win nt file system recommendations?-- possibly off topic slightly?

[markie 2]

howdy.   I have a bunch of disks, and stuff all over them

does anyone have a good suggestion on how to organize my shows so that

a) they're not all on the same HD (to provide some backup redundancy)

b) i can view it as one drive ??

(I know, I know.. I can use a mount point on one of my drives to mount the other drives).

So, lets say I use my d: drive as the new root for my directory tree

drive root
tv
tv\crime
tv\sitcoms
tv\drama
tv\watched
tv\movies

so I currently use drive letters for all of my directories (E: (emby), g:\crime  etc...

I also have a large disk I am using for backups of files, using a robocopy file.

any ideas??

goal is to actually SIMPLIFY so that I can move (say) a movie to watched after it's done...

The good news is that Most/all of my shows show up fine.

Any ideas on how to implement???

 

thanks for reading/responding

 

[GrimReaper 4739]

StableBit DrivePool? 

[ebr 16169]

100%.  Use a drive pooling solution and your life will get WAY easier.

[brothom 177]

On 17/09/2025 at 00:14, markie said:

goal is to actually SIMPLIFY so that I can move (say) a movie to watched after it's done...

My setup is like this:

Movies Library
C:\Media\Movies
... etc
J:\Media\Movies

TV Shows library
C:\Media\Shows
... etc
J:\Media\Shows

Documentaries (Mixed) library
C:\Media\Documentaries
... etc
J:\Media\Documentaries

Live (Mixed) library
C:\Media\Live
... etc
J:\Media\Live

Each drive has the same structure.
Depending on the space available and their studio (I like to keep Disney, Marvel, Star Trek, Star Wars etc together) I add them to their folder and that's all.

If you wanted to move them to a watched folder, you could simply use the same structure but add a "X:\Media\Watched" folder.

Personally I wouldn't move files based on their watched state but use the Emby "watched"-flag 

The reason I use "X:\Media" is because I don't want the root level to contain a bunch of media items directly to keep the hierarchy of the drive a bit cleaner.
You could also name the folder "Emby", but if you wanted to add other platforms like JellyFin or Plex that name obviously would become confusing.

Edited September 18, 2025 by brothom

[rookies 12]

Not sure this is exactly what your trying to do, but may be an option.

Could you not just create a folder on a drive.  say c:\mymedia  then inside that folder create a symlink called movies pointed to c:\media\movies another for shows  etc. etc.
Can even be scripted with powershell using:
New-Item -ItemType SymbolicLink -Path c:\mymedia\Movies -Target c:\media\Movies -Force

This would present a unified starting path to all of your different media locations across drives.  
You could use HardLink directive if you would prefer hard links instead.

[markie 2]

On 9/16/2025 at 6:56 PM, GrimReaper said:

StableBit DrivePool? 

After looking at drive pool  it's well worth the $29.95 for the features.

 

I guess I will post an update in a few weeks.

This may simplify my life a bit, as right now my 'emby' drive has backups on three separate devices, and was done via a robocopy script...

once it seems good, I will report, and show the comparisons for future users!!!

cheers to all...

[markie 2]

31 minutes ago, markie said:

After looking at drive pool  it's well worth the $29.95 for the features.

 

I guess I will post an update in a few weeks.

This may simplify my life a bit, as right now my 'emby' drive has backups on three separate devices, and was done via a robocopy script...

once it seems good, I will report, and show the comparisons for future users!!!

cheers to all...

UPdate 1:

OK. 

Now I have a drive pool on the "J: drive"

How do I use this, with EMBY?

do I still use my original files?

do I adjust my EMBY to use this drive?  what are the ramifications of either method?

 

[Luke 42077]

7 minutes ago, markie said:

UPdate 1:

OK. 

Now I have a drive pool on the "J: drive"

How do I use this, with EMBY?

do I still use my original files?

do I adjust my EMBY to use this drive?  what are the ramifications of either method?

 

Hi, can you just use the J path in Emby library setup?

[markie 2]

The problem with just using J as my new emby letter is that the J drive includes my (previous) main emby drive, but drive-pool takes any existing (pre-formated) drives, and just 'hides'  everything that was on the drive as 'hidden'.  so, to drive-pro, even though the files are on the drive ((and hidden), the drive shows as empty...

 

What I think I need to do is"

take my original emby directories

tv
tv\crime
tv\sitcoms
tv\drama
tv\watched
tv\movies

 and then copy them back to the j drive, and THEN tell emby to re-scan J drive, after all the misc. directories are put back onto J drive.

Can someone with drive-pool please confirm this?  it seems to  be just what I need, and all of my copied HD's will just be extra files (good I guess)

thanks again  for this..

And if you have the drive-pool software, do you also use their 'stable-bit scanner' software?  I've used Steve Gibson's spinrite for over 20 years, and this seems to do most of the same thing, except it seems to do it as a native volume.

Interested in if you have that too, and have used it...?

Thanks again!!!

[ebr 16169]

18 hours ago, markie said:

This may simplify my life a bit

Hi.  It is going to simplify your life a whole lot .

Its been too long since I setup mine for me to be able to answer your questions but I believe StableBit has an active forum of their own that should be able to help.

[markie 2]

On 10/5/2025 at 6:50 PM, markie said:

The problem with just using J as my new emby letter is that the J drive includes my (previous) main emby drive, but drive-pool takes any existing (pre-formated) drives, and just 'hides'  everything that was on the drive as 'hidden'.  so, to drive-pro, even though the files are on the drive ((and hidden), the drive shows as empty...

 

What I think I need to do is"

take my original emby directories

tv
tv\crime
tv\sitcoms
tv\drama
tv\watched
tv\movies

 and then copy them back to the j drive, and THEN tell emby to re-scan J drive, after all the misc. directories are put back onto J drive.

Can someone with drive-pool please confirm this?  it seems to  be just what I need, and all of my copied HD's will just be extra files (good I guess)

thanks again  for this..

And if you have the drive-pool software, do you also use their 'stable-bit scanner' software?  I've used Steve Gibson's spinrite for over 20 years, and this seems to do most of the same thing, except it seems to do it as a native volume.

Interested in if you have that too, and have used it...?

Thanks again!!!

-----------

update: 

A few interesting thoughts:

Drive-pool seems great, but it's difficult to set up for an existing server.

1) I am using robocopy to do the copy from my x:\tv drive to my J:{Drive-pool} drive.

2) Make sure that if you are using robocopy to use the following options:

• a) /XD (Exclude Directories (exclude your x:\$RECYCLEBIN, as well as system information (and filehistory) folders
• b) /XF *.!qb (all your uncopied bittorrent files) if applicable

ALSO make sure to use the following options that I forgot to use:  

/MT[:n] :: Do multi-threaded copies with n threads (default 8).
                       n must be at least 1 and not greater than 128.
                       This option is incompatible with the /IPG and /EFSRAW options.
                       Redirect output using /LOG option for better performance.

a Multi-threaded copy is MUCH faster, but uses more resources on pc.  I have now been copying for over 2 days, and dont want to restart the copy.

I have included the beginning of my robocopy job to show what options I used as 'code'

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
   ROBOCOPY     ::     Robust File Copy for Windows                              
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  Started : Tuesday, October 7, 2025 5:38:37 PM
   Source : G:\
     Dest : j:\

    Files : *.*
	    
Exc Files : *.!QB
	    
 Exc Dirs : G:\filehistory
	    G:\$RECYCLE.BIN
	    g:\System Volume Information
	    
  Options : *.* /V /X /FP /TEE /S /E /COPYALL /ZB /NP /R:1 /W:1 

In theory I could stop execution on this, and the /ZB would restart it, but I've been doing the copies since friday and restarted a bunch of times, so I am loathe to restart again, even if it would go faster with the /MT 64 (as example) option.  (multiple threads for copying..)

I hope that this helps others if they start to use Drive-pool.