Drive Bender is a storage pooling software designed for Windows that allows you to combine multiple physical hard drives (internal, external, USB, or NAS) into a single, large virtual drive. It acts as a layer between your hardware and Windows, presenting your storage as one or more drive letters. Key Aspects of Drive Bender:
Storage Pooling: It merges different-sized and types of drives into one, simplifying file management.
Flexibility: It can handle various drive types, including USB, Firewire, and networked drives.
Performance and Driver Type: Drive Bender historically utilized a user-mode driver (ElDos) rather than a kernel-mode driver, which can lead to slower performance compared to competitors like StableBit DrivePool, which often uses kernel-mode drivers.
Features: It supports features such as folder duplication for redundancy and different balancing options, including a “most space” mode where files are written to the drive with the most available space.
Status: It has been a long-standing tool for DataHoarders (often discussed on Reddit and in forums) that, while functional, has faced comparisons regarding speed and performance.
As of 2016, the software was updated to handle better file tracking and address UI bugs, but user feedback from 2018 indicated it might be slower than competitors, specifically noting the difference between user-mode and kernel-mode drivers.
Note: There are also tools for sheet metal bending that share the name “drive bender” (e.g., Flagler Power Cleatbender), but they are not the software mentioned here. If you’d like, I can:
Compare it directly with StableBit DrivePool or Windows Storage Spaces.
List the advantages and disadvantages of user-mode drivers for storage pooling. Let me know what you’d like to explore further. DriveBender vs DrivePool Speed Comparison : r/DataHoarder
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