Recommendations for a home NAS

fross

fross

fross

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London and Florence, Italy
Hi all,

I'm looking for something to centralise my home data, and an ethernet-based NAS seemed the appropriate way to go. My uses are:

Storage of media files (dvd + hd files, music, etc) connected to a mac running Plex for media streaming, and to 2 PCs running iTunes (+ whatever my gf uses, wmp i think).
1 TB might be a bit low on the storage front as I've got 700Gb already.
I'd like some sort of RAID 1 reliability if possible.
It will be in the living room (that's where the router is), so it needs to be as quiet as possible.

The obvious candidates are the IcyBox, which doesn't seem to support NTFS, so not sure if that would be an issue over Samba, and the WD My Book World Edition, which doesn't seem to be out yet, and also I've heard has a noisy fan (I don't really want to invalidate the warranty).

Anyone got a recommendation or another suggestion? Thanks in advance.
 
Have you looked at synology's? Ive got a 109 along with a 1.5tb and i can recommend it does everything i need and more
 
I've got a QNAP TS-209. It has all the features you're looking for and more. The fan on it has a slightly annoying pitch regardless of the speed setting, but it's quiet enough that you may well not notice it in a living room environment.

The main alternative I looked at when choosing this was the Synology DS209, which has a very similar specification and feature list. I don't think there's anything you need missing from the cheaper "j" version of this box, but check the specifications.
 
why not build a small server from old pc bits if you have any.

I build one with 1.5tb of storage for about £120. used a few old bits i had kicking around plus some stuff from members market.

E2140 (£25)
2gb ram (£15)
G31 gigabyte motherboard (£20)
psu - had an spare tagan one
case - old coolmaster case that a mate was chucking out.
stock intel fan
1tb sammy - £50
500gb WD - from my existing setup.

Just bunged XP on for the time being and been streaming media/itunes etc etc from it no bother. Also used as a seed box etc.

You would just have it passive as it doesn't need any major cooling as it has no gfx card. Mine sits in the garage and i just ran 15m external cat5 to my router.
 
That's fine if you've got somewhere like a garage to store it. If the OP really does need it to be in the living room, though, a NAS is much smaller and less intrusive. It's also a lot easier to set up since you don't have to go through all the hassle of building it and installing your chosen OS. Oh, and I don't think the G31 board you mentioned supports RAID, which was one of the OP's requirements. Other than that, though, I'd agree that knocking together a PC from bits and pieces is a cheaper option.
 
CBJ said:
I've got a QNAP TS-209. It has all the features you're looking for and more. The fan on it has a slightly annoying pitch regardless of the speed setting, but it's quiet enough that you may well not notice it in a living room environment.

The main alternative I looked at when choosing this was the Synology DS209, which has a very similar specification and feature list. I don't think there's anything you need missing from the cheaper "j" version of this box, but check the specifications.
Click to expand...

I think the j's are noticbly slower on data transfer, im managing a steady 50mb/s on my giga switch, i had the 109j which i managed to do a deal with someone and got the 109 :) 209 same but two drives i believe oh and raid ;)
 
I would seriously consider a Windows Home Server based machine. The HP MediaSmart and Acer EasyStor 430 are very small machines, comparable to a NAS box, but will offer much more functionality, and based on my experience of NAS much better performance and transfers.

Whilst WHS doesn't officially support RAID it does provide duplication over multiple disks, without you having to worry about setting up RAID. You simply add more disks and say which folders/shares you want to be duplicated.

I'm not sure if that would be within budget. An alternative might be a self build based on a mini/micro ATX case or Shuttle/Barebones type system.
 
Thanks for the tips, everyone.

Yeah the idea was to get away from using a whole PC and have something quieter and less intrusive. I figured I'd have to spend about £100 to get something working anyway, may as well make it a NAS instead.

Thanks for the recommendations on the synology and the qnap, will check them out.
 
also, check out the netgear readynas duo which includes a free 500gb harddrive
 
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