2013 Troy-Bilt Pony 42 in 17.5 hp Lawn Tractor Model 13WN77KS011 Review

This is the least expensive TROY-BILT PONY you can buy. Lowes sells a ton of these but before you buy I want you to be sure it is the mower for you. It features a good 42 inch deck, a 17.5 hp B&S engine, and an easy to use 7 speed shift-on-the-go transmission. For a basic, no frills mower, it has a very good reputation. This mower can be equipped with a bagger, mulch kit and will pull a small yard cart!

Is this the right lawn tractor for you? Please read this entire review before you buy this tractor. I am going to spend some time and go over this mower completely. This mower is a great value but it is not for everyone.

Is this the right mower for you? The positive:

If you just want an inexpensive mower and you have a flat lawn about 1/2 to 1 acre, this tractor will do the job. This mower does not have special features. It is just a good, basic lawn tractor. It does not have anti-scalp wheels on the deck and it does not have a deluxe seat. If you have a flat lawn without a lot of trees and other landscape features to mow around this may be a good choice for you. This tractor will mow up to 1 acres an hour.

Most owners today prefer a tractor with a hydrostatic transmission: A “hydro” is easier to shift and saves you time when mowing around many obstructions. If your lawn does not require you to change speeds or back up a lot though the 7 speed shift-on-the-go transmission is a lot easier to use than the manual transmission in your old mower. You don’t need to use the clutch when shifting up. In other words when you shift from 1st to 2nd to 3rd you just move the dash mounted shift lever. When you want to use a slower gear or stop then you have to use the clutch. The transmission also has a “shuttle.” If you want to back up just depress the clutch and move the fender mounted lever from “F” to “R” and the mower backs up at the same speed as you were going forward. This is a nice feature that really improves the maneuverability over the older manual transmissions.

– You can use a 2 bin bagger on this mower. Many mowers in this price range do not accept a bagger.

Is this the right mower for you? The negative:

– This mower is a great value, but it is not for everyone. It is designed to primarily mow lawns. If you need a rider that will pull a heavy yard cart, sweeper or ground engaging attachments look at a different tractor.

– The specifications state it will mow from 1 to 4 inches, but in reality it will only mow up to about 3 1/4 inches. If you like a thick, lush lawn and mow high this mower will not mow high enough for you. If you install a mulch kit this mower may not mow high enough for you to get the best cut.

– If your lawn is very rough this mower does not have anti-scalp wheels on the deck. There are no after-market wheels available.

– This model has very basic tires. If you have a lot of sticks and other debris you mow over or if you need all the traction you can get because you are mowing slopes look at a different mower.

Drobo S Review (USB 3.0, 2nd Generation)

This is a review of the new Drobo S second generation 5-bay storage array by Data Robotics. Although the Drobo S is officially known as the 2nd generation unit, my PC recognized it as a 3rd generation Drobo S, so I’m not sure what I should call it. I guess I will simply call it the “new Drobo S” for this review. There are several reasons why I decided to write this review. First of all, Drobo products are gaining more and more popularity among photographers and in many cases are becoming a part of their workflow. While some well-known photographers have already endorsed Drobo as a photo storage solution, I wanted to see exactly how fast and reliable this unit is for storing photographs, compared to internal and much cheaper single/dual disk external storage. Second, I have been working with some of the best DAS/NAS/SAN storage solutions during the last 5 years (from small business to enterprise-level storage solutions like EMC Clariion) and having a pretty good idea on what to expect from a storage array, I wanted to see what Drobo has to offer compared to other similar products like Netgear ReadyNAS Pro. Lastly, I wanted to test and see how well the new Drobo S works with the latest technologies like USB 3.0 and how the new eSATA port performs in comparison. I will do my best to make this review as objective as possible, with plenty of data and screenshots to back up my words.
1) Introduction to Drobo S

Drobo S is a 5-bay Directly Attached Storage (DAS) device developed by Data Robotics, targeted at “creative pros, photographers, videographers, small office/home office”, as stated on their website. While designed with simplicity and reliability in mind, the Drobo S uses a fairly complex, proprietary “BeyondRAID” technology with a single or dual drive redundancy, which means that your data would be safe even if two drives were to fail at the same time, as long as dual drive redundancy was enabled before drives failed. On top of that, “BeyondRAID” has some great features like mixed drive size utilization, which allows mixing any size SATA hard drives, and instant expansion, which allows users to insert additional drives when more storage is needed. Traditional RAID technologies such as RAID 5 and RAID 6 have certain limitations and do not provide as much storage as BeyondRAID, especially when mixing small and large hard drives of various sizes. Lastly, the self-managing and self-healing features of the Drobo family are very attractive – if a drive experiences a failure such as a bad block, the system switches to a “self-healing” mode, where it will try to work around bad sectors and return to normal state. During such failures, the system will blink with red lights in front of the unit and will prompt you with warnings (through Drobo Dashboard), indicating which drive must be replaced. Drobo S also proactively monitors the amount of free space available on the unit. If you get to near full capacity, Drobo S will notify you through lights and its dashboard software.

In short, the Drobo S is a single large storage unit that is designed to consolidate your data into one place, or serve as a backup device to store data from multiple machines on your home or office network.