I believe there is some kind of compatibility issue between Drobo and Western Digital software. For the past several months, when either WD Security or Drive Utilities apps are installed, my Drobo has had severe connectivity and speed issues. Even when the Drobo manages to stay connected, speeds hover near 0 mb/s, tending to fluctuate in waves that peak around 20 before sinking again near 0. Even file directories in Windows Explorer cannot populate without freezing. As far as I can tell, WD Discovery and Backup apps do not have the same drastic negative impact on Drobo performance.
However, even without the WD Security and Drive Utilities apps installed, the Drobo dashboard sometimes does not recognize a Drobo is connected even as I can access all my files at expected speeds through Windows Explorer. And I’ve sometimes received a few device controller errors (I believe but am not positive for both the Drobo and for an external WD hard drive) as I’ve attempted to backup my files on the Drobo to various external WD passport hard drives, which seems to have had some issues completing as it used to before all my problems began a few months ago.
I’ve been in touch with both WD and Drobo support. Both effectively said it is something the other company should look into. Drobo said that the security app encrypting and decrypting the drive would cause a performance drop, but it seems a stretch to me that the impact would slow the Drobo to hover close to 0 mb/s. And that doesn’t explain why the Drive Utilities app would have the same negative impact. WD said they “do not have expertise on third party enclosures” and suggested I run diagnostics on the individual drives in the Drobo.
I’m using Windows 10 with 4 WD Red 3 TB drives in a Drobo 5D3 connected by USB 3. All software is up to date, and the problem(s) persisted after buying a new computer.
I’m not a technical person so am hoping someone else here is and might have some ideas. I’m also curious if anyone else can replicate the same findings. But mostly I’m hoping Drobo and WD fix this issue, as I imagine I can’t be the only one.
