looking for a NAS


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What do you guys think of this one, for $170 before tax?

 

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=7839349

 

 

My main goal is to backup my files to a "stationary" drive, because I have 2TB WD passport that I take with me almost everywhere. Streaming media would be a nice option too.

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At least its cheap that's the only thing its got going for it no point in paying more when as awalys any old pc equipped with a hp p400 card will trounce any of these trashcan even synology supporting up to 8 drives in RAID 6 with 512mb of battery backed cache for as little as 20$ online.

Not a difficult choice to make, prices on consumer nas's are insane feel sorry for anyone who gets one, you can get a bloody sas expander for the same price as a 4 bay nas on ebay.

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Yeah, I was looking for something simple and cheap. I don't want to build my own.

 

Hmm...I thought Seagate was also reputable in the hard drive industry..

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With one drive, It's not necessarily a NAS. Just  a drive with extra features.

 

Seagate is reputable, but not as much as WD.

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Your listed choice is not terrible per say and will work as a NAS just fine. The only problem is the single drive/no expanding choices. Once that drive is filled you'll have to replace it or buy another one again and have 2 sources of data.

If you don't plan on storing much there then yeah that works just fine but for the money you can get a better option that uses 2 drives or more and go from there.

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Really depends what you'll be using the NAS for. This is just a 3TB drive in an enclosure with limited software, a NIC and no expansion. I'd even take a QNAP over it.

 

Just remember you can choose two: Cheap, Fast, Good.

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Ok, now I understand. Maybe 2 hdd to raid them, a better option? Any pointers for what I can get for $170?

I like the feature where I can stream videos and access files away from home.

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This is the closest you are going to get for $170:

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822108095

 

You still have to buy 2 hard drives, though, which would be likely another ~$150.

 

I would HIGHLY recommend you wait and save up a little more. Also, if you go with anything other than Synology, you are wasting your money. The bare minimum I would recommend would be a DS212 at this point.

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I work with LenovoEMC and QNAP consumer / small business grade NAS and i must say that i still prefer to build my own; why is that? Because i can get better hardware parts, better hard drives for less money. Those NAS have too much options (video surveillance in LenovoEMC, for example) that none of my costumers use, so it's useless junk in the OS; the parts like hard drives are more expensive as well. The only benefit is the long warranty (minimum 3 years) and somewhat good support. If i build my own NAS the support is myself, so i can get the necessary hardware for much less and in faster time.

 

Not even mentioning the crap hardware than some business grade NAS have and charge an insane amount for it.

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Also, if you go with anything other than Synology, you are wasting your money.

Just out of interest what other NAS systems have you tried to make such a categorical statement.

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Just out of interest what other NAS systems have you tried to make such a categorical statement.

No problem. I started out with a home-built Windows Server 2000, which I later upgraded to Windows Server 2003. After a few years I wanted something smaller and more power efficient, so I bought an HP MediaSmart Home Server. That worked great for a few years until MS hosed the Home Server software, so I bought a used QNAP TurboNAS TS-219P II from a friend. I used that one almost 2 years until it died. It wasn't under warranty any more so I was going to buy a new QNAP. The same friend I had purchased it from had moved to Synology, and after telling me about it, he gave me admin and remote access to it. I played around with it for a few days and was immediately impressed by how much nicer the OS was compared to the QNAP, so that sealed the deal for me. I bought a DS212 which I upgraded to a DS212+ about 3 months later. I would have loved to go with a DS712+, but that series remains far out of my budget.

Synology has by far the best of all the NAS/Server OS I have ever used. I continue to periodically log into QNAP.com to try out whatever the latest OS they have released, but they have yet to even match the functionality and ease of use that the Synology OS has had for years now. QNAP still makes nice hardware, but their inferior OS has me ranking Synology as the undisputed NAS champion currently.

I hope this helps.

Tim

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Nice discussion guys, but Black Friday deals are almost over! I need to decide... like now?

Save your money until you can afford a Synology.

Tim

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Save your money until you can afford a Synology.

Tim

 

Yeah, they go on sale all the time, it's just not Black Friday.

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I just picked up a NAS last week, I got the Synology 213j (or something like that, can't remember right now). It's a 2-bay NAS for $200. I threw in a 650gb drive and a 1tb drive, and now I have a 650gb RAID :p

 

Eventually I'll get around to making it a 3tb RAID, but for my purposes (backing up laptops and holding old projects) it's a great little machine. I also admin a small business network and put a Synology on there too. It's the main file server, and it too works wonderfully well. I have nothing bad to say about Synology products, and would recommend them over anything else.

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