wireless storage

vix2000

I had been looking to buy a buffalo link station as my laptop hard drive is getting full and I want to dump some stuff onto an external hard drive, but want a wireless one to put next to the router. I have now read some really bad reveiws on it. I had seen a 1tb one for around £69.99 (recon) and wondered if anyone could recommend a decent alternative. Thanks.

diable

If it is going next to the router can't you just use a wired one as a NAS is slow at the best of times and a wireless one would be even slower.

nikaso

On my home network I have a Buffalo Linkstation Live, it is wired and does its job quite admirably, my experience of wireless NAS is it can be too hit and miss quite apart from the speed issues, I watch films stored on my NAS and from past experience it can be a trauma watching those streamed wirelessly and if they are HD films you can forget it! It is dependant obviously on what you are wanting to use the NAS for but if its going to sit next to the router then wiring it in is the far superior option.

Two tips with the Buffalo btw, you might want to login to its web admin pages and turn the recycle bin off, otherwise your space gets filled rapidly. It happened with me using the backup software bundled with it, basically the software makes a full backup then amends the backup as needs be by scanning your PC for new files or file changes or deletions, the recycle bin on the Buffalo though will keep deleted files and older files and rapidly eats your space. Secondly it has three options, ON, OFF or AUTO. Basically if you are wanting it to only be active when your laptop is on you can leave it on AUTO but this isn't fullproof, if you leave it ON then the Buffalo's drive will be spinning all the time which has the advantage of being the quickest access and will always be available but eats more power and can shorten the life of the unit.

Sorry for the long winded reply but hope it helps!

KillerWatt

diable wrote: »

If it is going next to the router can't you just use a wired one as a NAS is slow at the best of times and a wireless one would be even slower.

I wouldn't call 50 - 60 MB/sec slow for a hardwired transfer, although to achieve that sort of speed you obviously need to have Gigabit network interfaces and a Gigabit switch.

Definately right about staying away from wireless where transferring large amounts of data is concerned though, that does take forever even when using N draft kit.

vix2000

Sorry, I didn't explain properly.

I had assumed it would be hard wired to the router, but was wanting to access it wirelessly from my laptop and any others in the house.

The reviews I've read about linkstation were related to people losing their data from them when they break down. As the primary reason for getting one is to dump stuff from my hard drive to store it, relasing valuable disk space on my too full laptop, it is a concern that I'll lose the data.

diable

You can lose the data on any hard drive, I access my NAS that is hard wired to my router wirelessly from my laptop.

Where are you buying you recon drive from?

tronator

vix2000 wrote: »

The reviews I've read about linkstation were related to people losing their data from them when they break down. As the primary reason for getting one is to dump stuff from my hard drive to store it, relasing valuable disk space on my too full laptop, it is a concern that I'll lose the data.

Any hard disk can and will fail eventually. This also applies to the hard disk in your laptop. You always should make backups of your important data.

vix2000

diable wrote: »

You can lose the data on any hard drive, I access my NAS that is hard wired to my router wirelessly from my laptop.

Where are you buying you recon drive from?

ebay. I enquired and its got a year guarantee.

So you think that buffalo is no less reliable than any other then?

diable

I think Buffalo is better then most NAS manufacturers but at the end of the day the hard drives inside are manufactured by either Seagate, WD, Hitachi or any other component manufacturer.