Looking at a new NAS - Synology + Red Drives ??

anthony566

anthony566

anthony566

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That is a good combo, the Asustor 3 series would be worth a look mate. Not as mature as Synology but getting there so price/performance is more aggressive than Synology/QNAP

The Asustor can also be hooked direct to the tv and used as a media player
 
Ant, I am in the same situ.
My 2TB Buffalo just doesnt cut the mustard anymore.

I bought a HP ProLiant MicroServer G7 N54L last night for £130, it arrived about 30mins ago.
Got a couple of 3tb hitachi drives en-route, I spotted the WD Red 3TB drives for 85 delivered somewhere else.
Cant remember where though.

It will be used as a file server, nothing more.

Worth taking a look mate.
 
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Thanks for the quick feedback guys .... these are the things that make the OCUK forum what it is ... the people who take an active part in a supportive way thanks again...

finger is on the order button ...
 
I recently picked up a ds414. I also have a file server which will now be demoted to back up file server only. So that will remain off for 95% of the time.

Synology 'just works'. I highly recommend getting one.
 
Ok so its up and running .... took all of 20 mins to unpack it slip the drives in and boot it up.

The WD Red drives are almost silent I am very impressed.
 
So its been a few days and I have to say I am very pleased with this NAS its very quick and quiet and even when in sleep mode recovers very fast, the software installation is simple and the hardware setup was even easier... a few photos to give an idea of setup and size.

Out of the box :-



Drives :-



No screws for these you just slip them in to the holder and clip the retaining strips onto the sides.

with the front panel removed and the drive holders removed :-



Drives slid into place - this is very easy as they are lined up by the holder and pushed into place :-



complete and setup :-



The Synology symbol on each side is actually pressed through the sides on the NAS and provides air for cooling along with the front cover as this sits forward of the unit allowing air in from the top/bottom and right hand side so heat should not be an issuer with this NAS as the rear mounted fan pulls air through the case.
 
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Hi

I am thinking about the same approach, basically to store films and access via my Sony TV.

So this would be in the front room behind the TV, how quiet is it?

Thanks
 
I have the ds215j with WD reds just below my Sony TV and I cannot hear a thing from it. It's so quiet. I then use the DLNA client on the Sony to connect to the NAS as my media server and as long as you accept that the interface is basic, you get an excellent system. As others will tell you, the Synology is very easy to setup and run. Well worth the money in my opinion.
 
Make sure you install Plex Media Server on your NAS to manage your media.

It is without question the best thing to have installed on your NAS.
 
jackboy said:
Hi

I am thinking about the same approach, basically to store films and access via my Sony TV.

So this would be in the front room behind the TV, how quiet is it?

Thanks
Click to expand...

Or get the qnap or asustor with hdmi out for direct connection to your tv. Both run Kodi and you can use that. Major plus being all the available repositories....
 
Many TVs now have in built Plex apps so you don't even need a HTPC or Raspberry Pi to run it. My TV is a little older (3 years) so I don't have an app inbuilt so I use a Raspberry Pi 2 with Rasplex to run my Plex and it is fantastic.

In my opinion Plex is better than Kodi as it acts as a server rather than storing your viewing history on the client.

This means when you watch 30 mins of Game of Thrones Plex will know where you got up to and you can carry on another device (TV, iPad, PC etc). All your recent viewing history, ratings etc are stored on the Plex Server on your NAS and so each device accessing it has the same results. It also has the added benefit of being able to stream content remotely when you are out and about or at a friends house. Assuming your NAS device has the required grunt it can also Transcode the content so if you want to limit the bandwidth at either end this can be done.

Below is a comparison.

http://www.htpcbeginner.com/plex-vs-kodi-comparison-guide/
 
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Broken Hope said:
It's easy enough to setup Kodi to use a mySQL database so that you get the same functionality with Kodi as you're getting in Plex.
Click to expand...

Fair enough, but Plex just works out of the box no need to muck around with SQL databases.

It is personal choice at the end of the day but Plex is amazing for me.
 
Loving Plex myself.

Went around and around deciding if I should buy a NAS device such as a Qnap, Synology, etc, or build a NAS.

Realised that from spare parts I could put a NAS together for no cost but the case, and it was much cheaper. Tried running FreeNAS and NAS4Free, hated both.

In the end I'm running Server 2012r2 on it, it has VMs for the various hosted things (webserver, SQL server, etc) I'm running on it, then I run Deluge for downloads with the frontend on my other PCs, and I have a ReFS storage spaces array with 4x2TB and 2x256gb Samsung 830s as cache drives (tiered storage) and it all works really well.

Because it has 24gb of ram and a decent CPU (i5 4460) it is perfectly able to run a few VMs and transcode for plex where needed (Plex uses QuickSync) and it sits in my cellar where I don't care about the noise/heat.
 
DS215j about to land (replacing a ReadyNas Duo)

thought the failure rates for Red's were VERY high and bought Hitachi 7K4000 4TB for £120 ea
 
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