Need help choosing between these NAS

[blackwing]

Hey All,

So I'm trying to buy my first NAS because my 2 TB external drive is dying due to the hard drives and need some help choosing the right NAS. I intend on using it primary as storage and file sharing to my friends and family via FTP/SSH or some kind of remote access. I'm looking for a NAS with pretty fast transfer from my computer to the NAS (which will be configured in a RAID 5 setup). I'm trying to achieve transfer rates from my computer to the NAS at about 40+MB. I have a pretty fast computer and wasn't sure if that will potentially increase or decrease the transfer speeds because it can affect which NAS I would buy.

Here is my computer spec and router incase it did make a difference.
Core I7
6 GIG Ram
Marvell GIG ethernet
D-Link DIR-655

Here are some of the NAS I've been looking at:

Netgear ReadyNAS NVX
Synology DS409
Synology DS409+
QNAP TS-419P

Of those four I was initially leaning towards the NVX since the speeds are pretty fast and the X-RAID 2 feature, but the cost of the NVX is more expensive than any of the other NAS. According to the NAS chart the DS409 beats the NVX while the DS409+ falls a bit short of the NVX. Is the DS409 really faster than the NVX or QNAP? Cause if the DS409 is faster than the others in copying and reading that would be my choice since it is faster and cheaper. I didn't see the QNAP 419 review or benchmarks on the site so could anyone shed some light into its speed? The QNAP would be my second choice because of the applications/features you can use with the QNAP.

I'd like to have a NAS that will allow me to transfer my data faster than 40MB and accoding to the NAS chart the DS409 can do more than 40MB and is the cheapest of the other NAS, but if the DS409 can't do more than 40MB should I think about getting the NVX instead? Or go with the QNAP and hope the speeds are over 40+MB and just be happy with all the features the QNAP provies over the other NAS?

Thanks for your help and advice.

PS

I also had a question about "green" hard drives. Do they effect the transfer speeds of reading and writing in a NAS?

 

[thiggins]

The DS409 and 409+ are iffy for 40 MB/s performance. I'd look more at the File Copy Benchmarks to see "real world" speeds.

The TS-419P uses the 1.2 GHz Marvell Kirkwood; same as the DS409. So speeds will be comparable.

RAID 5 file copy write shows 32.1 MB/s and 34.3 MB/s for the 409 and 409+ and 51.6 MB/s for the NVX. Reads for all are much faster (57, 70, 90 MB/s respectively).

I think you'll want to look at Atom-based NASes like the TS-439 Pro if you want alternatives to the NVX. I wouldn't let XRAID2 be the deciding factor. All the products you're looking at support RAID migration and expansion.

I hope you're not thinking that RAID 5 will make your data secure, since you said you're using the NAS as primary storage. RAID is not backup.

I haven't done testing of Green vs. other drives. But I don't think they'll be a major factor in performance. They definitely will reduce power consumption, though.

 

[claykin]

+1 on RAID is not backup. Tim is 100% correct. Please don't learn the hard way!!

 

[blackwing]

Hey guys,

Thanks for the response. Are there any other ATOM based NAS besides the QNAP 439? The QNAP 439 is a bit pricey and would prefer something a bit cheaper like the NVX price range, which, is about $600 disk less after a $100 rebate from newegg.

The only other NAS with an ATOM core that looks fast is the Thecus N4200. I know that this NAS is rather new, but are there any benchmarks on the N4200?

If the N4200 post speeds similar to the NVX should I pay the extra $150 (after NVX rebate) for the N4200? From what I've read the Thecus' interface is a bit harder to use, whereas, the NVX has a rather user friendly interface. I'd like to get the QNAP 439, but I think that is too pricey for me.

Thanks for your advice and help.

 

[thiggins]

QNAP has made the biggest commitment to Atom NASes. But if they're too expensive for you, get the NVX.