NAS Drives

stockton_2

Hi All,

I am one of those people who (for no good reason) have two computers on the go. I spend a lot of time reformatting and swapping drives and installing new operating systems. Dont ask me why. It is just what I do and I cannot see things changing any time soon. Having said that I have recently changed from Win XP to Windows 7 and also have migrated from 3.5 Sata Hard drives to 2.5 Solid state Drives so there is some justification for all of this.

Recently on this forum I heard mention, for the first time, of NAS drives. Now that would seem to solve a lot of problems for me. If I could have a central system of storage I would be able to reformat and swap drives to my hearts content without the constant hassle of saving files, documents and emails that have been downloaded to one particular computer and need to be saved to a central location.

Question is what NAS drive to go for? I have done some research but my understanding is still very cloudy. My requirements would be a Nas drive that held just a single hard drive with a capacity of no more than 1Tb. I would want it to hold a 2.5 SSD drive and be directly connected to my router.

This would be just a simple home network so I dont need anything too sophisticated. I obviously want to keep costs down and go for something basic but sufficient for my needs.

So question is: can anyone point me in the direction of a Nas drive that would meet my requirements? As I have said I know very little about these drives and want to get it right.

enfield_freddy

a good nas unit contains more than one drive , 2 drives + set up as raid in case one fails


I have a dlink dns320l , with 2 x 2t hard drives , WD red as they are built for this job


for such a basic system you are asking for , may I suggest just getting a caddy and keeping a drive in it. and plugged into the usb slot on your router , you can set this idea up for less than £15 , but its slower


if you have access to an old computer (base unit) you can convert that , or even a raspberry pi into a nas unit connected to your network


PM me if you want more help , or indeed want to buy my nas

InsideInsurance

No point putting SSDs in a NAS as your limited by the slowest component and that isnt going to be the HD read/write speed.

For email switch to using a IMAP rather than POP server and everything will always be on the server anyway and read/reply etc status will be maintained across all devices that connect to the account too.

NAS drives can be useful for central storage of files etc but access speed is much slower than a local drive. For opening a 100kb Word document this isnt going to cause any issues at all. For dealing with 2GB movie files etc then you will probably see the speed difference.

Non-SSD drives are so cheap that you may as well spend a little more to get a dual drive with RAID capabilities and mirror across the drives to that if one HD does fail you dont lose any data.

enfield_freddy

sorry , InsideInsurance I read his post differently , I didn't read of any email issues, but secondly and more importantly , I read it that the OP had converted to SSD drives on his main computers and had a surplus of conventional (ok 2.5) normal sata drives lying around**






** edit


sorry , why did the op state they had spare sata drives , then go on to say they wanted to use SSD drives

Tropez

stockton wrote: »

I would want it to hold a 2.5 SSD drive

There's no point to that. Assuming you have Gigabit ethernet (which you might not, depending on your router), you're talking a theoretical maximum transfer speed of 125MB/s (a little less than a quarter of the average SSD read and write speed) and even then, actual performance is likely to vary on other factors.

NAS are designed for mass storage, but not necessarily fast storage; in fact, they rarely need to have fast storage. I currently have two Seagate Central single drive NAS (bought a second one for data protection). They have large HD video files on there that are streamed to devices on the network, there's lots of photos, lots of documents - basically the general stuff a home user would back up. Even though I'm on Sky, using their crummy 100Mbps router, actually accessing the files on the NAS is nice and fast. The only bore was getting them on there in the first place but since you apparently only need 1TB of storage (seems very low) it shouldn't take you very long to back it up.

enfield_freddy

Tropez wrote: »

There's no point to that. Assuming you have Gigabit ethernet (which you might not, depending on your router), you're talking a theoretical maximum transfer speed of 125MB/s (a little less than a quarter of the average SSD read and write speed) and even then, actual performance is likely to vary on other factors.

NAS are designed for mass storage, but not necessarily fast storage; in fact, they rarely need to have fast storage. I currently have two Seagate Central single drive NAS (bought a second one for data protection). They have large HD video files on there that are streamed to devices on the network, there's lots of photos, lots of documents - basically the general stuff a home user would back up. Even though I'm on Sky, using their crummy 100Mbps router, actually accessing the files on the NAS is nice and fast. The only bore was getting them on there in the first place but since you apparently only need 1TB of storage (seems very low) it shouldn't take you very long to back it up.

in one breath the OP states they have converted to ssd drives on there main computers and have spare sata drives lying around , then they say they want to use a single SSD dives and hold 1t of data , I think the OP needs to price up a 1t SSD drive , then stand back and rethink

Tropez

enfield_freddy wrote: »

in one breath the OP states they have converted to ssd drives on there main computers and have spare sata drives lying around , then they say they want to use a single SSD dives and hold 1t of data , I think the OP needs to price up a 1t SSD drive , then stand back and rethink

I'm reading it as the OP has discovered the faster speeds of SSDs and wants to continue using them. He does say he's changed his drives from 3.5" SATA to SSD, but he doesn't actually say he's got the old drives spare, so I'm guessing it's a case of him believing non-SSD drives to be inferior for all purposes.

For the price of a 1TB SSD you could easily get a 16TB 4-Bay NAS with several different RAID options for data protection which would be overkill for most home users. So you're right, OP should look at the cost and see what he could get with much less

enfield_freddy

as posted above I have a dlink , but not over happy with it. I set a raspberry Pi up for a friend a few weeks ago , one of the older oners (about £15) + a 4g sd card , a USB sata caddy and his old drive , , even dragged 5v to feed the Pi out of the caddy , runs all day long , does the job and cost him just over £30 . it connects to his network , hell we even had it running wifi thru a £7 dongle , and its faster than a usb caddy connected thru his router.


the OP needs to rethink , and then get back

stockton_2

Many thanks to all for the brilliant replies. They have clarified a lot of the issues that I was unsure of.

Just to update. In view of your advice I am now thinking of a Nas drive with two drives set up as a Raid. There are easier options, as you have pointed out, but I think the Nas would be a better long term solution.

I am now thinking of non SSD drives as they are a lot cheaper. Sorry for the confusion Freddy but as Tropez said, it is not that I have spare 2.5 drives but rather that I have just become aware of the efficiency of SSD's when used for an operating system. I now see that they are no advantage (and a lot more expensive) to use for mass storage.

I am now going to look at IMAP for my emails. That would make life a lot easier.

Just to add that speed of access to mass storage is not critical as I dont have large movies or stuff like that. I do have a lot of programmes that have accumulated over the years but 1TB should easily meet my needs.

I am getting transferred to fibre optic broadband next week so that will change things. BT are going to send me a new router.

Some of the ideas you have proposed are intriguing and are going to take some time to digest and sink in.

I am away for a couple of days so will get back to the serious business next Monday. Many thanks to all.

InsideInsurance

enfield_freddy wrote: »

sorry , InsideInsurance I read his post differently , I didn't read of any email issues

Here:

stockton wrote: »

emails that have been downloaded to one particular computer and need to be saved to a central location.

Its the usual issue of using a POP mailbox but its better solved by using IMAP instead of creating a central location for emails to be stored.

Most providers I've used over the decades have provided both POP and IMAP access and so all that needs to happen is to change the protocol on the email client or at most change the inbound server address to the IMAP version. I am sure there are possibly some that offer POP only though

Fightsback

Get a Synology NAS a DS215j should do you nicely.

https://www.synology.com/en-global/products/DS215j