Anyone here use NAS (Network Accessible Storage) devices?

[shponglefan]

I've been thinking about getting a basic two-drive one (probably to set up RAID 1).  Looking at either the QNAP ts219p ii or Synology ds213, or maybe something else.

Mainly I just want to replace my existing aging file server with something more compact, energy efficient, and capable of using larger (i.e. 3+ TB) drives.

[zanna5910]

Are you looking for advice?  I have a NAS box at home.  Make sure you run it with a good internal router to maximize access speed.  My UVERSE built in router limits Wireless LAN traffic (sigh).

[emphatic]

I recently got myself a Synology DS DS212J and I love it. The app support is great (starting downloads from your iPhone, streaming our stored media to your iPhone - I'm sure apps exist for other mobile platforms as well) and the plugin for Chrome (you get a "Download with DownloadStation" link) works great too, even though it's sometimes hit n' miss with YouTube videos.

There's some functionality I'd love to have, but I'm sure they will get added with future updates to the O/S.

[mlabrie]

We have a synology ds713+ in our office. We use it as our main file server for an office of about 10 people. We have never had any issues whatsoever with it.  I highly recommend their products.  Just make sure to put high quality drives in it.

[ChadTower]

I run my media at home off a standalone single drive WD NAS.  Almost entirely plug and play into the network, it's pretty nice, and so far has been rock solid reliable.   I don't ask for much from it.  Just serving files/media to the house from any of 7-8 clients (WDTV, PCs, phones).

[lilshawn]

I used to use a NAS (linksys EFG80 later an EFG120) but when they stopped supporting it (and still had issues to fix) I stopped right quick. (system going down, freezing, slow transfers)

If you can find something that isn't going to be vaporware and a company will continue support (or just works from the get go) it should work good.

I currently just host a massive share off my desktop and it seems to work okay. (3 computers and 4 video players)

[DLinkOZ]

My approach was slightly different - I used a PC with raid controller and installed openfiler.  Then I carve out LUNs and client machines can connect via iSCSI.  Technically, it's a SAN (not NAS), but close enough.

[shponglefan]

Are you looking for advice?  I have a NAS box at home.  Make sure you run it with a good internal router to maximize access speed.  My UVERSE built in router limits Wireless LAN traffic (sigh).

Whoops, yes, should have been more specific in the OP.  Basically I just wanted to know what people's experiences were with them, anything to look out for, things to avoid, etc.

I do have a Gigabit router, although the rest of my network is currently 10/100 due to older h/w (switches and NICs).  I'll probably upgrade those sooner or later.

[shponglefan]

There's some functionality I'd love to have, but I'm sure they will get added with future updates to the O/S.

Like what, if I may ask?

[ChadTower]

I do have a Gigabit router, although the rest of my network is currently 10/100 due to older h/w (switches and NICs).  I'll probably upgrade those sooner or later.

I haven't had ANY issues with speed on my device.  That includes streaming 720p video to two clients at the same time.  My whole network is standard 10/100.

[Dawgz Rule]

Been running a Synology for a few years now and love it.  Lots of nice features.

[lilshawn]

I do have a Gigabit router, although the rest of my network is currently 10/100 due to older h/w (switches and NICs).  I'll probably upgrade those sooner or later.

don't worry. as long as everyone is connected to switches, the 100 speed they get is lots. in a home network, it's actually pretty hard to saturate it unless you are for some reason buffering entire videos before playback. streaming is f-all.

[edekoning]

I've have a Synology 110J. Its only got one bay, but I don't really need much storage, and did not want to use raid. After a few days the NAS started acting weird. I contacted Synology support about it, and they were very helpful. In the end it was my HDD that was faulty. After replacing it I have never had anymore problems. What is also great about Synology are the frequent software updates.

I use my NAS mostly for streaming photos/videos/music to my WDTV/Sonos/Xbox360, and some occasional downloading of large/slow files.

[shponglefan]

Thanks for all the replies everyone.  It sounds like Synology is the way to go, so I'll see if I can find a DS213 soon.

For HDs I'm thinking a pair of standard 3TB or 4TB Seagate Barracuda's.  Although it seems like the 4TB versions are only 5900RPM, whereas the 3TB versions are 7200RPM...

[lilshawn]

with data packed on the platters as tight as they are on the 4gb drives, it needn't go very fast to perform the same.

less RPM's usually means less heat too.

[drventure]

I put together a cheap machine, with the biggest HD's I could find, mirrored them, and stuck linux and Samba on it.

It can do more than just a NAS drive, maybe just slightly more expensive, easy to swap/upgrade drives, and it's accessible from windows just like any other network drive.

But I will admit that I was using an IOmega nas till it got fried by lightning and that thing worked quite well, with basically no setup (plug it in, set some permissions and done).

[lordnacho]

I put together a cheap machine, with the biggest HD's I could find, mirrored them, and stuck linux and Samba on it.

It can do more than just a NAS drive, maybe just slightly more expensive, easy to swap/upgrade drives, and it's accessible from windows just like any other network drive.

But I will admit that I was using an IOmega nas till it got fried by lightning and that thing worked quite well, with basically no setup (plug it in, set some permissions and done).

Did the same and put freenas on it.  Looking at my newegg part list now, spent about 350 before the 4x2TB drives I put.  Reused a couple old drives, one was giving smart errors, so I replaced it.  Pretty easy

If anyone cares, here's a couple of the parts:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811112339 LIAN Li PC-Q25, drives just snap in.  Kinda pricey but I've learned not to cheap out on cases over the years.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131843 Then this cpu/motherboard.  Suprisingly can handle everything so far.

[DLinkOZ]

I built another SAN using two boxes and Ubuntu, some DRBD and heartbeat love and it's a quick and easy fault tolerant SAN cluster.  When access to your data is 110% critical

[shponglefan]

I've done the Linux file server thing in the past (as mentioned i'm replacing my existing one).  While it can be more flexible, I'm going the NAS route this time for ease of setup, lower cost and likely lower power usage.

Maybe it's just me, but I find the older I get the less time I feel like devoting to building PCs.

[ChadTower]

Maybe it's just me, but I find the older I get the less time I feel like devoting to building PCs.

I hit that point a while ago.  I just want to plug something in, configure it, and get on with my life.

[lordnacho]

I still like building my pcs....up until there's a problem.

[edekoning]

Btw, why do you want to use raid 1?

[drventure]

Btw, why do you want to use raid 1?

For myself, I did on my setup for an extra layer of redundancy (all those tagged MP3s and painstakingly downloaded roms I'd hate to lose).

Sure you can STILL loose both drives, but my iomega was mirrored, got hit by lightning, and I was able to completely recover everything off one drive even though the other was smoked.

Still, I have offsite backup as well<g>

[shponglefan]

Btw, why do you want to use raid 1?

Is this addressed to me?

At any rate, I plan to use it simply to guard against drive failure.

[emphatic]

There's some functionality I'd love to have, but I'm sure they will get added with future updates to the O/S.

Like what, if I may ask?

I miss uTorrent, basically. DownloadStation (the included torrent/etc client) does what it's supposed to, but there are features missing, like "remove torrent and data". If you remove 10 torrents in DownloadStation, you'll have to go to the file browser and remove the files yourself while remembering which ones they were. I think that's all I'm missing.

[Howard_Casto]

uTorrent is still around man.  It's my primary torrent client. 

[ChadTower]

I still use uTorrent. 

[kahlid74]

I have a Synology (4 disk) and QNAP(2 Disk) systems.  Both work well.  I've also built FreeNAS and Openfiler system in the past (never again, their performance is so piss poor).  I currently now run a 4U server chassis with an Adaptec card and Nexenta OS.  I still use the Synology and QNAP for stuff like 3D printing archives/Laser cutting/MP3's but I've since moved all other services onto a new SAN I built.  The speeds with the Synology/QNAP were still too slow for me.

For you, if you're looking for simplicity, you can't go wrong with Synology.  QNap is a little pricier but they work very well too.  Lots of features.

Be careful with size of disks right, a 2 disk mirror at 3/4TB could take days to build on one of these systems.  Slower processors and fixed memory with resource containers preventing faster array builds/rebuilds.  If you go 3/4TB make sure you backup your data.

[shponglefan]

For you, if you're looking for simplicity, you can't go wrong with Synology.  QNap is a little pricier but they work very well too.  Lots of features.

I ended up ordering the DS213; Synology sounds ideal for my purpose.

Be careful with size of disks right, a 2 disk mirror at 3/4TB could take days to build on one of these systems.  Slower processors and fixed memory with resource containers preventing faster array builds/rebuilds.  If you go 3/4TB make sure you backup your data.

Why does it take so long?  Or rather, what is taking place that takes so long?

I plan to buy a pair of fresh 4 TB drives and set them up in RAID 1, so there won't be any initial data to mirror.  Then I'm just going to copy files bit by bit until I eventually get all my necessary data onto the drives.

Insofar as data backup, I have an external 1 TB drive (USB 3.0) which I was thinking of hooking up just to backup more critical data like personal project files.  Stuff that I really don't want to lose, as I realize RAID 1 won't protect against stuff like data corruption or accidently deletion.  I'm hoping the backup features of the DS213 will allow for that option and that doing weekly backups will be enough.

[Gray_Area]

How does security work (differently) in this circumstance?

[kahlid74]

For you, if you're looking for simplicity, you can't go wrong with Synology.  QNap is a little pricier but they work very well too.  Lots of features.

I ended up ordering the DS213; Synology sounds ideal for my purpose.

Be careful with size of disks right, a 2 disk mirror at 3/4TB could take days to build on one of these systems.  Slower processors and fixed memory with resource containers preventing faster array builds/rebuilds.  If you go 3/4TB make sure you backup your data.

Why does it take so long?  Or rather, what is taking place that takes so long?

I plan to buy a pair of fresh 4 TB drives and set them up in RAID 1, so there won't be any initial data to mirror.  Then I'm just going to copy files bit by bit until I eventually get all my necessary data onto the drives.

Insofar as data backup, I have an external 1 TB drive (USB 3.0) which I was thinking of hooking up just to backup more critical data like personal project files.  Stuff that I really don't want to lose, as I realize RAID 1 won't protect against stuff like data corruption or accidentally deletion.  I'm hoping the backup features of the DS213 will allow for that option and that doing weekly backups will be enough.

Think of it no different than a home router.  Home routers come with fixed CPU's and memory.  When you're bittorrented to 1000 seeds/peers your router will run out of memory to contain the FIB/Adjacency tables and begin dropping them.  As it becomes over-worked it begins slowing down because it's no longer able to hold the table of contents of every session open.

The same is true for home/SMB based NAS devices.  They come with a limited amount of CPU/Memory and "Resource Restrictions/Shares".  So the idea is that the device must hold onto a portion of it's resources in case it needs to serve data.  So the remaining portion of resources can be claimed by the array building service.  Most Home/SMB NAS's want to Zero your array out before you start using it.  Since they have limited resources and cheaper components (to contain price) they don't allow you to write to an array while building/re-building.

As the technology gets better, they work in features like writing to it while building/rebuilding an array or using all the resources available unless a higher priority request comes in.  I can't remember off the top of my head if that Synology lets you do that but it was more of a "be aware of this" than a huge concern.

Here's what I'll say about your data, if it's important, back it up ( disk is fine).  If it's Critical, back it up, Archive it regularly and store it somewhere else.

[edekoning]

Here's what I'll say about your data, if it's important, back it up ( disk is fine).  If it's Critical, back it up, Archive it regularly and store it somewhere else.

Indeed, RAID / Backups / Archiving are all different things, so don't confuse them.

Insofar as data backup, I have an external 1 TB drive (USB 3.0) which I was thinking of hooking up just to backup more critical data like personal project files.  Stuff that I really don't want to lose, as I realize RAID 1 won't protect against stuff like data corruption or accidently deletion.  I'm hoping the backup features of the DS213 will allow for that option and that doing weekly backups will be enough.

Yes DS will allow you to backup to an external USB drive. You can just pick what folders you want to backup, and create a schedule for that job.

[struisje]

I converted an old Fujitsu Scaleo Home Server (which came standard with Windows Home Server) to an UnRaid box
Now serving 8 TB of data.

[shponglefan]

To update, I got the DS213 and set it up about a week ago.  Setup was a breeze.  Took less than an hour from start of unboxing to copying my first files over.  I particularly liked how easy it was to just download/install the latest OS for this thing.  Far less time spent than when I previously set up my Ubuntu server.

Only issue I've run into so far is apparently a bug in which Windows service stops and restarts.  Apparently this bug is in the latest OS and is known and expected to be fixed in the next release.  Workaround is to just disable HD hibernation, so no worries there.

Other than that, I've been very impressed.

[lilshawn]

now i got the bug. 

picked up a intel atom itx mobo with 2gb ram for next to nothing. between it's 2 SATA ports and the USB flash boot (with an 8gb flash chip i already have for the OS) i should be able to pull out my 2 main share drives from my desktop and plop them on there.

so... any one know if one these nas software solutions able to access NTFS drives directly or am i going to have to reformet and transfer all 2tb of data?

[MonMotha]

Linux has very usable NTFS support these days.  It's not fast, but it's pretty good (I dunno what the status of ACLs are - I just have it map everything to be owned by one user with fixed UNIX style permissions).  So, if you can find a good "NAS Software" solution that is based on relatively modern (past few years) Linux and is flexible enough to let you actually use said NTFS support, then you should be good.

In the end, many commercial SOHO NAS systems are just ARM systems running Samba on Linux with a cheesy little web GUI.  They just only support very minimal, fixed configurations.

[lilshawn]

maybe i'll splurge and pick up a couple of 2tb drives and just run freenas. (also i'm lazy) i booted up the board with freenas on usb stick last night and it seems to work okay. plays well with the rest of the network. i'll have to download the CD version and install it to the usb flash.

Maybe i'l just pick up a couple of 2tb drives instead of reusing old hardware. probably better in the long run since these drives probably have a couple thousand hours on them.

[lilshawn]

ta da! ...well almost.

I set up freenas and tested it out a few days ago. since then, i burned the CD and installed freenas to the usb flash disk. it has an option to import an NTFS filesystem disk. I don't know if it works or not, but the option is there if someone is wondering.

i ordered a Coolermaster Elite 120 microATX case off newegg to house my disks and microATX board for 49.99+ shipping. It even comes with a couple of fans pre-installed to cool the mobo and the drives. It's a fair size as it accepts a standard ATX power supply, which in my opinion is much better than the smaller form factor power supplies. it also has room for 3 disks which will probably be more than enough. If it comes down to not being enough room for disks down the road, i'll pick up something else. I suppose i could have gone all fancy and bought a rackmount chassis with slots for 10 drives...but then i have to buy a rack, and on and on and on...

I opted to (for the time being) throw 2 old 500gb drives in there and set it up as some kind of JBOD as a test. after a bit of messing around (and a little freenas forum search) i set up the disks (stripe array) easily (I had to select multiple disks in the volume selection screen) and created a share for it on my windows network.

I'm currently dumping 700gb of video on it and will test it out over the next while and see how it goes.

Since I had most of the parts already, and freenas was well, free... the total spent on this endeavor was the board, which i got for cheap cheap off a buddy and the cost of the box, which I probably could have done without...but hey, might as well make it look nice. if this continues to work out i'll splurge for 3 new disks for it and set up a proper raid for data safety.

but, thumbs up so far for freenas. 

nas porn photo below 

[lordnacho]

My only complaint is the constant emails.  It's now in my morning routine to check if there's an issue.  Would be nice if in the subject it said there's a problem, then i could do some sort of mail filter on it.

Someone complained about throughput speeds, but for me it's fine.  Streaming 1080p movies to xbmc in the living room works without any hiccups.

I originally hoped to set this thing up and work remotely off it, like My Documents would be running off freenas.  I set up symbolic links but Windows pretty much hated it, random blue screens.  So now I'm just using a file comparison to manually copy stuff over.  Haven't gotten around to tinkering with rsync.

Other thoughts, I set it up as raidz2 and replacing a drive with smart errors was painless.

[kahlid74]

A quick note for those of you building NAS/SANs for your home.  Be very careful when buying disks.  Regular disks are not made to run in raid environments and have a lowered MBT due to the extreme conditions a NAS/SAN operate under.  It's why a WD Green 1TB drive is 2-3 times lower than an equivalent "Raid" certified disk.

High level what does this mean?  If you bought off the shelf regular disks for your NAS/SAN you better make sure you BACKUP your data fairly regularly.  Those disks will fail faster than normal (inside a PC being normal where the disks are allowed to go to sleep)