Questions for a Home NAS

[Vanyun]

I have been trying to gather information on NAS systems for the house. We (mainly myself and not my wife) are tired of copying multiple files/directories to multiple sources in order to have a backup incase of any drive failures. Being that I work in our Tech department and know how handy our inhouse SAN works I want to incorporate a similar setup at the house.

So I guess onto what I am after...

• 24/7 access
• Network connection
• 2TB minimum disk space (we're nearing this already between pictures and movies of the little ones)
• Hot-swappable drives incase of a failure
• Auto-rebuild the raid incase of a failure
• Accessible via Windows and Linux devices
• Main data repository (not really a backup location but sort of would be since it would be across multiple drives)

And some questions...

• 2bay or 4bay
• Synology and QNAP are decent brands (from what I'm reading) and wasn't sure how much brand impacts functionality
• WD Red drives are good from my research but are other brands just as good for a NAS
• How easy is it to expand capacity in the future (if I have a 4bay NAS with 3 drives can I eventually buy a 4th drive and rebuild the array without data loss?)
  

Some more info...

• Preferably 1Gbps connection
• Accepts 2.5" or 3.5" drives
• Possibly an auto-wakeup if a device is attempting to get/place content if 24/7 isn't the right choice
• Not sure if I want a mirror setup (2 bay) or raid 5 (4 bay) depending on how easily I could increase drive capacity later
• I personally prefer WD drives in all my PC builds

I look forward to hearing the responses and thank you ahead of time for any input regarding these questions.

 

[stevech]

I have been trying to gather information on NAS systems for the house. We (mainly myself and not my wife) are tired of copying multiple files/directories to multiple sources in order to have a backup incase of any drive failures. Being that I work in our Tech department and know how handy our inhouse SAN works I want to incorporate a similar setup at the house.

So I guess onto what I am after...

• 24/7 access
• Network connection
• 2TB minimum disk space (we're nearing this already between pictures and movies of the little ones)
• Hot-swappable drives incase of a failure
• Auto-rebuild the raid incase of a failure
• Accessible via Windows and Linux devices
• Main data repository (not really a backup location but sort of would be since it would be across multiple drives)

And some questions...

• 2bay or 4bay
• Synology and QNAP are decent brands (from what I'm reading) and wasn't sure how much brand impacts functionality
• WD Red drives are good from my research but are other brands just as good for a NAS
• How easy is it to expand capacity in the future (if I have a 4bay NAS with 3 drives can I eventually buy a 4th drive and rebuild the array without data loss?)
  

Some more info...

• Preferably 1Gbps connection
• Accepts 2.5" or 3.5" drives
• Possibly an auto-wakeup if a device is attempting to get/place content if 24/7 isn't the right choice
• Not sure if I want a mirror setup (2 bay) or raid 5 (4 bay) depending on how easily I could increase drive capacity later
• I personally prefer WD drives in all my PC builds

I look forward to hearing the responses and thank you ahead of time for any input regarding these questions.

Most important:
In a NAS, "RAID is not a backup". This includes mirroring (RAID 1).
Opinion: Most likely cause of data loss is not drive failure. It's human error, file system corruption, theft of NAS.
USB3 or eSATA, external drive(s), stored out of reach of burglars is essential. Some data on the NAS need not be backed up again, e.g., PC disk backups stored on the NAS.
I'd think that most home NASes can be 2 bay with today's 3TB drives.
My NAS is 2 bay, (DS212), uses two volumes and time backup to offset human error in deleting or clobbering file content. Volume 1 is primary, volume 2 is backup and time backup. USB3 drive for anti-theft and to protect from NAS mainboard failure.
and so on.
The NAS software from Synology and QNAP are quite superior to others. Try the on-line demos.

 

[Kris404]

And some questions...

• 2bay or 4bay
• Synology and QNAP are decent brands (from what I'm reading) and wasn't sure how much brand impacts functionality
• WD Red drives are good from my research but are other brands just as good for a NAS
• How easy is it to expand capacity in the future (if I have a 4bay NAS with 3 drives can I eventually buy a 4th drive and rebuild the array without data loss?)
  

Some more info...

• Preferably 1Gbps connection
• Accepts 2.5" or 3.5" drives
• Possibly an auto-wakeup if a device is attempting to get/place content if 24/7 isn't the right choice
• Not sure if I want a mirror setup (2 bay) or raid 5 (4 bay) depending on how easily I could increase drive capacity later
• I personally prefer WD drives in all my PC builds

• 4-Bay if you can afford it, easier future expansion options.
• You can't go wrong with either one.
• Red drives are good, although, I have Green drives in my NAS for years (some are removed from USB external enclosures )
• Yes, you can expand without data loss (Synology SHR2 even allows you to have different drive sizes but still utilizing full capacity)

• Most of them have single or dual GbE ports
• QNAP has 2.5 drive models, not sure if Synology does.
• Most for the NASes (NASii?) support disk hibernation/standby mode with auto-wake functions on access.
• RAID-5 works for home-use; go to RAID-6 if you are so inclined (or paranoid).

 

[Vanyun]

In a NAS, "RAID is not a backup".

Hahaha... that sounds like the response I usually give our Infrastructure Manager regarding our SAN's snapshots are not meant for backups.

Anyhow, I'm not really after a "backup" device but more of a repository for everything since right now the data is thrown between my desktop, my laptop, my wife's laptop, and other externals. Though your points do make me think of this project being more of a NAS with Backup setup rather than just a NAS. I'll let my wife know you put the idea in my mind to spend more money.

I did stumble across the Synology DS213j and from the features I think I like the sounds of it. The fact it can be a DLNA Server interests me being my bluray player could then load the images and videos we've been storing between many devices without the DLNA option.

Does anyone know if 2.5" HDDs in a 3.5" adapter work just as well as a true 3.5" HDD? The reason I am asking is because I currently have ~3 external 2.5" HDDs I could potentially use upfront to help offset the cost.

Also, do you need to keep the disks at the same RPMs in a NAS? The spare disks I have currently are a green, blue, and black WD drives which I think all have different RPMs.

The reason I am asking is because at work we've been warned (from our SAN vendor) about mixing 10k and 15k disks in our SAN enclosure (in a column not a row) because the vibrations from one spinning disk could cause the other to corrupt itself since they are not spinning in sync with each other.

Which if that's the case then I'm forced into buying HDDs at the time of buying the diskless NAS.

 

[stevech]

Anyhow, I'm not really after a "backup" device but more of a repository for everything since right now the data is thrown between my desktop, my laptop, my wife's laptop, and other externals.

Repository - has to have a backup if there's no other copy of the data on different media!

Some of us, like me, use ordinary 7200 RPM drives in the home NAS. Mine is 2 bay, with independent volumes for safety.
Thus the two don't need to be similar in any way.
10K or higher RPM drives are in the $$$$ world we don't see here in home/SOHO/SMB NASes.

 

[Vlad]

"RAID is not backup". I always cringe when I hear this triviality.

RAID is a piece of hardware (and software which controls it), backup is copy (or a process of copying) selected data to a physical media. What people using this triviality typically mean is: never trust that it is sufficient to have a single copy of your data, even if it resides on RAID system. To be safe, keep multiple copies of your backup, some in remote location.

Would you say: "disk is not an operating system" when you want to say: "OS resides on disk"? How about: "a car is not the driver" instead of: "drive carefully" or "a plane is not a trip" instead of: "hope your flight will be safe and enjoyable"?

 

[L&LD]

"Raid is not a backup" is not a triviality... it means exactly what it says. And RAID isn't a backup nor was it meant to be, but many less knowledgeable newbies think that anyway.

 

[Vanyun]

Well I think my mindset is moving/has moved away from the original setup that I was after for the NAS.

I'm now leaning towards utilizing my spare 2.5" HDDs (with drive adapters) and 3.5" HDDs for this project as a Raid 0 setup for an increase in total capacity (rather than a mirrored setup incase of a drive failure). I will then tether a external drive via a USB for a backup location of the critical files (set to a Time Backup for both Human Error and possible drive failure).

My questions now are more towards the Synology software side of the NAS...

Does anyone know if the software itself is different from a Home setup compared to a Business setup? Looking at their site for the DSM 4.3 software they have it categorized into the two choices but wasn't sure if they are just trying to hit on the popular features home users may be after or if they offer different software options.

The software pieces that are of interest to me are;
DLNA Media Server
Print Server (to both Windows and iOS via a USB HP printer)
Web Server
FTP Server

Any insight or suggestions on which NAS could provide this would be great. Right now I'm still looking at the Synology DS213j model to accomplish all of this.

 

[stevech]

Well I think my mindset is moving/has moved away from the original setup that I was after for the NAS.

I'm now leaning towards utilizing my spare 2.5" HDDs (with drive adapters) and 3.5" HDDs for this project as a Raid 0 setup. Better to just use independent volumes, each with an independent file system. In mine, none of the shares on the 2nd volume are exposed to the LAN. Only the NAS writes to the 2nd volume: Time Backups (last 90 days of key file changes) and daily backups.

Any insight or suggestions on which NAS could provide this would be great. Right now I'm still looking at the Synology DS213j model to accomplish all of this.

I don't recommend RAID 0 as your only protection is a disciplined backup to external USB or eSATA medium.

DS213 or 213j is what I'd buy if I was buying today. When I chose the DS212, I paid more to get a bit faster CPU than the "j" models have. I already had one drive.

The 2.5 inch drives have a higher cost/GB by far, and slower transfer rates.