Advice on first NAS box

drumdogg

drumdogg

drumdogg

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6 Mar 2009
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495
I am looking to buy a NAS box shortly. Have done a fair bit of research and like the look of the Qnap Turbo ts-412. http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=NW-012-QN&groupid=46&catid=2125&subcat=2126

or the TS-410 - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=NW-002-QN&groupid=46&catid=2125&subcat=2126

The 412 is slightly more expensive but will have the more power.

Also thinking of using these drives in it too in a RAID 5 setup. - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-397-WD&groupid=1657&catid=1660&subcat=1954

What do you think of this setup, would it be ok??

Cheers
 
Hi cyber69, I had actually been looking at that synology one for a while and looks good too. Now im back to square one lol

Think I will order a couple of the 2TD ones to get me started:)
 
With Synology, the more you pay for the NAS then the faster the performance. I have a couple of DS212's and one DS710+. The DS710+ outperforms the DS212's noticeably but I find the performance with the DS212 acceptable over a Windows network.

The external USB3 is a nice feature on the modern Synology units but I still don't find them particulary fast when backing up or copying to an external hard drive.

I did make the mistake of adding as I went along and ended up with 3 x 2 bay units instead of maybe 1 x 4 bay and 1 x 2 bay. I could'nt afford the cost for a fast 4 bay unit at the time.

I run raid 1 in all 3 devices which is not cost effective but it saves me having to backup a raid 5 unit all the time.
 
Yea the USB3 would be nice as i have an external usb3 drive.

Quick question about RAID 5. If i have a 4 bay NAS, start off with 3 x2TB in RAID5 then down the line i want to add another 2TB drive. Would i have to format all drives and setup the RAID again or is it just the case off adding another drive and continue adding files if you know what i mean.
Cheers
 
You can add another (4th) drive later and just expand the array to add the extra space. I was thinking of going this route myself and with hindsight wish I had bought a 4 bay unit instead of 2 x 2 bay one's.

With 3 x 2TB drive's in raid 5 you will lose one of the drive's to parity so you will have 4TB storage roughly in total. Just make sure that anything important on a raid 5 array is backed up regulary.
 
Ok thanks, thats what i was hoping:)

It will mostly be media such as movies and music so dont want to be loosing anything. But in RAID 5 with one drive being parity does that not stop you from loosing data if one drive fails?? So why would i need the reguar backups?
 
drumdogg said:
Ok thanks, thats what i was hoping:)

It will mostly be media such as movies and music so dont want to be loosing anything. But in RAID 5 with one drive being parity does that not stop you from loosing data if one drive fails?? So why would i need the reguar backups?
Click to expand...

You can lose one drive in the array and it would normally rebuild from the other drives but that depends if the data on the other drives is ok and a bad sector has not developed which can corrupt the rebuild process so it's always best to have a backup.
 
Ok i know what your saying now. Always better to have a backup of it aswell. As i said i have a 2TB usb3 external drive which i could use as a backup.
 
cyber69 said:
You can add another (4th) drive later and just expand the array to add the extra space. I was thinking of going this route myself and with hindsight wish I had bought a 4 bay unit instead of 2 x 2 bay one's.

With 3 x 2TB drive's in raid 5 you will lose one of the drive's to parity so you will have 4TB storage roughly in total. Just make sure that anything important on a raid 5 array is backed up regulary.
Click to expand...

I cheap-skated my 4 bay NAS with 2x 2TB disks in RAID 0 and it's been a ball ache to upgrade. I had to buy a 3TB disk, transfer evening off, rebuild the RAID5 and copy it all back.

My 4x 2TB NAS in RAID5 shows up at 5.36TB after losing one disk to the RAID

MW
 
drumdogg said:
Has anyone tried synology's on RAID?
Click to expand...

I run raid 1 on a DS712+ - fantastic. Can also upgrade to additional bays with this and some other units. Synology on the whole are veyr easy to implement and perform great. I review them and QNAP and a few others HERE

Their hybrid raid is nice and flexible too.
 
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