Trying Again to Figure Out a NAS

[[email protected]]

Well, I know I pop in every so often for advice, and I've been trying to refine what I need. Basically, I am still trying to find a NAS that is (1) reasonably expandable; (2) reasonably quiet; (3) able to move fast enough that using a sparse disk, referenced photos or iSCSI I could put my iPhoto library on the NAS rather than an external drive; (4) could comfortably handle Time Machine; (5) can do expansion of RAID-like volumes and deal with different size volumes in the array (e.g. Flex-RAID, Beyond RAID, whatever you want to call it).

In August, I bought a ReadyNAS Pro thinking that was the answer. Unfortunately, it is significantly noisier than Netgear's specifications say, which made it a non-starter. Worse, the noises were more of those in a malfunctioning fan than simply a loud one -- and this happened in two different units. This is too bad, because I found Netgear's forums for ReadyNAS more active than the other NAS providers' forums.

In November, I settled on a Synology DS 1010+, but was not able to spend the time on it back then and by the time I had more time, it went up in price by a hundred dollars on Amazon and was discontinued.

So, any thoughts or recommendations that would fit my needs? I'd love to stay under $700, though $800 is possible. I'm contemplating a Synology 411+ right now.

I really appreciate y'all's advice. Thanks for putting up with my questions.

 

[claykin]

Did you consider swapping the case and CPU fan? There's several threads on the Readyans forum site with people discussing swapping the CPU and case fan with Noctua fans and reducing noise considerably.

Sure I know some people don't want to monkey with their new $1K NAS, but sometimes you have to make sacrifices if you want what I believe is your best NAS option at this price point.

BTW, those who have swapped with quieter Noctua fans also find their NAS runs cooler. Sure wish Netgear would spend the extra couple dollars and buy quieter fans. Oh well.

 

[[email protected]]

I did... And I am comfortable tinkering with it. My problem is that I am very uncomfortable potentially voiding the warranty on the said $1k NAS. If only Netgear would give its blessing on the swap...

(I would add that it doesn't make me feel confident that a $1k NAS doesn't perform to specs and sounds like the fans are failing, but, I digress. )

Netgear does count that as a warranty violation, doesn't it?

Thanks for your help, Claykin.

Tim

 

[[email protected]]

The other issue is that the Pro Pioneer has effectively gone up $200... When I purchased it before, Netgear had a $200 mail in rebate...

 

[claykin]

If you were using a Pro Pioneer before maybe you ought to consider the Ultra6 or Ultra6plus? Feature-set is the same as the Pioneer, but the Atom CPU runs cooler and the unit should be quieter.

Yeah, Netgear would likely void the warranty if they knew you swapped fans. Does that mean you have to tell them you did?

 

[[email protected]]

Hmm... Interesting idea. How do you think the performance compares on the Ultra's?

Are the fans relatively easy to swap out where one could get the old ones back in if the unit needed to be sent in?

Thanks,
Tim