What is a media server and do I need one?

Raymond Lin · 14 Apr 2013 at 18:59

I have a dodge external seagate HD that disconnects when my mac goes to sleep, it doesn't happen to my other external HD so I think there is something wrong with the PCB. Anyhow, planning to replace it with something like a WD thunderbolt duo anyway for faster access in which I will have a spare HD (or 2).

So that leads me to the opportunity of separating and moving my media out of my drobo and putting them on a NAS.

The only requirement is that it shows up on the network, good expansion and plug and play with hot swap, low noise is a bonus.

I like something I can just turn on and show up on the network.

Ideas? Thanks.

Phage · 14 Apr 2013 at 20:17

What sort of budget ? How many bays ?
I'd be looking at Synology, or Qnap or ReadyNAS Duo.

Raymond Lin · 14 Apr 2013 at 21:17

At least 4 bays, I want to run Raid 1 or Raid 5 for redundancy.

About £200 is the budget.

Kreeeee · 14 Apr 2013 at 21:20

HP microserver for that price. You can get 5 bays in there and your budget rules out the 4 bay Synology and QNAP offerings.

Mercutio · 14 Apr 2013 at 21:46

I'd vote the HP microservers too, have a hunt around. They seem to be permanently on offer/cashback scheme.
They don't come with an O/S though (runs to £30ish for a windows home server license or free with extra hassle for some form of linux)

The "raid" they do is software which... is fine for most cases, certainly up to par with the synology etc type stuff. They have a PCIe slot if you can find a card small enough for hardware raid or you can go a bit nuts with faster (than gigabit) network cards.

With it being a "full OS" you can do pretty much anything else you want with them too.

Raymond Lin · 14 Apr 2013 at 22:28

^^^ That sounds awfully not "unbox and plug and play"

If it needs an OS then I am not sure I can be bothered with that...

Does the HP need any setting up? I just want to unbox it, put HDs in and power it up. May be install the CD it comes in, select Raid and be done with that.

Mercutio · 15 Apr 2013 at 01:56

It's the HP I'm on about. It's basically a tiny computer.
If you want to drop your disks into something, spend 10 minutes messing in a UI and have it running it's probably not your thing.

It IS the best value for money you're likely to get in the £200ish range though. I'm sure you could find a pre-config'd one somewhere for a little extra.

Raymond Lin · 15 Apr 2013 at 07:36

Reading this thread on HP microserver

http://www.avforums.com/forums/netw...iots-guide-setting-up-his-hp-microserver.html

It certainly gives me the impression that its not plug and play. You end up having only 4 bays anyway as you use the top bay for the OS. There is mention a constant plug in with a keyboard and mouse to it, I plan to put it under my desk, don't really have space for more than a NAS. There is also a mention of running anti virus software?!

It sounds more complicated than I'd like. I have 1.2 TB of media already in the drobo so would really like a NAS that let me grow as I get new drives. Going to put in a 2TB and 3TB first, add more late and the NAS should configure itself to the update with no input from me.

I could get another drobo but wondering if anything else has come up to the market for the past 3 years since then.

If I up my budget, what is on offer? I rather spend a bit more to get a 4 bay NAS then get a 2bay NAS within budget only to run out of space in a year.

TheVoice · 15 Apr 2013 at 10:14

I've been looking at Synology stuff lately to replace my WD MyBook World, it's expensive but they don't seem to do any low-end ranges really which in many ways is a plus I suppose.

Check out the DSM 4.2 demo on their website, it gives you an idea of the interface and what sort of things they can do. I was really impressed with it.

Raymond Lin · 15 Apr 2013 at 14:04

TheVoice said:
I've been looking at Synology stuff lately to replace my WD MyBook World, it's expensive but they don't seem to do any low-end ranges really which in many ways is a plus I suppose.

Check out the DSM 4.2 demo on their website, it gives you an idea of the interface and what sort of things they can do. I was really impressed with it.

Almost double my budget of what I have in mind...still £100 less than a Drobo but should do what I want.

http://www.synology.com/products/product.php?product_name=DS413&lang=uk#p_submenu

Thoughts?

Phage · 15 Apr 2013 at 19:11

Very nice. I have the DS211j and I'm very happy with it. That model would be much better again.
I can confirm that they're a doddle to setup.

Raymond Lin · 15 Apr 2013 at 19:35

Looking at it again (!), I think spending another £50 may be a good idea.....as i find out that model doesn't support Plex, the next model up does.

Hmmmmm, now it is getting really expensive. May drop 4 bay down to 2 bays, put in 2x 3TB HD in there and be done with it....I dunno !

JonJ678 · 15 Apr 2013 at 22:41

Install FreeNAS to a USB stick (may be able to download a program for windows which does this for you), plug it into the USB port on the inside of the HP box, and you now have a perfect, impeccably reliable NAS. Error correcting ram, gigabit ethernet - everything you could ask for. No keyboard, no mouse, no screen.

Or pay double the price for something which sort-of works out of the box and continues to sort-of work for a while. Your call.

Raymond Lin · 15 Apr 2013 at 23:11

JonJ678 said:
Install FreeNAS to a USB stick (may be able to download a program for windows which does this for you), plug it into the USB port on the inside of the HP box, and you now have a perfect, impeccably reliable NAS. Error correcting ram, gigabit ethernet - everything you could ask for. No keyboard, no mouse, no screen.

Or pay double the price for something which sort-of works out of the box and continues to sort-of work for a while. Your call.

Hot swap?
Can use different size HDD?
Self aware of HDDs amount and change between RAID options on its own? Or easy to do.

Mercutio · 16 Apr 2013 at 02:32

There's quite a few options with freenas. You can definitely config it to allow you to throw pretty much any drive you want at the drive pool and it will sort it out with some redundancy on the side.
Have a read around but it might be the best compromise without the $$

Raymond Lin · 16 Apr 2013 at 07:33

Mercutio said:
There's quite a few options with freenas. You can definitely config it to allow you to throw pretty much any drive you want at the drive pool and it will sort it out with some redundancy on the side.
Have a read around but it might be the best compromise without the $$

Looking at the freenas website, where is the user guide? And instructions to install? I can't download the package on my iPad.

JonJ, it's not "sort of work out of the box and sort of work for a while". I have a Drobo 5N that worked 100% out of the box, 100% for the past 2 years. It took me as long as unpacking a toaster.

Is the freenas as simple as copy the download package into a USB stick socket from a freshly unboxed microserver and pressed power button and it will do all the above?

Without a monitor and keyboard I do I configure it and check the status of the NAS, or if there is a any drive failure.

What happens if the USB stick is pulled accidentally whilst the machine is on?

TheVoice · 16 Apr 2013 at 09:32

JonJ678 said:
Or pay double the price for something which sort-of works out of the box and continues to sort-of work for a while. Your call.

That's not fair really, the whole point of these expensive dedicated NAS units is that they're designed exactly for that purpose. They don't "sort-of work", they just work.

JonJ678 · 16 Apr 2013 at 11:18

Hot swap is a hardware thing. FreeNAS will deal with hot swap, but the HP microserver doesn't. Documentation is linked from freenas.org, here (bottom of the page).

Well, installing FreeBSD involves compiling the operating system from source. FreeNAS is FreeBSD where someone else has already done all the work for you. It certainly looks like you write it directly to usb.

I think most people control and check on the NAS through a browser. I'm happy with ssh, so don't have a http server running on mine.

By default, unlocking and opening the door, reaching into the box and pulling out the usb stick will probably stop the NAS running. Your data would usually be fine, though if a file was partially written at that point it may be lost. FreeBSD will boot from a ramdisk, so you could boot and then unplug the usb stick, but I don't believe FreeNAS will do so out of the box.

I'll defer to yourself and TheVoice about the reliability of Drobo et al. I am sure that they are slow, relative to more diy hardware. I suspect a Drobo failing leaves you with low probability of getting your data back off the array, but it's possible they use mdadm/zfs and a normal *nix box would read it fine.

It's worth spending a spare 20 minutes or so reading about zfs. The premise is a file system designed to avoid losing your data. It's an astonishingly good piece of software engineering - if the Drobo family don't use it, they really should. Available on FreeBSD, FreeNAS, Solaris and (probably stable) on linux.

Raymond Lin · 16 Apr 2013 at 11:54

JonJ678 said:
Hot swap is a hardware thing. FreeNAS will deal with hot swap, but the HP microserver doesn't. Documentation is linked from freenas.org, here (bottom of the page).

If HP Microserver doesn't do Hotswap then that is not in the running at all, regardless of price. Almost everything else comes secondary. It could even be plug and play and I still wouldn't buy it. Same as any Synology NAS that doesn't do Hot swap. It's not on the shortlist.

JonJ678 · 16 Apr 2013 at 11:57

Really? That's interesting. Why is hot swap so important to you?

I've been avoiding it because I don't quite trust it. My desktop claims to handle hot swap, but I still power it down before unplugging the drives. Too worried about making/breaking connections with power running through them. So far I haven't been in a position where a couple of minutes of downtime while swapping a drive over matters.