Advice on NAS

SAM81

SAM81

SAM81

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I'm looking at get a NAS to provide access to shared media in the house. The main use will primarily be so people back back up their photos/videos to a shared location that is readily accessible providing people are connected to our home wifi.

I'm thinking something like this would be ideal

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/west...-hard-drive-wdbctl0030hwt-eesn-hd-462-wd.html

Has anyone used one and have any thoughts or comments around hot it performs? Would I be correct in thinking when attahced to our router and set up, it would just show as a networked drive in explorer, from which we can move files to and from?

Our current router is a Sky Hub so I guess I will always be limited to the speed of my wireless network plus the fact the router doesn't have gigabit ports. Could anyone tell me what the realistic networking speed of moving stuff to and from the NAS would be?
 
I would recommend getting a 2 bay NAS for redundancy in drive failure. RAID is not a backup, but it's one extra failsafe if you can loose one of the two drives.

Do you plan to do any media streaming on it, or just backup files?

I've no experience with the WD NAS, but I used to have a Synology NAS which has a great interface but they have expensive hardware for it's performance. I've since bought a HP Microserver which I think are down to 120ish after cashback now, you'd need to buy a couple of drives too but then you can install xpenology (There is a thread on here, or a forum for the people who make xpenology out there if you google). This is Synology's interface, which has user accounts etc that you can set up as well as many apps.
 
craig_t said:
I would recommend getting a 2 bay NAS for redundancy in drive failure. RAID is not a backup, but it's one extra failsafe if you can loose one of the two drives.

Do you plan to do any media streaming on it, or just backup files?

I've no experience with the WD NAS, but I used to have a Synology NAS which has a great interface but they have expensive hardware for it's performance. I've since bought a HP Microserver which I think are down to 120ish after cashback now, you'd need to buy a couple of drives too but then you can install xpenology (There is a thread on here, or a forum for the people who make xpenology out there if you google). This is Synology's interface, which has user accounts etc that you can set up as well as many apps.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply. I have to admit I don't really know to much about networking and don't have the time to invest in learning how to build a more customised solution right now. Hence why the above appeals to me.

Primarily it will be used as a easy back up solution but there may be some streaming. I'm assuming it would be able to cope with that?
 
It may - But that link doesn't suggest it is DLNA compliant which you would need for your TV to connect to to stream. With a Synology, you have DLNA media server OR you can install Plex (If you haven't heard of it, it is a little like netflix but for your own content if you have movies on your NAS).

Microserver is £109.99 after cashback, I can't link you to it as it is on a competitor and OCUK don't sell it but just google HP Microserver and you'll get results.

Most would reccommend buying 'NAS' specific drives, although I don't run NAS drives in mine I just have two 5TB drives, it doesn't get seriously heavy use so I think it's fine. It would take you over budget to get two 3TB drives to RAID them, plus a microserver. Around £140 for two drives, plus the microserver. As I said, RAID is not a backup but I made the mistake of buying a 1 drive NAS, it came to the time of needing more space and I couldn't expand. I realised if one drive goes I loose it all. So I had to buy again, another NAS (microserver) and more drives. You can have 4-5 drives in a microserver and hot add them too, so if you run out of space you can add a new drive and extend the raid to that. That being said, you could save a little on drives and get 2 x 2TB drives now in RAID-1 and if needed down the line buy a third 2TB and extend to RAID 5 and get the extra space.
 
In my experience you pay for the user interface - I've had a few NAS boxes and I can't recommend Synology enough!

You may pay a bit more for one but it's worth it for the DSM interface!
 
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