Pulling ahead of the RAID 5 Pack: QNAP TS-509 Pro Reviewed

[corndog]

Hi Rupert,

My experience of QNAP so far is that the software can be a bit quirky in places, but it is "reliably" quirky - i.e. it always does the same thing.

I have also been using Sans Digital for years, and one thing you should know is that I have had LOTS of reliability issues with Sans Digital software. I haven't lost data ever, but I have ports that don't work sometimes (My MR5CT2 eSATA port barely ever works, and sometimes I have to reboot twice to get the USB to work. The firewire always works, which is what I primarily use)

I've never used Synology, so can't comment. Of course, I'm just one guy, which makes my experience quite anecdotal, so don't build a whole case on it.

I find that the QNAP hardware seems better built than Sans Digital. Do with this info what you wish...

-corndog

 

[rpwoodman]

Thanks for the info Corndog - I appreciate you passing on your experiences - it's really what I was looking for.

I guess things are never really clear cut. It looks like whatever product I decide to buy, I should let others try out new firmware for a few weeks before I try it...

rgds

Rupert

 

[Netson]

I am also looking to buy this unit due to the positive messages I've read here and elsewhere on the web.

However, I would some more info on some other area: remote access.

I've been dragging around portable harddrives for years, have had private FTP servers running, had tried (partial) online storage, and none of these solutions worked very well (keeping in mind my somewhat limited budget).

Now I've come to the point where I want to invest a little more in a solid solution which I can use for the following:

* Safe backup solution (RAID5) of my many GB's of data (around 1,5TB atm)
* Remote, secure access to all my files

I seem to remember that the QNAP TS509 supports secure FTP? Has anyone tried this feature?

I could open up a port on my router and forward it to the FTP port on the QNAP for remote access. Or would it be recommended to setup a VPN instead? Again, any info/experience in this field would be great!

Would the QNAP be able to serve as a VPN Server? And would that allow me to mount the drive (as a network drive or something) while not connected to my local network?

Also, I read that the QNAP supports wake-on-lan, is this also possible through a remote connection? So I could, for example, go on holiday, and if desired I could fire up my QNAP and log on to get some files, that would be awesome and save on the power bill as well!

I am really looking forward to your reply(ies)!

 

[Dennis Wood]

1. Backup to an Esata drive is supported and is working well.

2. Remote access is best achieved (cheapest) with a router supporting a VPN endpoint, or one of the models Tim reviewed with SSH based VPN (simple!). Once you have an IP address on your network via encrypted VPN, you can use the NAS web based file access, or directly access the NAS, through a mapped drive as if you were in your office. With regard to security, this minimizes open ports on your router. The VPN does not behave as an endpoint, however if you're good with Linux, I'm pretty sure you could install it yourself. None of the packaged QNAP applications include VPN support to my knowledge.

3. We're testing out rysnc with a second TS509, offsite. This is an encrypted delta-based synchronization (very efficient) of the NAS files from one unit to another. In my mind, this is the best solution as it's scheduled and offsite. You don't need matching QNAP products for this to work so your "home" NAS could be any of their less expensive NAS units.

4. Wake on LAN does work through a VPN connection (router based) in my testing using FUSION WOL. There is a problem with the QNAP supplied utility.

The unit does support FTP, but it's not secure. If you connect as described above, there's no need for it. The unit does support connection via an SSH port (for the admin user only) and I'm guessing you could set up a tunnel this way if you wanted.

 

[Netson]

2. Remote access is best achieved (cheapest) with a router supporting a VPN endpoint, or one of the models Tim reviewed with SSH based VPN (simple!).

Happen to have a link? Been looking to buy a new router anyways!

Thanks for the info so far, you've been helpful and it is much appreciated!

 

[thiggins]

Happen to have a link? Been looking to buy a new router anyways!

Linksys RVL200 Review: No Hassle SOHO / SMB VPN

 

[Dennis Wood]

No worries. When you start searching for "real" data on stuff like this, it's sometimes hard to find. Tim and company are doing an outstanding job in that regard. I do have an ulterior motive as we're searching for cost effective solutions for SOHO and video editing types. Somewhere down the line we may look at adding selected products to our own business offerings as a one-stop "package" that covers all the basics...pretty much as you've described.

I should be working for these QNAP folks

 

[Netson]

lol, apply for a job!

I have another question. I'm planning on using the load-balancing feature on the QNAP, hooking it up to a 802.3ad (Link Aggregation capable) switch. My new motherboard also has dual gigabit connections that support Link Aggregation, so I'm hoping to get blazing fast network performance there.

However, not all my network, including my current router, is gigabit capable. If I hook up the QNAP and my PC to the gigabit switch (smart switch), and then connect the switch to a 100Mbit router, will that affect performance of the QNAP<->PC traffic, or will only outside traffic be affected?

 

[Dennis Wood]

Hooking up LACL for your workstation will have little to no advantage, but you'll want the TS509 connected this way. Why? Because the QNAP load balancing will not necessarily open up both ports for downstream traffic...at least it won't based on our testing and analysis of port stats. Link aggregation seems to behave a bit differently and this depends I believe on the driver. In other words, where a dual LAN server will use both ports equally in serving workstations, the QNAP load balancing seems to favour 1 port in RX mode and the other in TX mode, seeing performance gains this way. In other words, the best performancewill be simply having the QNAP hooked up in load balancing mode, particularly with more than one workstation loading it...but don't expect both ports to be used for one workstation's traffic. With the 509 in load balancing mode, you can expect 50MB/s writes and 83MB/s reads to a Vista SP1 workstation with local RAID 0 drives. There is a code update coming to deal with multiple workstation loading, and this may or may not change the load balancing behaviour.

Hooking up a 100Mbit router to a managed gigabit switch will have zero impact on other gigabit traffic. Our test scenario has mixed 10/100 and gigabit devices (including a 10/100 router) and all of my testing has been conducted with them "live". There are some situations where straying from default settings on flow control can affect mixed mode traffic, but we're not seeing them.

 

[Netson]

Hooking up a 100Mbit router to a managed gigabit switch will have zero impact on other gigabit traffic. Our test scenario has mixed 10/100 and gigabit devices (including a 10/100 router) and all of my testing has been conducted with them "live". There are some situations where straying from default settings on flow control can affect mixed mode traffic, but we're not seeing them.

Thanks again for all the info, very useful stuff!

So if I understand correctly, even if I let the 100Mbit router function as DHCP server in the network, traffic on the 1Gbit switch will not be dragged down to 100Mbit? I'm not an expert on this stuff, just trying to learn!

 

[Dennis Wood]

That's correct. Just leave the switch at its defaults for auto port configuration and plug in your router. The switch will negotiate the fastest rates with each device attached to it via a hardware "handshake". There are always exceptions where some NICs/devices fail to chat appropriately in auto mode with given switches, but these issues are far less common today than even a few years ago.

A little tip with regard to your switch choice. The HP Procurve 24 port unit (pointed out by another forum member) is the only fanless unit I've seen yet that fully supports 802.3ad (LACL), at around $400. The other two 16 port units we've tested from Dlink and 3COM (2916T) are crazy loud and only suitable for an equipment room or closet.

 

[Netson]

I haven't purchased a switch yet, but I was looking at the NETGEAR GS108T smart switch (announced on SNB here), which is supposed to support LACL (802.3ad). Netgear product link here.

Not sure if this is a fan-less design or not though... 8 ports would be sufficient (for the switch) combined with 4 ports on an average router and the wireless AP which I will be using for the laptops.

If anyone has any experience with this swicth, I'd be happy to hear about it!

 

[Dennis Wood]

$134, and it looks like a fully 802.3ad featured switch. Had no idea this was out there...but it should work just fine. The TS509 needs a trunk with LACL configured ports and this switch will do that.

 

[tazdevil]

Gs108t

The Netgear GS108T is a smart fan less switch. It has a lot of nice features. I personally prefer the HP switches, but I have two Netgear (GS716T and GS108T) switches as well as a bunch of HP ones.

Tazdevil

 

[Netson]

Ordered my QNAP and new switch yesterday, hope to receive everything this week! (QNAP wasn't in stock in any of the online stores I use regularly, so might take a few days...)

I will post my experiences here! Thanks for all the help everyone provided; it convinced me this was the right unit for me!

[edit]Two more questions:

* Anyone have any experience/thoughts on encrypting the entire contents of the disks?
* Any experience running a full-fledged mail server on the QNAP? I'm thinking of letting the qnap collect all my email from various accounts, after which I can logon to the QNAP and collect all email through IMAP or something... thoughts?

[/edit]

 

[Dennis Wood]

Encrypting disks always leaves me a bit wary particularly after a decade or so of working with fully encrypted laptop deployments. It's great until things go awry with a bad critical sector, and suddenly the whole disk is a paperweight. If you can avoid it, I would.

QNAP does have it's add-on installer packages and one of them includes support for Xmail or something similar. None of the QPGK packages I've tried to auto-install has actually worked...so I'm guessing you'd need to get under the hood via the console. This is an attractive option for collaborative use, but once you start trying to reverse engineer a NAS build, I question even using a NAS. In other words, building a more or less standard box, loading Ubuntu or similar, and then working through that would be less work IMHO than figuring out how to get it working on a NAS unit. The attractive thing about using a NAS is that the price includes something no one ever accounts for .... support. Once you start foraging into mod's I'd say all bets are off and you're better off building a box with a dedicated RAID controller and loading your own OS.

There is a good group of Linux jockeys over at the Qnap forum who've been doing all kinds of mods to their NAS units, and I suspect the same will end up being (or already is) the norm for all NAS builds. The manufacturer that figures out some slick installs (and supports them) for the popular open source distros will find themselves in a very strong market position. That kind of support is worth two or three times the hardware cost of these NAS units.

 

[Netson]

Just to make good on my promise, I'm posting my experiences here so far.

Setup:

Netgear FVS336G SSL-VPN Gigabit Router
Netgear GS108T Gigabit Smart Switch (LACP)
QNAP TS-509 Pro with 5x WD RE2 500GB (RAID5)
Linksys WRT150N running DD-WRT, access point only

I must say, I absolutely love the combination of devices and would recommend it to anyone! I use the VPN to connect to my local network, and can then access the NAS as if it runs locally from anywhere in the world. Ever been somewhere where you wanted access to that file at home? Now you can!

I usually turn off the QNAP when I leave. Despite the fact that I was unable to get wake-on-lan working over the VPN, I can use the Linksys WRT150N, because DD-WRT has built in support for Wake on Lan.

It's been running extremely stable so far, transferred about 1,6TB of files to the NAS and transfer speeds are in line with the other reports here on the forum. If my warranty expires I might consider upgrading the RAM to 4GB as was suggested elsewhere here on the forum. That would make the unit even sweeter!

Anyways, long story short, I'm a happy new 509 owner!

 

[drbiggly]

Tim,

One thing that was pointed out to me by my boss (he's looking to replace a NAS at his house and the two options are Netgear ReadyNAS Pro and the QNAP TS-509) is that supposedly the QNAP has online volume expansion, which sounds awfully similar to XRAID/XRAID-2 offered by Netgear.

http://www.excaliberpc.com/588089/qnap-ts-509-pro-5tb-5x1000gb.html

It's mentioned in that article, but without a lot of detail, but your review (which I consider to be more thorough honestly) didn't mention it.

Can you elaborate on those? Do you have a TS-509 handy? I feel like the online expansion offered by XRAID is truly the Netgear's party piece but if QNAP does it as well, then that levels the playing field a bit more. Just curious to find out more as always.

-Biggly

 

[thiggins]

Sorry, I don't have the TS509-Pro. Perhaps Dennis Wood can comment.

I haven't been testing RAID expansion, but probably should. It just takes so long!

 

[SirBC]

The 509 Pro does have online expansion. I have not tried this feature out yet, but from what others over on the QNAP forum have said, it takes forever and a day to bring the new drive(s) online. Like a week or so to add a 1TB drive to a 3 TB array. Yikes.

I will likely be adding a couple of 2 TB drives to my 3 TB (RAID 5) array in the near future. However, instead of using online expansion I will just backup the array, flatten it, and then add the 2 drives and rebuild the array and copy my backup over. That will be much quicker.

-Dave