Home Storage

[coxhaus]

I need to buy a home storage product before January when Windows 7 goes out. I was thinking of buying a refurbished small Dell workstation with Windows 10 Pro. I am open to other suggestions? I want something which the OS is self updating. One or 2 drives. Cheap is what I am thinking. I have just under 1TB of music files that took a long time to convert from CDs that I would not like to lose. I plan on keeping a copy on a workstation and a backup copy on my home storage. I have never used a NAS but I ran Microsoft Home Server 2011. I don't care to run a Microsoft Server as I have turned off my server rack and I am selling it. I want something small which will fit up on a closet self with low power draw. Noise is the main concern for me, no loud fans.

Any suggestions?

 

[L&LD]

QNAP. With as many WD RED 4TB or 10TB HDD's as the NAS can use. Anything else is just wishing you had a proper NAS.

Proper backup isn't cheap. You can try and you can be lucky for a long time. Don't find out the hard way that the cheap way eventually ends with lost data.

 

[RMerlin]

Try to go with at least a four bay NAS. They will have a larger fan, and will therefore be a bit less noisy than dual bay models.

The Asustor AS5004T that I use in the living room is quite quiet, I can't hear it behind the closed glass door of my audio/video cabinet. The fan runs at around 520 rpm. I can only faintly hear disk seeks if something is generating a fair amount of activity.

One idea for backups if you have a large amount of data is to get another NAS. It can be a lower-end model however, as you won't need as much RAM or CPU power out of it. Personally I use a QNAP TS-228A to receive backups from my Asustor. It's just not quite fast enough to saturate my gigabit LAN when running rsync unfortunately, so personally I'm a bit disappointed by it. It's reasonably priced however.

 

[dosborne]

IMO, avoid anything Microsoft based. Performance generally will suck. As suggested, it is cheap and easy to buy a dedicated NAS box these days.

With such a low storage requirement, you may also want to consider cloud storage instead (or in addition to).

Lots of good cheap units by Synology, QNAP, etc. Having had (and still have) a number of NAS boxes, I prefer the features and functionality of QNAP but everyone has slightly different usage and likes / dislikes.

 

[coxhaus]

So what does a small NAS cost? I am thinking a small Dell with Windows 10 PRO is under $300. What are some small NAS models?

 

[L&LD]

So what does a small NAS cost? I am thinking a small Dell with Windows 10 PRO is under $300. What are some small NAS models?

How much data are you protecting currently and how much do you generate in a year?

It's not the NAS that is the main cost (usually).

That same $300 will get you something much more suited to protect your data as well as access and share it (securely) as you want better than a general operating system can without a lot of setup work that may or may not be secure or easily rebuilt in case of HDD failure.

 

[sfx2000]

Try to go with at least a four bay NAS. They will have a larger fan, and will therefore be a bit less noisy than dual bay models.

QNAP, Synology, AsusStor - good brands...

4-bay - yes, don't need to populate all the bays at once.

I have QNAP, and a used to the oddities that it has, e.g. features are a moving target due to heavy development on QTS -

That being said, I'd recommend Synology or QNAP - both are decent.

 

[coxhaus]

Looking at Synology the DS218+ looks around my price range. I do have a 4TB drive.

 

[ddaenen1]

Looking at Synology the DS218+ looks around my price range. I do have a 4TB drive.

I have a Netgear Readynas RN212 of which i am very satisfied. It is fast, has got very fast transfer speeds and runs flawless with Plex. Aside from that, very easy to configure. If i compare it with my other NAS, a Synology RS214, i must say that the RN is way easier to configure and to navigate than DSM and everything just works. DSM on the other hand has a myriad of different functions which i don't see a lot of people using on a NAS.

All in all, i believe the RN212 is way better value for money than some of its competitors.

 

[coxhaus]

Amazon no longer sells the RN212 NAS. It seems like the DS281+ has a faster processor. Is Netgear coming out with a new model?

 

[ddaenen1]

Amazon no longer sells the RN212 NAS. It seems like the DS281+ has a faster processor. Is Netgear coming out with a new model?

Don't know about that. It is still published on the Netgear website. About CPU, DS218+ carries a 2.5GHz dual core and the Readynas a 1.4GHz quad core. I honestly have no clue which one is faster.

 

[coxhaus]

What about antivirus on a NAS? If I run a Windows 10 desktop for storage I can clean it if something happens. I don't plan to go on the net with my storage.

 

[ddaenen1]

What about antivirus on a NAS? If I run a Windows 10 desktop I can clean it if something happens. I don't plan to go on the net with my storage.

The Netgear has antivirus embedded. Automatically updates almost every day. On my Synology you can install a virus app through DSM but haven't done that.

 

[dosborne]

QNap also has built in (configurable) anti-virus. You can also set your desktop to scan your NAS, either as you access files or as a scheduled task. In any case, either through windows or most NAS devices directly, you should be covered.

If you really want to go cheap, you could get a single bay NAS, but this is really not your your best option for too many reasons to list.

I'd stick with one of the brand's listed already. The ensure you will get updates, bug fixes, etc, for at least a few years. Depending on what you use it for, and how exposed to the internet it is, this may or may not be important though. I still have 3 super old DLink NAS 2-bay units that essentially are riddled with security holes, but still work great as basic storage, protected behind my firewall, with essentially no direct internet access.

2-bay units give you either extra capacity or redundency.
4+ bay units are even better and may come with a lot of extra features (which may or may not ever be useful to you) and again give you the option to increase capacity down the road or move up RAID levels.

As already mentioned, a multi-bay unit does not have to be "filled" from the start, and depending on the the unit, you may be able to mix drive sizes as well. Most capacity typically means higher cost for the base unit though. A 2-bay unit is typically a good starting point for an average home user. (I have 4 x 2-bay units and a 5-bay, but my usage is probably higher than average lol)

 

[coxhaus]

I was in Discount Electronics yesterday in Austin TX. They have a bunch of Dell 9020 ultra small form factor PCs for cheap money about $150. I plugged one in and it seemed very quiet. There seems to be a choice of CPUs but the problem is they use a 65 watt CPU. Do I really want to run a 65 watt CPU?

I was thinking of plugging into my large screen TV 65" as a monitor. The CPUs are power houses for this kind of thing but I am not sure I need that big of CPU? How well does Dell DisplayPort work on a 65" TV using DVI and an audio cable?

 

[elliot.trance2]

I would suggest looking at ITX-boards and housing, then you could have a usable computer and an NAS all-in-one

External PlugPSU (2x12V to pico-style PSU board)
- Chenbro ES34169 ITX
- 4x 3,5" HDD on hotplug slides
- 1x low profile DVD
- 1x 2,5" SSD internal
- no LP PCIe bracket!
- watch out: only certain coolers will fit, intel core i5-660 boxed fits btw.

ATX-PSU:
Chenbro SR30169
- 4x 3,5" HDD on hotplug slides
- 2x 2,5" internal SSD
- 1x LP-PCIe bracket
- watch out: for the correct backplane, that you get 4x SATA ports - otherwise you need a some SAS-Connector to 4xSATA
- mouting everything needs a certain order

FlexATX-PSU
- Inter-Tech IPC SC-4004 ITX Tower

Newer itx board for ryzen and so on only have 4x SATA, but the M.2 slot compensates for that, and ryzen has reasonable fast onboard-gfy along with DVI, DP, HDMI connectors.