BUFFALO 1TB LinkStation Pro Duo NAS Review

[maurere]

I was looking for a NAS (network attached storage) device to connect to my home gigabit network to share files among my multiple workstations. My current setup had me sharing an external 250GB USB drive connected to my HTPC that was always on, but I was quickly running out of space (videos of new baby) and the performance was horrible. My requirements were: web-based configuration, Gigabit ethernet interface, RAID 1 (mirror), and possible power management (turn off when not in use).

I decided on the Buffalo 1TB LinkStation Pro Duo NAS. I paid just over $300 from NewEgg.

The device features a Gigabit ethernet connection, USB port to connect additional hard drives, web-based configuration, FTP server, and power management. Let me run through my thoughts:

Opening the box showed the NAS itself, a power cord, manual, CAT6 cable, and CD. The software is pretty useless but you do have to install it to take advantage of the power management features. Initial configuration can all be done through the web interface which I found simple but extremely slow.

Reliability: I chose to use the device in RAID 1 mode, cutting the storage space from 1 TB to 500GB. I wanted the reliability of RAID 1 so that in case one drive dies I can easily replace it and keep my data. This of course assumes that the NAS itself doesn't die first, I have read horror stories of the proprietary RAID format in the Linkstation that will not allow you to move your hard drives from a dead NAS to a new NAS without having to recreate the RAID array and thus lose your data. There is an always-on fan in the back of the unit that should help prevent premature hard drive failure due to heat.

Price: The price seemed good compared to similar devices, very few at this price level offer RAID 1 and gigabit, more on that later.

Power Management: The power management features are basically limited to having the device power up every time a computer on the network boots up with the Buffalo software running. This was not exactly what I wanted, but it's better than having to walk down to the basement where the NAS is located and hit the power button every time, or leave it running 24/7.

Expandibility: I wasn't really concerned with being able to add more storage, after the initial file copy I realized I had a lot of junk that could be deleted. I could not for the life of me get the device to recognize my USB drive when I plugged it into the back of the NAS. I thought the USB port was for additional storage, it turns out it is for backup purposes. You can run scheduled or manual backups to an attached USB drive or another Linkstation on the network.

Performance: My biggest complaint is about performance. I am running a gigabit network with all CAT6 cables, file copies between PCs are normally measurably quick. File writes to the device were not too slow, the initial file copy of over 200GB took all night (I don't know exactly how long because I started it up and then went to bed). Where the device really craps out is in file reads; just opening my Video share with about 25 folders underneath it took almost 2 minutes (just to display the list of folders, this is normally instantaneous between workstations). Opening a 200MB AVI file took almost 30 seconds, and to copy that same file from the NAS to my main workstation took 58 seconds. That's 3.44 MB/s and 27.6 Mb/s, completely unacceptable for a gigabit device. I was actually seeing faster performance with using the USB drive connected to a workstation, which shouldn't be the case. I know that RAID 1 is measurably slower than RAID 0, but it shouldn't be this bad. More on this later.

Security: You can set up the device to integrate with an Active Directory domain, use local users, or use no security. I tried to set up local users and passwords, making the exactly the same as the local users and passwords set up on my workstations, but I could not get it to work. Since I disabled the internet-based sharing I changed the security to "Allow All" and it magically worked fine. Note on the Internet-based sharing: you can assign your NAS a name and access your files through buffalonas.com by typing in that name, but access is so unbearably slow and of no real use to me that I disabled this "feature".

All in all I was very disappointed with the device. Yes, barring a double-drive failure my files were safe thanks to RAID 1, but questions about what happens if the NAS itself dies leaving the hard drives intact sort of overshadowed this feeling of security. Performance was terrible, my gigabit network normally is smoking fast when accessing / moving files between workstations, but the Linkstation just wasn't up to the task, turning out horribly slow numbers for file writes and file reads.

I paid just over $300 for the Linkstation and have used it for about 3 weeks now. I have since resurrected an old workstation and set it up as my new file server. It's a Pentium 4 3.0 GHz, 2GB RAM, 80GB main drive running Windows Server 2003 R2 with 2 brand new 500GB Seagate SATA2 drives running in software RAID1. These drives have a 5 (five!!) year warranty and I don't have to worry about losing my RAID array if one drive dies, I can easily remove it, wait for the replacement, install it and resynch the array (This saved me at least twice with my old file server). Expandibility is a much easier option, I can easily add drives and move up to a RAID 5 array spanning 4 or 5 drives. I now have Wake-on-LAN capabilities so I can put the server in Standby mode after 30 minutes and then wake it up with a magic packet from any PC on the network, it wakes from S3 standy in about 11 seconds. Performance is 1,000% improved over the Linkstation, the 200MB file that took 58 seconds to copy from the Linkstation now takes just under 9 seconds for a respectable 177 Mb/s transfer rate. Just for kicks, after moving all my data from the Linkstation to the file server I put the NAS back in RAID 0 (performance) mode and tried the file copies again. Performance was only slightly increased, copying the 200MB avi file took 52 seconds instead of the 58 seconds it took with RAID 1, which is still pitiful.

Total cost for the new server: $208 for the 2 hard drives from Circuit City, everything else was laying around extra in my storage closet.

My recommendation is if you can deal with extremely slow file transfers and a somewhat slow and quirky configuration interface the Linkstation is not a bad deal, but always have a separate device that backs up your critical data rather than putting everything in one place. If performance is important to you then steer clear of this NAS, I'm sure there are better options available for you for the same or slightly higher cost.

[TruckWEB]

Well, I had the same problem with another NAS product. I'm also all in Gigabit here, and I finaly gave up and built myself a small server instead with 2 x 500Gb in software RAID 1 with Win2003R2.

It's *WORLD* faster than any NAS setup. Even if it's more expensive, it's worth it.

[Chimera]

My boss has a 4tb Buffalo NAS, connected by gigabit and has the exact same issues. He's not too concerned about speed but it bugs the hell out of me because it should be much faster than that. We have a 1tb Buffalo rack mounted system in RAID 5 and it's way faster than the 4tb desktop system in RAID 5, and the rack mounted system is only using 100bt instead of gig-e. It has to be something with the architecture of the desktop raids because the firmware etc is practically identical.

[J400uk]

Trouble with a server though is its noisy and hard drives get hot unless you can spend a lot of money on cooling systems.

[S.MULLA]

i had a hp media vault- good as a nas unit but file transfers were absolutely terrible.. 5mbps to 10mbps if i was lucky. there was no way i could read and write to it at teh same time with steady speeds. writing small files to it, took ages... so now im currently in the stage of buidling a matx server with a icydock external 4 sata caddy and set that up in my server cabinet and get rid of the mediavault.

i've tried a few dedicated NAS devices-and very very few of them tend to give fast speeds. Thecus ones are nice but expensive around ?300+ for a decent one...

[TruckWEB]

Trouble with a server though is its noisy and hard drives get hot unless you can spend a lot of money on cooling systems.

Well, my "server" is hidden in a closet, backed by a UPS. So I don't have any noise problem and the case came with enough fans to keep it cool. I've put an air vent to let the warm air flow out of the closet and it works 100%. I'm quite happy with that setup, it's fast. I've installed TVersity on it so that I can share all my media with my game consoles.

[Inertia]

Well, my "server" is hidden in a closet, backed by a UPS. So I don't have any noise problem and the case came with enough fans to keep it cool. I've put an air vent to let the warm air flow out of the closet and it works 100%. I'm quite happy with that setup, it's fast. I've installed TVersity on it so that I can share all my media with my game consoles.

I have practicaly the same setup, got 4 750gb drives thoguh in raid 5

I alsom run tversity to share media to upnp media devices / consoles.

[Echilon]

That's very cheap for a 1TB drive on it's own, let alone a NAS. I got a 1TB MyBook on eBay a few weeks ago for ?140 including shipping, which is less than they retail for in the UK. $300 for a NAS is a damn good deal.