Cheap(ish) NAS that supports Active Directory?

bremen1874 · 20 Mar 2009 at 04:33

I need to add some secondary storage to my Domain (500GB+) so that I've got somewhere to dump desktop drive images to.

Are there any decent NAS devices that'll integrate with Active Directory without costing an arm-and-a-leg? I'm thinking of something similar to the D-Link DNS-323 but with AD support.

I’d prefer to be spending under £200 (excluding drives) but there’s no set budget.

Thanks.

iaind · 20 Mar 2009 at 07:36

I just bought a Buffalo Terastation Pro rackmount with 4 x 500gb drives for about £500.

Works fine with AD, featureset is a tad limited but you cant expect much for the price.

cybergeek · 20 Mar 2009 at 13:12

Synology DS108j + 500GB?

smids · 20 Mar 2009 at 13:48

Build a small server (or buy one - HP Proliant ML115 goes for £200) and run Openfiler (open source) on it. Full AD support as far as I recall... Certainly the best option for speed and reliability.

slylittlefox · 20 Mar 2009 at 17:51

smids said:
Build a small server (or buy one - HP Proliant ML115 goes for £200) and run Openfiler (open source) on it. Full AD support as far as I recall... Certainly the best option for speed and reliability.

This, or FreeNAS. I prefer FreeNAS, quicker to get started with, and also integrates with AD.

iaind · 20 Mar 2009 at 17:55

If its just for dumping images onto, I wouldnt imagine you'll want to waste your work time building a machine to do it.

Something like this should be sufficient

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-004-NG

slylittlefox · 20 Mar 2009 at 18:11

iaind said:
If its just for dumping images onto, I wouldnt imagine you'll want to waste your work time building a machine to do it.

Something like this should be sufficient

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-004-NG

I'm not too sure on that model, but I doubt that comes with AD support/integration.

FreeNAS (or OpenFiler) can be installed on any PC, and will give you about fifteen different methods of accessing the disks within.

I built a machine yesterday with 6 x 80GB SATA drives we had lying around, they're now shared out via iSCSI and software RAID'ed.

It's a great way to use any old disks you have lying around.

bremen1874 · 20 Mar 2009 at 22:06

Thanks for the suggestions.

I've got enough spare hardware kicking about so I think I'll have a play FreeNAS/OpenFiler and see where it gets me.

dazza13 · 23 Mar 2009 at 22:18

I would not go with the netgear readynas got one at a new client we have just taken over and it's very fiddly and the AD integrations is not brilliant.

I would defo go with the freenas route.