NAS advice for video editing

[Ian1000]

I’m new to NAS storage and am looking for a 4 or 5 bay solution to connect to a 10gbe enabled iMac. I’d greatly appreciate any advice from knowledgeable people.
I’m on a small budget but am aiming for something reasonably fast, at least SSD comparable speed.
I’m working on high resolution video editing a lot of which is 8k 360 video. It’s mostly for connecting to one computer though there may be times when a second computer would need to be connected though this wouldn’t neccesarily need to be a high speed connection. I’d also like to have the data online so I can access it from elsewhere and have remote editors working on it. I would plan to use 10TB drives in raid 5 and backup to USB drives.
These are the units I’ve shortlisted so far

Terramaster F5-422
qnap ts-932px
QNAP TS-453BT3
NetGear 10GbE 4 port Switch XS505M-100EUS 4-Port

My questions are
1. Is it worth spending extra on the thunderbolt enabled NAS? Would that give me any speed and versatility boost rather than connecting via 10GBe given that it is mainly just one computer that I will be connecting locally? I presume I can connect an extra computer to the switch via a thunderbolt to 10GBe adapter.
2. Would the SSD caching of the 9 bay qnap ts-932px give me a considerable speed boost?
3. Would connecting directly to the NAS via 10GBe have any advantages over connected via a switch?
4. Any other kit worth considering

Thank you

 

[dosborne]

If it fits your scenario, the ideal solution would be to store the "in progress" data on a local drive and use the NAS for backups, sharing, storage, etc.

The software you use can make all the difference too. For example, my editing software sucks really bad when using the NAS directly just because of the way it was designed. Temp files and other things get stored on the share, not locally, and cannot be reconfigured. Copying massive files to the local drives, editing them and copying them back save about 60% of the time it would take to edit in place. I know it is then particular software I use as other apps are fine. But, even though I have a fast 10gbe infrastructure, I don't ",edit in place" even with the better apps.

If your switch is 10gbe, then direct or through the switch will likely not be noticeably different.

Ssd caching is available on many models, or can often be added after. It really depends on the type of hits you are making if you will perceive a performance increase. Any particular reason you are looking at a 9-bay unit?

 

[Ian1000]

Thanks for the reply. I'd be curious to hear how your NAS is badly designed to make direct editing suck. Live editing from the NAS Is a must for me so I'd like to buy/design with this in mind. Ideally I would connect to the NAS via a switch so it's accessible from the Internet though if direct connection to the computer through the 10 gbe port or a thunderbolt Port is significantly faster I could do that. I was looking at the nine bay unit as it seems quite reasonably priced and has the option of SSD caching. I'm guessing the SSD caching speeds things up

 

[L&LD]

It's not the NAS that is 'badly designed' for the ineffective use of live video editing. That mostly depends on the program you use.

For the NAS part, the translating of the constant data stream (there and back) from the HDD's (even with an SSD caching to help), over the LAN (with its inherent overhead), to the local computer and the local resources (RAM, storage and program(s) used) and then all back again is what makes editing on a NAS a royal pain vs. having direct access to the data over PCIe lanes.

Over the internet? Lol... good luck editing video of any quantity/quality.

Even with 10GbE ports on all required equipment, the Ethernet translation/hit will still be greatly felt, depending on the program used for the editing.

An SSD will mostly speed up small/tiny file transfers. It can't speed up the maximum (peak) speeds the unit and the HDD's are capable of as a whole.

To have a large amount of storage available, at the fastest speeds you're expecting, that you don't need 'on-board' for your computer what you're looking for is a DAS (Directly Attached Storage). But that is a different animal altogether. For that kind of solution, an all-SSD setup (forget HDD's at this point if the goal is speed) is required. And yet, for some editing projects, you may still find that an internal SSD would still provide greater performance too.

 

[degrub]

Post over on AVSforums for what folks are using in your situation.
DAS and not NAS is a given for editing. If you have budget limits, spend it on DAS.

 

[dosborne]

I'd be curious to hear how your NAS is badly designed to make direct editing suck.

The issue is with my editing software not the NAS. It is constantly buffering huge chunks of data, which results in delays up to 30 seconds to perform simple actions (no delay with local data). Your situation may be better, or may be worse. It all depends on the way the software is written. Many, dare I say most, software packages are designed and tested with data on a local drive, particularly for editing large files. So, set your expectations low so that you are not disappointed.