Cornballer
Member
I'd be interesting in answers to these questions, too. I just got my DS213j yesterday afternoon. I installed the two drives, but that's it so far.
Wow, end of an era.
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Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!
It's the NAS (Network Attached Storage) Thread, yo.
- Thread starter Jill Sandwich
- Start date
with two disks you only really have two options, RAID 0 and RAID 1. RAID 0 is striping RAID 1 is mirroring. Since you said you want redundancy I would go with RAID 1. this will give you 3tb of space with an exact copy on both drives.
I just looked up Snyology Hybrid Raid, yay for companies making up new shit, and it seems like this would be better if you have more than 2 drives, sounds like a RAID 5. Sounds like this is for you if you dont want to know anything about RAID and just let the software handle everything for you.
As for the firmware, i would update that first if you want to. Most companies claim that it may or will wipe your drive once you update the firmware. That said I would look at what the benefits of upgrading the firmware are and see if its even worthwhile.
Thanks for the response. The other thing I am considering is a non duplicate locally (to use more space) and use amazon glacier as an offsite backup. Thoughts on that?
After more reading, it looks like glacier is great for writing to and storing, put they can pound you for hundreds of dollars if you need to retrieve everything. Might stick with local duplication.
Jill Sandwich
the turds of Optimus Prime
End of an Area!
Cornballer
Member
My Synology setup is up and running. Just trying to work out the particulars, but in general it's been a smooth process thus far.
:lol
I think I'll need a NAS soon. I'm currently using a Mac Mini as a HTPC with a 2TB USB drive attached, but I'm running out of disk space. I could buy another HD, but I'd rather have a single box with a single logical volume.
The only use cases for the time being are to stream media to the Mini and to other computers (though also via the Mini, as I'm using Plex) and of course adding new stuff occasionally.
I'm not sure which one to get, though. A 2-bay NAS with another 2TB drive would last quite some time. But as my collection grows, I get more and more worried about losing it because of hardware failures. So I should rather get a 4-bay NAS with three 2TB in total and use RAID-5, right? According to Synology's RAID calculator, I'd end up with 4TB usable space. That's fine, and I'd still have one free bay.
I had a look at Synology's product lineup, and it seems I have to choose between the DS413j and the DS413.
The major difference seems to be that the DS413 has got a 1GHz dual core instead of 1.6GHZ single core, 1GB RAM vs 512MB and USB 3.0 (and the price, of course). How much power and RAM do I actually need? The theoretical maximum demand is two simultanous 1080p streams + one file transfer from/to the NAS, but in reality this will hardly happen.
Another minor question: If I wanted to separate data on a simple physical volume, (e.g. Media + Backups + Work), I'd partition it. How would one do this with a NAS? Simply creating subfolders?
edit: Apparently the DS413 is noisy. I'm gonna compare with older models (DS412 etc.) as well.
The only use cases for the time being are to stream media to the Mini and to other computers (though also via the Mini, as I'm using Plex) and of course adding new stuff occasionally.
I'm not sure which one to get, though. A 2-bay NAS with another 2TB drive would last quite some time. But as my collection grows, I get more and more worried about losing it because of hardware failures. So I should rather get a 4-bay NAS with three 2TB in total and use RAID-5, right? According to Synology's RAID calculator, I'd end up with 4TB usable space. That's fine, and I'd still have one free bay.
I had a look at Synology's product lineup, and it seems I have to choose between the DS413j and the DS413.
The major difference seems to be that the DS413 has got a 1GHz dual core instead of 1.6GHZ single core, 1GB RAM vs 512MB and USB 3.0 (and the price, of course). How much power and RAM do I actually need? The theoretical maximum demand is two simultanous 1080p streams + one file transfer from/to the NAS, but in reality this will hardly happen.
Another minor question: If I wanted to separate data on a simple physical volume, (e.g. Media + Backups + Work), I'd partition it. How would one do this with a NAS? Simply creating subfolders?
edit: Apparently the DS413 is noisy. I'm gonna compare with older models (DS412 etc.) as well.
Calm Killer
In all media, only true fans who consume every book, film, game, or pog collection deserve to know what's going on.
Has anyone here worked with the Drobo products at all? Any insight?
Black Republican
Member
"How can Nas be garbage?
Semi-autos at your cartilage"
Semi-autos at your cartilage"
RangersFan
Member
Easy to setup and use, but performance is lacking.
Calm Killer
In all media, only true fans who consume every book, film, game, or pog collection deserve to know what's going on.
Welp there goes 2 grand. Sexy though. I think I will go with 1 of the Hard drives for now and save up for the NAS and additional hard drives later.
RangersFan
Member
Couldn't help myself. Along with my ps4 and xbone pre-order's it's gonna be an expensive fall season.
crazygambit
Member
Jesus $850 for a 5 disc NAS? My 20 disc unraid setup was probably less than that.
Calm Killer
In all media, only true fans who consume every book, film, game, or pog collection deserve to know what's going on.
What is this you speak of?
Edit: This?
What type of box are you using that you could fit 20 drives in it for less than $850?
You could build your own for that price pretty easily - this case runs $300, and you can definitely get the motherboard/CPU/RAM/PSU/etc. for $550, though depending on what kind of setup you're using you might want to go for proper server-grade HBAs, which will probably push it over.
kurisu_1974
Banned
I have been using a 4Gb Iomega IX2 since last March, and it's been making kinda weird noises (which seems normal?) but what was worse is that the media server functionality never really worked. I could stream content for 5, 20, sometimes maybe 40 minutes but it constantly disconnected itself from my network to come back immediately. The shares on the PC were not disconnected tho. It used some version of Twonkyserver for the media capabilities.
Then this weekend I noticed there was a firmware update, and now everything is rebranded Lenovo, Twonkyserver got updated to version 7... and the streaming now works perfectly.
I honestly didn't expect to have this fixed.
Then this weekend I noticed there was a firmware update, and now everything is rebranded Lenovo, Twonkyserver got updated to version 7... and the streaming now works perfectly.
I honestly didn't expect to have this fixed.
D
Deleted member 12837
Unconfirmed Member
Ok, I need some help with my HP Mediasmart EX495 (hoping someone else has one...)
I turned mine on for the first time in a while today (I don't use it very often so I'll turn it completely off if I know I don't need it for a while). Upon starting up, the health indicator light blinks red 5 times and then starts blinking blue for a while and then repeats.
According to the manual this indicates a "Multiple boot failure" and recommends I call HP support. Calling them is the last thing I want to do because I know I'll be on the phone for hours and might not even solve anything. I tried pulling all but the system drive out and rebooting, and the problem persists, so I'm thinking the system drive might be corrupt.
I'm planning on buying a Synology NAS soon anyway, and luckily I don't need any of the data that's "trapped" on my disks right now (or maybe ever. Are there a few simple things I can try right now before I call HP (ex: buy a new HDD and replace the system drive and initiate some sort of restore)? Is there an easy way I can eventually recover the data off of those drives without needing to repair the EX495?
This is all compounded by the fact that I have a Mac, so it probably won't be easy for me to run the presumably Windows-only recovery software...
I turned mine on for the first time in a while today (I don't use it very often so I'll turn it completely off if I know I don't need it for a while). Upon starting up, the health indicator light blinks red 5 times and then starts blinking blue for a while and then repeats.
According to the manual this indicates a "Multiple boot failure" and recommends I call HP support. Calling them is the last thing I want to do because I know I'll be on the phone for hours and might not even solve anything. I tried pulling all but the system drive out and rebooting, and the problem persists, so I'm thinking the system drive might be corrupt.
I'm planning on buying a Synology NAS soon anyway, and luckily I don't need any of the data that's "trapped" on my disks right now (or maybe ever. Are there a few simple things I can try right now before I call HP (ex: buy a new HDD and replace the system drive and initiate some sort of restore)? Is there an easy way I can eventually recover the data off of those drives without needing to repair the EX495?
This is all compounded by the fact that I have a Mac, so it probably won't be easy for me to run the presumably Windows-only recovery software...
Marty Chinn
Member
You can pop the drives into an external enclosure or buy a sata to usb adapter and read the data off the drives. The nice thing about WHS was that if it ever died, it was super easy to get the data of the drives.
D
Deleted member 12837
Unconfirmed Member
Hmm well that's good news, OK. Any recommendations for an inexpensive adapter (seems like it'd be quicker/easier than popping them into and out of an enclosure)?
Even with duplication turned on though? What are the drives going to look like, particularly if one of them is corrupt? Is the data just randomly spread across the 4 drives I have?
Marty Chinn
Member
Sorry I don't know of one offhand. I would just go to Amazon and search and see what comes up for the price point you're looking at and then read the reviews on those. You'll either want to look for a sata to usb adapter or a hard drive dock. Hard drive docks are a little easier to deal with but might cost a bit more.
With regards to duplication, you'll just have that file on two drives. So the hard part will just be sorting through all the data and weeding out the unique files from the duplicates. If one drive is corrupt, I would just ignore that drive and pull the data off the rest of the drives. Yes, the files will be randomly spread across the 4 drives.
scissorfight
Banned
also worth mentioning that when you take a look at the HP MSS drive, it'll look like the files are in multiple places. the \DE\ folder is where your actual files are on the drive.
I also moved to a synology. i really liked the HP MSS at first, but the issues just became too frequent. glad to be done with it.
easy way to deal with this is to just use something like Syncback Free or similar when you move all your files to one new location. you set it up to do a quick compare each time and only take the files you haven't already got.
I also moved to a synology. i really liked the HP MSS at first, but the issues just became too frequent. glad to be done with it.
easy way to deal with this is to just use something like Syncback Free or similar when you move all your files to one new location. you set it up to do a quick compare each time and only take the files you haven't already got.
Marty Chinn
Member
What issues were you experiencing?
How painful or easy was migrating from one to the other? I'm using a couple Sans Digital multiple bay hard drive enclosures attached to my MSS; any idea if I can use them with the Synology to expand past whatever number of drives they limit you internally? Also finally, I'm using Crash Plan to back up data like photos from my MSS; any idea if Synology works with Crash Plan and how one would migrate from one to the other without having to push everything back up online or pulling everything down to restore?
Heh these are a few of the things that have prevented me from just biting the bullet and switching =)
Thanks for the suggestion. I'll keep this in mind if my MSS ends up kicking the bucket before I ever move.
scissorfight
Banned
i had 10 disks running on my ex485. i had constant disk corruption and slow response. multiple changed disks, multiple restores, it was only a matter of time before it eventually happened again. i just got tired of it.
i was using the exact same setup, but i upgraded to larger WD Red NAS drives for my new DS1813+ so i no longer needed to use the USB enclosures. all i know is that the units are expandable with the Synology expansion units...not sure about standard USB expansion units.
i also use Crashplan and I had no issues, but that's because i had my shares mapped to windows drives (that requires a manual workaround to set up with Crashplan). when i moved everything from the HP MSS to the Synology, just used the same mapped drive paths and my backup didn't lose a thing.
TunaMarshmallow
Member
I am looking for a cheap, bargain-basement NAS that I can hook up to my modem/router, and use for three OSX computers (via Time Machine). No bells or whistles. 2TB is enough. Cheap is good. Anything reliable and cheap that's OSX-friendly and is pretty much plug-and-play?
Valkyr Junkie
Member
Synology is getting ready to release the DS414play (4-bay version of the DS412play) which is what I've desperately been hoping for, but now that it's almost here I'm not sure if the hardware transcoding abilities are worth losing some performance over the non-Intel CPU Synology devices in regards to file handling performance. My Sony smart TV in my bedroom can play MKV containers fine, and I have a Raspberry Pi running XBMC in my living room (in addition to a PS3 and a PS4 which is currently worthless in this regard), so I really only need transcoding for the PS3 and maybe the PS4 some day.
How does the app ecosystem compare between the Intel and ARM Synology boxes?
How does the app ecosystem compare between the Intel and ARM Synology boxes?
Bboy AJ
My dog was murdered by a 3.5mm audio port and I will not rest until the standard is dead
Yes, it is. I mapped the drive to my Mac's Finder. I think I CMD+K the NAS IP into Finder.
hipbabboom
Huh? What did I say? Did I screw up again? :(
Depending on the model you got, Synology NASes also support iSCSI which allow you to mount them as physical drives. You have to first make the LUN available on your NAS then you can run something like the iSCSI Initiator in Windows to attach it. After that, it shows up in your Drive Manager as a drive you can access like any other local device.
This may be overkill. Other solutions to look at are Symbolic Links and as others have mentioned, Mapping it as a network drive. Its rarer these days but there's still some software that won't work properly when given a network drive.
Got the Shakes
Member
In my setup, it shows up as another "computer" in my network places in Windows and on my Mac it shows up as a shared drive. Double clicking on it gives me access to the file and folder structure in Windows Explorer and Finder just like any other drive. I move files to and from it that way.
Hmm, I gotta look at this when I get home.
I have a Synology DS411j. Is this capable of doing that?
I also don't know all the terms of iSCSC or where to go to make it work.
You can access the shares through Windows explorer or you can map your shares to drive letters if you prefer
http://www.synology.com/en-us/support/tutorials/565
industrian
will gently cradle you as time slowly ticks away.
I plan to build a new PC later this year and I'm looking to re-purpose my current, old, desktop (Q9450 + 8GB RAM) into a NAS with 4x4TB WD Reds.
I've been looking at FreeNAS and NAS4Free mainly, and I just want to know if anyone here's got experience with them or other options I could use. That and general advice for what file systems and such I'd use (as there's no ECC RAM I figure ZFS would be redundant.)
I've been looking at FreeNAS and NAS4Free mainly, and I just want to know if anyone here's got experience with them or other options I could use. That and general advice for what file systems and such I'd use (as there's no ECC RAM I figure ZFS would be redundant.)
Unraid?
I use FreeNAS. Works great. I recently discovered that it can actually do iSCSI which is perfect as I will now add more drives to it and use it for my HyperV envrionment that I'm going to build.
And yes, just use ZFS.
industrian
will gently cradle you as time slowly ticks away.
This is new to me. Do you (or anyone) know what the performance is like? I've also noted that I wouldn't be able to use more than 3 drives unless I paid for it.
Are you referring to the NAS system management or accessing files?
And referring to a potential USB connection: it's a NAS, not a DAS.
My apprehension about ZFS is down to the lack of ECC RAM compatibility and the limit of 8GB RAM that my system has. I guess if I don't use deduplication or compression the RAM won't be an issue though.
I'm still rocking my Netgear ReadyNas NV+ for the past 5 years. Problem now is it is starting to restart at random times. Thinking it may be the power supply as all the drives are good and no errors on them.
Having a hard time finding a new power supply, so I may be in the market to replace it. It has a ton of plugins, just wondering if there is anything else out on the market that would be better than it now?
Having a hard time finding a new power supply, so I may be in the market to replace it. It has a ton of plugins, just wondering if there is anything else out on the market that would be better than it now?
If you really value your data , use ECC with a ZFS filesystem.
Compression only takes slightly more CPU usage, absolutely use lz4 unless you are using an Atom CPU or something. Dedup takes tons of ram.. forget about that.
If you can pick up some ECC DDR2 (16gb goes for about $70 on ebay) and use ZFS i would absolutely do it, it provides protection that RAID+(EXT4, NTFS) just doesnt offer.
industrian
will gently cradle you as time slowly ticks away.
If I were building a NAS from scratch it'd be a Xeon-based build with ECC RAM. But right now It's all about repurposing an old desktop.
And yeah, ZFS is great. I work in the NAS industry and wrote (well, ghostwrote) a few articles about it.
It is, ive been in the process of migrating Compellent SAN storage to something cheaper.. we got sick of having to spend $1000 for a 1TB drive.
With those old Core 2 procs, the memory controller is on the chipset.. you really might just have to replace the ram. $40-$80 bucks really is pretty cheap if you think about it.
With those old Core 2 procs, the memory controller is on the chipset.. you really might just have to replace the ram. $40-$80 bucks really is pretty cheap if you think about it.
Norwegian Rudo
Member
You should be able to play anything. I have all my movies, TV shows etc on my NAS, and they play fine.
My first guess as to why you can't would be that your wireless connection is too slow.
Yeah, just moved into a new apartment, and I have 10 neighboors using the same network. This really sucks as I bought the NAS for this purpose (besides backing up). =/
I also used to be on Mac, so now I don't know how to backup on Windows.
industrian
will gently cradle you as time slowly ticks away.
What's your Wi-fi standard? Keep in mind that speeds of common standards (802.11g, 802.11n, etc) are nowhere close to gigabit Ethernet connections.
For example, a 802.11n at 300Mbps has a maximum theoretical bandwidth of 37.5 MB/s. When you factor in other traffic across the wireless network, that will lower that speed.
Also, are you the only person accessing the NAS? If not, that's another potential bottleneck.