Need more storage, not sure which way to go

[Tight_wad]

First, here is what my setup consists of, that I use for streaming movies in my home:

1) Qnap 509 Pro in raid 5 with 50 2tb hard drives 95% capacity

1) Netgear 8 port Network switch

1) Dell Studio Slim computer Vista with 2) hard drives, one for Os and all general files and data, and the other hard drives is the one that I share to my media streamers using Symbolic Links to all of my movies.

3) WD My Book 2 tb external hard drives on Usb 25% Combined capacity

3) Tvix 6500 Media Streamers with no hard drives

12) Individual hard drives 1tb each that contain a backup of all of my data. I use and Thermaltake esata hard drive dock to do my backups.

So my Nas has run out of room. And I will say that I have been pretty pleased with it so far. I have had some dropped drives, but recent firmware updates have seemed to help this. I know that outside of the storage, I don't utilize the real abilities that a Nas has to offer. To be honest, most of the stuff that it can do, I just don't understand. Makes me feel like I am probably missing out on some good features.

The My Books are okay, and would get me threw the year for sure, but they don't play nice on my setup. They come setup to sleep when not active after something like 10 minutes, and it is not changeable at all per WD support. And if someone wakes one while another is watching a movie, their movie stops for about 10 seconds or so. Need something to get rid of these.

The question is, what do I get to increase may storage for my system. I need to have something that is as simple and unnoticeable like my Nas is. But do I really need to put a 2nd Nas on my system.

I have looked into the UnRaid, but I am not sure if I really want to build anything. I have not been able to find out if UnRaid plays nice with Symbolic links in windows or not. I do like the idea of being able to use a mix mash of hard drives, and I still have 5) unused 1tb hard drives that I could use to get started if I did.

Just not sure what to do. What do all of you think? Do I just go with another Nas? Or can I hook up to my esata on the Nas with something that would work. Maybe put a multiport esata card in my computer and hookup to it? Does Vista still have a 2tb partition limit, or is that not so anymore? Or maybe something else?

Let me know,

And thanks for any help!

 

[thiggins]

I would centralize your storage onto one or more NASes. You might get by for a bit by expanding your current NAS with an eSATA drive, but that's just a stopgap.

You do, however, need a backup for the NAS. RAID is not backup and you've been lucky that you didn't lose your volume via more than one dropped drive.

You might be a good candidate for a Windows Home Server-based system. You don't have to worry about RAID and it's very expandable. You'll just need to schedule replication during times when you're not watching videos.

 

[[OC]Pik4chu]

the other plus to centralizing with a server is that you can use your NAS devices as backups for the primary server. WHS is a handy OS and its very cheap too which is a huge plus. And it is also easy to configure, it also doesn't care what type or how big of drives you use, it just brings them all together. And its not like a raid where if you lose a drive data is unreadable on the entire setup you just lose what was on that drive (which is why you still need backups).

The 2tb limit in vista is only for the boot drive (where the OS resides) other than that it can handle partition sizes in the 10,000 terabyte range And with WHS you dont have to worry about that as it chops everything up just like it is supposed to and leaves the rest for storage.

Also the 2TB boot partition is an issue for any windows OS (dunno about linux but I suspect it might)

 

[Tight_wad]

I do agree that backups are essential, and I have lots of individual hard drives that I use to backup everything that is on my Nas.

Here is a little bit about how I have my system setup and why:

Originally when I set up my network, I did not plan to have it dependent on a computer to be on the network. I wanted to have the Nas networked to the Tvix boxes only, and just have the computer for adding and modifying files. But I could never figure out how to have Symbolic links on the Nas and share them to the Tvix, or on a Hard drive of the Tvix itself.

If this would have worked, then my network flow would have been like this:

Tvix---thru network switch---to Nas---back thru switch---to Tvix and play

But instead, it much more congested like this:

Tvix---thru network switch---to computer---back thru network switch---to Nas---back thru network switch---to computer---back thru network switch---to Tvix and movie plays!

I think that this is why when a Usb box is woke up, if someone is watching a movie, it pauses until the the demand on the network can recover. But I am not sure.


Here is the reason that I depend on Symbolic links so much:

I wanted to have the ability to pick movies by alphabetical, genre, and others. So most of my movies can be found in at least 3 to 8 different places. I have one file that is shared to the Tvix boxes, and in that file, have sub files of all genres, alpha letters, and etc. And then using Link shell extension, I create Symbolic links for every movie.

I was hoping to do this, and place the this file on my Nas, but it would not allow me to place them there. I tried putting a hard drive in my Tvix box, but again it would not allow me to do it also.

I believe that the Nas and the Tvix run a linux kernel, and this is something that I truly know nothing about

I hope that this all makes sense, and just wanted to share it so that you all knew how I use my system so that you could get me the best advise. Hey, if anyone could tell me how to do links (symbolic, junction, or I don't know) right on the Nas or Tvix box, that would be great!

 

[teknojnky]

that seems like a ridiculus amount of work

I don't know anything about tvix, but I use xbmc and it has a library with various views for genre etc, and I don't have to worry about creating a ton of symbolic links. I have 800+ movies, so multiplying that out would be a nightmare.

in any case, sounds like your creating symbolic links on windows that point to the nas or other drives?

linux does support soft links (even way before windows did) but I don't know of any visual way to create such links easily via windows.

you can create them in linux via command line with the 'ln -s' command.

you can google for more details if you desire.

as far as NAS advice, I have 3 readynas's: pro business (6bay), ultra 4 (4 bay), nv+ (4 bay).

the pro, or ultra 6 models would be closest to your qnap.

the ultra 4 also, but cheaper and less bays.

the nv+, while old and underpowered compared to current models, is an excellent and cheap option for basic file storage and/or backup of other devices.

all of the readynas device are easily expandable, start with 1 or more drives, then add more later, or swap in larger drives once available.

 

[Tight_wad]

Figuring out how to do it the way I did was a lot of work. But doing it each time I rip a movie is very simple and takes no time at all. Creating the Symbolic links is about as easy as select and drop.

Thanks for the info on your Nas setup, I am leaning more towards another Nas.
I have been considering the UnRaid, but after looking more into it, I not sure that I am really up to the task.

Thanks!

 

[teknojnky]

also, one other thing.

Since I already have multiple nas's, I've split them up as such:

pro - 6x 1.5tb ~5.5tb dual redundancy for video (dvd iso's/avi's/bluray folder rips)

ultra4 - 4x 1.5tb ~4.5tb single redundancy for audio (mp3/flac) and misc other files

nv+ - 4x 2tb ~5.5tb single redundancy - backup of ultra4 + some files from pro