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It's the NAS (Network Attached Storage) Thread, yo.

this is all fine and I've been a proponent of FreeNAS in this thread, Windows server 2012 is also a good option, though not free.

But the question is, why are you going to sketchy sites and downloading sketchy stuff? The crypto lockers can't just scan the internet and say Ohh here's a synologyNAS device lets infect it.

Disagree. Synology has a web based front end that can be proxied into doesn't it? Just like the readynas does? If it has a weak or known password you can get remoted into just fine.

In fact - a recent Synology patch fixes the OpenSSL vuln. Published 6/25/2014. What a likely culprit.
 
At the risk of coming across as lazy and taking advantage of a thread bump (which to be clear, I am doing)... Where's best to get an overview of NAS options? Wife and I both have Macbooks that I'd like to have a backup solution for.

I'd also like something we could use to synchronise music and photo folders across the machines. Kind of like Dropbox, but we don't need the files to be stored on a server, just replicated across our machine. I expect this will need to be separate to the NAS solution, but throwing it out there...
 
But the question is, why are you going to sketchy sites and downloading sketchy stuff? The crypto lockers can't just scan the internet and say Ohh here's a synologyNAS device lets infect it.

Banner grabbing across the Internet on port 5000 looking for Synology devices is trivial.
 
At the risk of coming across as lazy and taking advantage of a thread bump (which to be clear, I am doing)... Where's best to get an overview of NAS options? Wife and I both have Macbooks that I'd like to have a backup solution for.

I'd also like something we could use to synchronise music and photo folders across the machines. Kind of like Dropbox, but we don't need the files to be stored on a server, just replicated across our machine. I expect this will need to be separate to the NAS solution, but throwing it out there...

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/nas is a good place to look.
 
Disagree. Synology has a web based front end that can be proxied into doesn't it? Just like the readynas does? If it has a weak or known password you can get remoted into just fine.

In fact - a recent Synology patch fixes the OpenSSL vuln. Published 6/25/2014. What a likely culprit.

Banner grabbing across the Internet on port 5000 looking for Synology devices is trivial.

This is actually exactly what happened with the MinerD exploit. Synology boxes with remote access enabled are pretty easy to spot.
its still looking for weak passwords. And I would still question any sites that are hosting banner ads that can do that.

Regardless, sounds like synology kind of sucks in the security department.
 
its still looking for weak passwords. And I would still question any sites that are hosting banner ads that can do that.

Regardless, sounds like synology kind of sucks in the security department.

We don't know the details of this exploit, however the previous major DSM exploit from this year does not require authentication to be exploited, so your password strength is irrelevant.

http://www.cvedetails.com/cve/CVE-2013-6955/

If your password is weak and I know you're running a web portal, other vulnerabilities are not needed.

Banner grabbing also has nothing to so with banner ads.
 
its still looking for weak passwords. And I would still question any sites that are hosting banner ads that can do that.

Regardless, sounds like synology kind of sucks in the security department.

From working in the industry, I can tell you they're not alone.

Not for security per se, but the number of applications/services on these devices that have default login usernames/passwords as admin/password and their absolute reliance on users to do the grunt work in securing their NAS's connections is widespread throughout most companies.
 
Here is an official statement posted on the Synology Facebook page.

"Thank you for your patience as we continue to investigate the ransomware "SynoLocker" which is currently affecting certain Synology NAS users.
We are fully dedicated to investigating this issue and possible solutions. Based on our current observations, this issue only affects Synology NAS servers running some older versions of DSM (DSM 4.3-3810 or earlier), by exploiting a security vulnerability that was fixed and patched in December, 2013. We HIGHLY encourage our users to update to DSM 5.0.
Furthermore, to prevent spread of the issue we have only enabled QuickConnect and Synology DDNS service to secure versions of DSM.
Please take a look at our official statement with more information here: http://bit.ly/1oypNfE
We sincerely apologize for any problems or inconvenience this issue has caused our users. We will keep you updated with the latest information as we continue to address this issue."
 
so it only affected old firmware versions. unfortunately, my DS1813+ was telling me that I was running the latest version available as recently as last week...when in fact it was still on old 4.3 firmware.

bang up job, Synology. really outstanding.
 
so it only affected old firmware versions. unfortunately, my DS1813+ was telling me that I was running the latest version available as recently as last week...when in fact it was still on old 4.3 firmware.

bang up job, Synology. really outstanding.

Seems like that was a problem that a lot of people on the official forums were complaining about. I'm not sure how something like that falls through the cracks.
 
Also here is the latest update I can find via AnandTech. I'll link the entire article, but for the tl;dr crowd here is the update from a bit ago:

"Synology has finished analyzing the exploit and confirmed which versions of DSM are vulnerable. The vulnerability in question was patched out of DSM in December of 2013, so only servers running significantly out of date versions of DSM appear to be affected.

In summary, DSM 5.0 is not vulnerable. Meanwhile DSM 4.x versions that predate the vulnerability fix – anything prior to 4.3-3827, 4.2.3243, or 4.0-2259 – are vulnerable to SynoLocker. For those systems that are running out of date DSM versions and have not been infected, then updating to the latest DSM version should close the hole.

As for systems that have been infected, Synology is still suggesting that owners shut down the device and contact the company for direct support."

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8337/synology-advises-users-of-synolocker-ransomware
 
This is actually exactly what happened with the MinerD exploit. Synology boxes with remote access enabled are pretty easy to spot.
excuse my ignorance on the subject, I didn't know the synology's setup a website.

However, it still sounds like if you don't have the synology.me site setup on your NAS you would have been fine.
Personally speaking, having any storage device publicly facing to the internet is a bad idea.
Even our hyper-V and SANs are on completely separate VLANS



From working in the industry, I can tell you they're not alone.

Not for security per se, but the number of applications/services on these devices that have default login usernames/passwords as admin/password and their absolute reliance on users to do the grunt work in securing their NAS's connections is widespread throughout most companies.
Yea, so here's the thing, these things are marketed at the non tech savy, they just want a lot of storage and a bunch of non sense features sound good to them. So where's the line on making things easy for the end user, but also being as secure as possible?
These are the types of people that want the NAS internet facing portal because they don't know about things like Plex or subsonic.

After reading all the links you guys posted, I wouldn't touch one of these with a ten foot pool, just out of pure principle.
 
so it only affected old firmware versions. unfortunately, my DS1813+ was telling me that I was running the latest version available as recently as last week...when in fact it was still on old 4.3 firmware.

bang up job, Synology. really outstanding.

That's the thing that bugs me too. I didn't even know DSM 5.0 existed. I always update my DS1513+ when it asks me to, and the last update iirc was 4.3 just a few weeks ago...
 
That's the thing that bugs me too. I didn't even know DSM 5.0 existed. I always update my DS1513+ when it asks me to, and the last update iirc was 4.3 just a few weeks ago...

That's crazy. There has to be something seriously wrong with the way that DSM checks the servers for updates for some units considering that the website lists the 1st release of 5.0 for your model as March 20th. I ended up in the DSM 5.0 beta at the beginning of the year and never had a problem with getting notified of updates for whatever reason.
 
Today I got a notification that my HP WHS hasn't been backed up to CrashPlan in 3 days so I go home to find out what's going on and I find that it's off for some reason. I turn it back on and don't notice anything wrong, but I'm starting to wonder if it's on its last legs. So I figure I'd be preemptive and start looking for a replacement before it dies out on me and makes it harder to transfer data.

I had always thought I'd go with Synology but the way those got breached not that long ago scared me away a bit. I've also seen some recommendations that Windows 8 can replace Windows Home Server with similar functionality. Are either of these the way to go? Either of them not the way to go? Is there another option?

Some requirements:

- CrashPlan compatible
- Multiple drives of different sizes, single storage pool
- Data redundancy across drives
- SMB support
- Plug-in and/or software installation for flexibility
- eSata port, USB port for my two external multiple drive bays from my current WHS with the ability to use these 4 disk drive bays as part of my pooled storage
- Ability to back up computers on network automatically and seamlessly
- Mac back up/time machine support would be nice, but not a requirement
- Would be nice if it can interact with a backup battery power supply that could initiate a shut down if the battery is low after power loss. My WHS does that through a USB connection to the battery backup and software.
- Quiet
- Low powered since it'll be running all the time

Any thoughts or suggestions? I'm somewhat leaning towards the Windows 8 solution but not quite sure.
 
I had always thought I'd go with Synology but the way those got breached not that long ago scared me away a bit. I've also seen some recommendations that Windows 8 can replace Windows Home Server with similar functionality. Are either of these the way to go? Either of them not the way to go? Is there another option?

They got in trouble because of people not keeping their software up to date. Synology identified those that were affected were running on outdated software. This would be the equivalent of you not updating your computer OS when updates push out.
 
They got in trouble because of people not keeping their software up to date. Synology identified those that were affected were running on outdated software. This would be the equivalent of you not updating your computer OS when updates push out.

Why isn't updating an automatic process? I tend to think of a home server as a set it and forget it type device so I might not be monitoring if it's gotten the latest update.
 
Why isn't updating an automatic process? I tend to think of a home server as a set it and forget it type device so I might not be monitoring if it's gotten the latest update.

Checking and downloading updates is automatic and you can have it send you an email or a SMS message when a new update has been downloaded and ready to update. I imagine they have you manually click the button to initiate the update so it doesn't happen when you have a bunch of people connected to your DiskStation.
 
Why isn't updating an automatic process? I tend to think of a home server as a set it and forget it type device so I might not be monitoring if it's gotten the latest update.

With a NAS I wouldn't want automatic updates because the potential of any plug-ins breaking. In this case though we're talking about some big steps in revisions. They released 5.0 and I think infected machines were 3 or 4 point versions behind.
 
So I'm doing a bit more research about the Synology setup and two things stand out:

1) It takes days to add a large capacity HDD to the pool

2) You can't add smaller hard drives to the pool once you have a larger one added.

That second one is extremely painful because I was hoping to get a couple drives to start migrating my data over from the old server and then slowly add in all my existing hard drives but it doesn't sound possible.
 
So I'm doing a bit more research about the Synology setup and two things stand out:

1) It takes days to add a large capacity HDD to the pool

2) You can't add smaller hard drives to the pool once you have a larger one added.

That second one is extremely painful because I was hoping to get a couple drives to start migrating my data over from the old server and then slowly add in all my existing hard drives but it doesn't sound possible.
Oh yay. A GAFer who can't decide between Synology and perhaps Windows Server 2012 Essentials.

Same scenario for me.

I like how Synology has a surveilance cam feature although the licenses are expensive. The system claims new users receive 1 to 2 licenses depending on which model purchased.
 
So I'm looking at buying a QNAP TS-212P.

Is it possible to buy it, stick 1 4TB drive in (I'm going to back up more important things off the NAS), and then add an extra 4TB drive later on when I want to expand?
 
This thread reminds me about my time spent slamming my head against FreeNAS earlier this week.

I can't get the jailed plugins I installed to let me connect to them via their web interfaces. I can ping their IPs and they respond, but I get "connection refused" when I access them via browser. It's perplexing, and Google is no help, most people with my problem seem to be running bizarre setups with bridges or on VM etc.
 
So I ended up deciding to give the Synology a try. Does anyone have any recommendations on the best way to migrate my data from my old WHS 2003 setup to the new Synology? I tried to connect to the share by remote desktop in WHS but after a short bit an error popped up complaining it ran out of resources during the copy. I wasn't even trying to do everything either. So now I'm having a Windows 7 box mount both servers and copying the files between the two, but that of course ends up being much slower. Like a half to even a third of the speed.

So does anyone have a better recommendation on how to move my data to the new Synology?
 
Since this thread's become active again, this is just a friendly reminder for people to check that their NAS manufacturer/provider has got a fix for Shellshock.
 
For those wondering why DSM 4.3 is reported as the latest available to them: doesn't Synology have a hardware cutoff for DSM 5?

In other words, if your hardware is of a certain, older make, 4.3 is as high as you're going?
 
I just want to say how much I love my Areca card. When I built my nas/home server I did a mix of 6 WD Reds as a raid 6 and to save some money 2 Seagate drives as a raid 1. Surprise, surprise just over 2 years later and one of the Seagate drives die. I order a new WD Red to replace it, and I pull out the dead drive slide in the new one, set it as a hot spare and it just rebuilds the raid one automatically. Data is all there and everything is back to normal.
 
Today I got a notification that my HP WHS hasn't been backed up to CrashPlan in 3 days so I go home to find out what's going on and I find that it's off for some reason. I turn it back on and don't notice anything wrong, but I'm starting to wonder if it's on its last legs. So I figure I'd be preemptive and start looking for a replacement before it dies out on me and makes it harder to transfer data.

I had always thought I'd go with Synology but the way those got breached not that long ago scared me away a bit. I've also seen some recommendations that Windows 8 can replace Windows Home Server with similar functionality. Are either of these the way to go? Either of them not the way to go? Is there another option?

Some requirements:

- CrashPlan compatible
- Multiple drives of different sizes, single storage pool
- Data redundancy across drives
- SMB support
- Plug-in and/or software installation for flexibility
- eSata port, USB port for my two external multiple drive bays from my current WHS with the ability to use these 4 disk drive bays as part of my pooled storage
- Ability to back up computers on network automatically and seamlessly
- Mac back up/time machine support would be nice, but not a requirement
- Would be nice if it can interact with a backup battery power supply that could initiate a shut down if the battery is low after power loss. My WHS does that through a USB connection to the battery backup and software.
- Quiet
- Low powered since it'll be running all the time

Any thoughts or suggestions? I'm somewhat leaning towards the Windows 8 solution but not quite sure.

I put together a Windows 8 NAS recently. It won't do everything you want it to do out of the box. You'll have to supplement with other software to do the backups, for example.

That said, paired with Stablebit Drivepool and Scanner it fit my needs really well. I was able to put it together entirely with parts I had lying around. I really like the way Drivepool works and the fact that the files are stored in NTFS so if something goes wrong everything is easily recoverable. I have it replicating (to 3 drives) only the things I care about losing while risking 1/6th of my Television and movie collections, which I know can all be obtained again, in the event of sudden failure of one of my drives. However, with Scanner also running it will automatically evacuate any drive it suspects might be failing. It works well for my needs.
 
For those wondering why DSM 4.3 is reported as the latest available to them: doesn't Synology have a hardware cutoff for DSM 5?

In other words, if your hardware is of a certain, older make, 4.3 is as high as you're going?

Yes, there is a cut off but it's hidden on their site. You'll have to contact them for a list but this is just like they did for DSM 4.3 as well.

So I'm looking at buying a QNAP TS-212P.

Is it possible to buy it, stick 1 4TB drive in (I'm going to back up more important things off the NAS), and then add an extra 4TB drive later on when I want to expand?

Yes it's possible. You'll just be adding another drive to the array/adding a new volume that you can carve up how you want to.

So I ended up deciding to give the Synology a try. Does anyone have any recommendations on the best way to migrate my data from my old WHS 2003 setup to the new Synology? I tried to connect to the share by remote desktop in WHS but after a short bit an error popped up complaining it ran out of resources during the copy. I wasn't even trying to do everything either. So now I'm having a Windows 7 box mount both servers and copying the files between the two, but that of course ends up being much slower. Like a half to even a third of the speed.

So does anyone have a better recommendation on how to move my data to the new Synology?

You can setup an FTP on the Synology and move it up that way or setup Iscsi and add a Iscsi target on the Windows box and move it that way. There's also NFS.

At the risk of coming across as lazy and taking advantage of a thread bump (which to be clear, I am doing)... Where's best to get an overview of NAS options? Wife and I both have Macbooks that I'd like to have a backup solution for.

I'd also like something we could use to synchronise music and photo folders across the machines. Kind of like Dropbox, but we don't need the files to be stored on a server, just replicated across our machine. I expect this will need to be separate to the NAS solution, but throwing it out there...
.

That's what I like about the Synology units. You can set it up to dump your files locally and they have an app that lets you sync across your desktops (PC/MAC) as well as an iOS/Android app.
 
I'm finally in a position to actually make this purchase.

My choice is between the Drobo 5N, the Asustor 604T, the Qnap 469L, or the Synology 412+

I need this device to last for a long time and be appropriate for streaming media/backing up data. An XBMC app is a must and I refuse to go over $590. I have a smartphone so media transcoding is somewhat important. Power consumption is a big issue as well. Which device should I buy?

While I'm here does anyone use the the Qnap TS-470 pro?
 
I'm finally in a position to actually make this purchase.

My choice is between the Drobo 5N, the Asustor 604T, the Qnap 469L, or the Synology 412+

I need this device to last for a long time and be appropriate for streaming media/backing up data. An XBMC app is a must and I refuse to go over $590. I have a smartphone so media transcoding is somewhat important. Power consumption is a big issue as well. Which device should I buy?

While I'm here does anyone use the the Qnap TS-470 pro?

What do you mean an XBMC app is a must? I picked up a Synology and I'm using it as a backend for XBMC and so far it's working great, but I'm not sure what your definition of an app is.
 
What do you mean an XBMC app is a must? I picked up a Synology and I'm using it as a backend for XBMC and so far it's working great, but I'm not sure what your definition of an app is.

I'll revise my initial statement. Quick research indicated that the DS 415play lacked the functionality to work with XBMC. Clearly, my research was wrong.

XBMC is important to me because I've used it to consume all of my digital media content.
 
My ReadyNAS Pioneer Pro died in a most horrific way a few months ago. Took all my data with it on its way out. neveragain.gif

I reclaimed the drives and built a box using the SilverStone DS380B case. This case is amazing, 8 hot-swap drive bays. I spent about $500 on case/mobo/ram/cpu/psu. Really happy with the build.

Running NAS4Free on it and loving it. ZFS kicks ass. Since it has a ton of spare horsepower, I installed Plex in a jail. It can transcode & stream multiple videos at once without breaking a sweat.
 
I'll revise my initial statement. Quick research indicated that the DS 415play lacked the functionality to work with XBMC. Clearly, my research was wrong.

XBMC is important to me because I've used it to consume all of my digital media content.

I guess I'm still a bit confused on what functionality you thought was lacking. Any NAS should be able to do a samba file share and XBMC can connect to that. Were you looking for additional functionality? Because in addition that, I set up my Synology to host the library database so that all the XBMC clients in my house will be in sync with what has been watched, what hasn't and the current play position of a video file.

just built multiple $10K systems. If there is any interest i'll post some pics.

I'm interested in seeing some.
 
My ReadyNAS Pioneer Pro died in a most horrific way a few months ago. Took all my data with it on its way out. neveragain.gif

Yeah that happened to my ReadyNAS too. Raid 1+0 and I still lost all my data. Needless to say I learned my lesson and now I back up everything to the cloud. Think I'm going to switch away from Crashplan though. They're so ridiculously slow.
 
I guess I'm still a bit confused on what functionality you thought was lacking. Any NAS should be able to do a samba file share and XBMC can connect to that. Were you looking for additional functionality? Because in addition that, I set up my Synology to host the library database so that all the XBMC clients in my house will be in sync with what has been watched, what hasn't and the current play position of a video file.

You're selling me on this with every response and that's a good thing because there's an 8 TB difference between the DS 415play versus the Asustor AS-604T, QNAP TS-469L, and Drobo 5N. That doesn't take into account the full transcoding abilities of the 415play either.

I sound like someone's paying me to puff up Synology but this is all from independent research, which is my opinion and in no way a definitive 100 percent accurate statement.

I can get around the lack of HDMI port using a chrome cast or other streaming device.
 
You're selling me on this with every response and that's a good thing because there's an 8 TB difference between the DS 415play versus the Asustor AS-604T, QNAP TS-469L, and Drobo 5N. That doesn't take into account the full transcoding abilities of the 415play either.

I sound like someone's paying me to puff up Synology but this is all from independent research, which is my opinion and in no way a definitive 100 percent accurate statement.

I can get around the lack of HDMI port using a chrome cast or other streaming device.

Oh wait, did you actually want it to run XBMC on the NAS? I forgot some of these include HDMI ports for their own media apps. If that's the case, then I don't know if any of those will work but most certainly not the Synology. I usually have various clients running XBMC that just connect to my network server for the content. The server itself doesn't run XBMC.
 
Oh wait, did you actually want it to run XBMC on the NAS? I forgot some of these include HDMI ports for their own media apps. If that's the case, then I don't know if any of those will work but most certainly not the Synology. I usually have various clients running XBMC that just connect to my network server for the content. The server itself doesn't run XBMC.

Yes, I wanted to run XBMC on the NAS. However, I'll gladly take that minor downside for 8 TB more of storage capacity. Technically, the only Nas that meets by Kameelah ass list for storage is the Qnap TS-470 pro but it costs well over $1200.

The DS 415play is a great compromise.
 
Going back and forth now on upgrading my unRaid box. Part of me wants to move away from unRaid because I feel like the product development is slowing. Things seem to not be getting much better in terms of features and speeds aren't really improving either. Docker implementation is nice but it still requires a terminal.

I've been thinking of just going to Synology and getting their 415+. The quad-core processor is already showing better performance over the 412+ based on some forum posts.

The dilemma here is there is about a $200-300 price difference. Upgrading my current unRaid box to Plex will save me, obviously, but I'm also at a point of not caring about the tweaking aspect of stuff. It's a good ole time versus money dilemma.
 
I'm finally in a position to actually make this purchase.

My choice is between the Drobo 5N, the Asustor 604T, the Qnap 469L, or the Synology 412+

I need this device to last for a long time and be appropriate for streaming media/backing up data. An XBMC app is a must and I refuse to go over $590. I have a smartphone so media transcoding is somewhat important. Power consumption is a big issue as well. Which device should I buy?

While I'm here does anyone use the the Qnap TS-470 pro?

QNAP NAS with Atom processors had tearing issues with HDMI-out. Not sure if it was ever fixed.

I'd recommend the TS-451. I've got the 2-bay version (TS-251) and it works perfectly and does everything I need. Just make sure you get the 4GB RAM version so you can use Virtualization Station. It uses a dual-core Celeron and I haven't noticed any tearing when using XBMC.
 
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