. Now I have open USB ports and my data is much more secure. And best of all, the price of the software was included in the drive, saving my $172 on getting it separately. Nicely done, MacSales. Nicely Done. I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from OWC ThunderBay 4, four-bay drive enclosure with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: RAR35
Rating: 4/5Product working great, but...October 31, 2017Getting there was a little difficult. I purchased this (along with one HDD) to set up immediately as a JBOD, (using 3 existing HDD's), with the idea that I would put it into service down the line as a RAID. Plans changed, I needed a RAID right away, and I ordered three more 4TB HDD's from MacSales. I used Softraid to set up the RAID, but 3 of the (all new) failed to certification. I sent an email to OWD support to figure out what to do. After nearly a week of no response, I sent another email complaining, and I finally got a response, although by then I had tried again on the certification and all drives passed. Now I'm noticing that my trial on Softraid is running out. It seems like if you buy a RAID, that management software shouldn't cost an extra $150.00. I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from OWC ThunderBay 4, four-bay drive enclosure with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Response from MacSales.com, Call CenterNovember 9, 2017
Hello! With the RAID 5 Solution ThunderBay, SoftRAID for ThunderBay is included with the purchase price. The serial number for activation should be listed on the underside of the ThunderBay itself. If you do need assistance locating or activating SoftRAID, please contact us at 1-800-275-4576 and we will be happy to help!
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: IdontwantanicknameLocation: WAAge: 45-54Experience Level: Home UserOwned Product: less than a month
Rating: 5/5Exactly what I neededOctober 25, 2017My old pair of 2TB drives in a RAID1 setup was full but I wanted to get something faster. SSDs would have been prohibitively expensive for the volume I wanted and this drive was/is an excellent compromise. In use it feels at least 2-3 times quicker than my old RAID1 pair, which is plenty good enough for my home uses. Setup was very simple and completed within minutes. The thing that took me the longest was locating the sticker with the key for the Soft Raid software (on the bottom of the drive case - duh!). Only other thing to mention is that for my 2017 iMac I needed to get a Thunderbolt 2 to Thunderbolt 3 converter - $50 from Apple. I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from 8TB OWC ThunderBay 4, four-drive HDD with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: raidloveAge: 45-54Experience Level: Power UserOwned Product: less than a month
Rating: 5/5Very impressed. Feels like a solid product.May 8, 2017I am a software developer working with video. I have two older 8TB (4TBx2) Guardian Maximus drives which are on a FW800 connection. I also have another Guardian Maximum that is 4TB (2TBx2). I replaced the 4TB drive with a ThunderBay 16TB.
It came with the drives already installed (unlike some earlier reports here). It was setup as a RAID 5 but I was easily able to reformat it as a RAID 10 (1+0). It is super fast and the SoftRAID software is very easy to use and work with.
I will likely end up buying another one of these as my storage systems are modernized.
Reviewer: WedgeAge: 45-54Experience Level: Home UserOwned Product: less than a month
Rating: 4/5Nice to have a lot of storage for everythingMarch 27, 2017I used to have 11TB of internal storage in my old Mac Pro. Since Apple doesn't like to support that kind of thing anymore I felt this Thunderbay 4 was my best option. Has great features for protecting data and is relatively fast. My only reason for not giving it 5 stars is that the fans are a bit louder than I expected. So this ThunderBay makes more fan noise than my 2008 Mac Pro. I am very happy with the product. I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from 12TB OWC ThunderBay 4, four-drive HDD with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Rating: 4/5Big, Powerful, and FastFebruary 5, 2017Easy to setup with SoftRaid, and although I was reluctant at first to use a software RAID instead of a hardware controller, so far this device has functioned very well. I am using it for the edit of a feature film (8.5 TB of data) as a (12TB) RAID 0 for speed, backing it up nightly to a slower 9TB OWC RAID5 over USB3 for security using the included Data Backup 3, also a very good product. I like the internal power supply (no wall wart). It would have been nice to have at least one alternative bus connection, like a USB3. I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from 12TB OWC ThunderBay 4, four-drive HDD with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: EE1979Location: Brookline, MAAge: 55-65Experience Level: Power UserOwned Product: over 6 months
Rating: 5/5Simple and reliableJanuary 2, 2017I've owned this drive for 1 1/2 years, populated with 4 x 4TB. Upon receiving the enclosure, I installed my 4 drives, installed Soft Raid, configured RAID 5, and haven't thought about it since (other than a Soft Raid update). Thunderbolt performance is very good, as expected. In my opinion, this is how storage should work; set it up and forget it, until the RAID systems starts complaining about a drive. It's so nice when things just work. I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from OWC ThunderBay 4, four-bay drive enclosure with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: rancheroLocation: CaliforniaAge: 45-54Experience Level: Power UserOwned Product: less than a month
Reviewer: SuperBeardLocation: Southwest FloridaAge: 45-54Experience Level: IT ProfessionalOwned Product: over 6 months
Rating: 4/5For the Price, You Can't Go Far WrongNovember 18, 2016This unit could not have been easier to setup and to use.
It is truly a plug and play unit, if you want a RAID 5 setup.
However I wanted to use the RAID 1+0 configuration. It came all setup as a RAID 5. There was a bit of setup to download the software and reconfigure the RAID.
Reviewer: daverLocation: Plano, TexasAge: Over 65Experience Level: Power UserOwned Product: less than a month
Rating: 5/5Just about perfectNovember 17, 2016I set this up as a 12TB RAID 5 system connected to my OWC Thunderbolt 2 Dock. This allows me to put two 24" monitors on my MacBook Pro. Extremely quiet and super fast using the supplied SoftRaid software. An excellent solution for using my MBP as a desktop but with the ability to pull out two Thunderbolt cables and the power cable and be on my way. I love this thing. I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from OWC ThunderBay 4, four-bay drive enclosure with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Rating: 5/5Lightning fast, trivial set-upOctober 27, 2016This thing totally flies with its Thunderbolt 2 connection. Unit is shipped preconfigured for RAID-5, but of course to actually use it the SoftRaid driver has to be installed onto the connected host Mac. Software installation was effortless, with the minor exception of having to install an update that was released by SoftRaid subsequent to OWC's preloading of the bundled installer onto the volume prior to shipment. Using the SoftRaid driver to work with the 4 drives as a single RAID-5 volume seems to add very little CPU overhead. I love this thing. I hate being locked into a particular vendor's chassis to support the RAID-5 as would be the case with any hardware RAID. But I do like this chassis, since it is ruggedly built and doesn't need an unwieldy external power brick. Fault tolerance would be even more awesome if I used this together with a second chassis with the same drive configuration so that I could configure it as a RAID-10 volume. Then if a drive failed (or even if multiple drives failed -- as long as the failures aren't on the "wrong" drives), or an entire chassis failed, my data would still be protected. Unfortunately, I can't afford another chassis yet. I would recommend this item to a friend!Customer Videos:
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: TimFrazier69Location: Nashville, NCAge: 45-54Experience Level: IT ProfessionalOwned Product: over 6 months
Rating: 5/5Best price for a super fast drive.October 24, 2016I have been using this item for the past few months now and it has worked flawlessly and been super fast with RAID 5 configuration. I would recommend this item to a friend!Customer Videos:
Reviewer: CurtDLocation: Washington, MissouriAge: 55-65Experience Level: Power UserOwned Product: over 6 months
Rating: 5/5Even BetterSeptember 29, 2016Even better than this enclosure, is this enclosure pre-loaded with drives! Even better than that is the RAID 5 performance. I now have two of these attached to my late 2013 Mac Pro (trash can mac), via Lightning cable. I would recommend this item to a friend!Customer Videos:
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: Damian
Rating: 5/5Excellent piece of hardware! Fast!August 11, 2016I've had this for about a month now and it is super fast and an excellently made piece of hardware. In RAID5 config it is almost as fast as my internal SSD drive. I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from 16TB OWC ThunderBay 4, four-drive HDD with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.Customer Videos:
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: bkayneLocation: San FranciscoExperience Level: IT ProfessionalOwned Product: 1-3 months
Rating: 5/5Fast and reliableAugust 1, 2016It was time to retire my Windows Home Sever and build a proper MAC home server. I purchased a well equipped Mac mini and a 20TB raid thunderbolt unit for storage. Great combination, installation was very simple, reliability and speed have been great. Recommend A+++ I would recommend this item to a friend!
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: AnonymousLocation: WisconsinAge: 55-65Experience Level: Home UserOwned Product: 1-3 months
Rating: 5/5Looking for RAID 5 solution? Look no furtherJuly 31, 2016I've been using this 4 bay raid enclosure for about 6 weeks now. I bought the enclosure without drives as I already had four 2TB Hitachi hard drives. Installation was quick and easy. Being it was the RAID 5 Solution, it came with SoftRAID software which is very easy to use. If you are looking for a RAID 5 solution look no furture as this is inexpensive and works splendidly. I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from (*) OWC ThunderBay 4, four-bay drive enclosure with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.
Reviewer: AnonymousLocation: Los AngelesAge: 35-44Experience Level: IT ProfessionalOwned Product: over 6 months
Rating: 5/5Great SolutionJuly 10, 2016So far, this has been the best solution to my data storage needs. I bought this unit, then found 4 5TB Drives on sale...and now have an awesome 15TB Raid 5 External Drive for about half the cost of buying a similar unit pre-configured. The RAID5 configuration slows the read and write times down a bit...but it's fast enough for my needs. In fact, I've already filled it up and need to get another one soon. :-) I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from OWC ThunderBay 4, four-bay drive enclosure with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.
Rating: 5/5Great Storage SolutionMay 26, 2016After 2 months the ThunderBay 4 works flawlessly. It has a beautiful design and contrary to other reviews I do not find it to be to loud. I purchased the enclosure and then added 4 5TB WD Black drives. Could not me happier I would recommend this item to a friend!This review is from OWC ThunderBay 4, four-bay drive enclosure with dual Thunderbolt 2 ports, RAID 5 Solution.
Verified Buyer
Reviewer: AnonymousLocation: New Jersey/PhiladelphiaAge: 45-54Experience Level: Power UserOwned Product: over 6 months
Time-Tested Cooling
Multi-Drive
Vibration Dampened
DisplayPort 1.2 Support
OWC Thunderbolt Cable
Click to load 360 Gallery
" ... great for performance and space. My internal Mac Pro 2013's 512 GB drive has been feeling tight for the past year, and a faster external drive has been something that I have been searching for."
— Paul Solt, iPhoneDev.tv
"OWC unlocks the incredible performance and flexibility of ThunderBay by pairing the drives with a robust software RAID solution."
— Tom Piper, appleJAC
"I turned to my friends at OWC, for solutions ... to efficiently and securely backup, transport, and archive all the data ... ( the ThunderBay 4 RAID) is a lot of storage packed into an eight and a half pound box with dimensions of less than 10"x7"x6"."
— James Mathers, Digital Cinema Society
" ... one of the more affordable four-bay Thunderbolt drives out there. ...performance over a Thunderbolt 2 connection is fantastic."
— Eric Reagan, Photography Bay
"Does great with lots of footage, handles 4K footage with ease ... copying over data is lightning fast, and its's whisper silent ... a terrific Thunderbolt solution"
— Shane Ross, Little Frog in High Def
"The performance is outstanding ... speeds are exceptional ... the Thunderbay itself is an efficient unit that does not get in the way of performance."
— Lloyd Chambers, DigLloyd - Mac Performance Guide
"... an amazing product that can meet the needs of the professional who needs high-performance storage, as well as anyone who is looking for a versatile method of storage and backup."
— Tom Nelson, About.com
"OWC's ThunderBay 4 brings to the market capacities that have yet to be seen in such a compact medium, as well as the performance and data security that only RAID 5 can provide!"
— Les Tokar, The SSD Review
"I remember when I spent $20,000 to buy 20 GB of storage. Now, we can get far more storage, with far better performance, for about $100 per terabyte ... I like what I see ... Congratulations, OWC."
— Larry Jordan, Larry Jordan.Biz
"It's affordable, fast, reliable, and gives any modern Mac access to fast, huge storage ... recommended for video editors"
— Iain Anderson, macProVideo
"Now we can do RAID5 via software and save substantially."
— Allan Tepper, Pro Video Coalition
"The ThunderBay 4 RAID storage isn't just fast, it's superior in performance to everything else in its class."
— Dan East, Layers
