NAS suggestions?

Networking Networking Hardware
1

I'm hoping to build a NAS for my home network that I could also acess from outside the home. From what I have seen synology makes greate little nas enclosures with good operating systems. Looking at putting a 4TB hard drive, maybe two of them mirrored and but all my media and work/school files onto it and acess it hopefully form outside of home aswell.

Any suggestions as far as hard drives and enclosures? This is my first time doing this.

Thanks :)

2

Like most things relating to hardware the price you are willing to pay will determine the quality etc.

The QNAP TS-420 4-bay turbo looks good. Sory no links as im not sure what suppliers you prefer. Thats about $500AUD where I live (which is australia).

3

i would just use an old desktop, something that supports atleast a few sata drives, or put a sata expansion card in

4

Using an old desktop is a good idea however setting up NAS to be easily accessible outside of home will be a bit trickier. It depends on how complicated you want to get. FYI NAS devices dont usually come with HDDs.

 

5

Agree with above, either converting a old PC or building one from scratch is much more cost effective.

I have 2 on my network, both were built from scratch and shoved into old PC cases. I just got the cheapest motherboard with 6 SATA ports I could find. Added to that a 1 GB stick of memory, a cheap AMD cpu which I underclocked and undervolted to keep the heat/power/cooling requirements down and added drives as I filled them. You can use something like FreeNas on it but I just went for Windows. I have it setup to wake up when needed then go back to sleep when not in use to save on power, works like a charm.

As for accessing it from outside your home network, just setup a secure FTP server on it and configure you router/firewall, no issues there. 

6

Sorry, my budget is around 400-600$ (CAD, same as USD really... :P)

i basically use NCIX (canada) They are 1 day away shipping and I have never had a problem with them.

I dont have any old computer laying around so that idea is somewhat out of the question. Also I donly really need more then 1-2 bays. 4+ would be over kill since this is mosly for media and smaller documents.

For an HDD, I was looking at Western Digital REDs:

http://media.desura.com/cache/images/members/1/320/319529/thumb_940x3000/an_hero.jpg x2

As for netowrk bays, these two from synology look pretty good.

http://ncix.com/products/?sku=66384&vpn=DS212J&manufacture=Synology%20Inc.&promoid=1316

or

http://ncix.com/products/?sku=76146&vpn=DS213&manufacture=Synology%20Inc.

or a dlink on the lower end

http://ncix.com/products/?sku=62901&vpn=DNS-325&manufacture=D-Link&promoid=1448

The synology ones apparently have built in webstations which is neat, i didnt know this would even be an option. As far as drives go are the WD reds my only choice for a 24/7 HDD in the ~200$ price range? Its odd how your read/write speads are limited to sub 200MB/s speeds : /  Hardware limitations?

 

7

I have installed a few Sysnology systems for businesses and it's the one thing I never have to revisit so I would recommend on personal experience. The OS/Apps are great also.

 

and yes WD reds HDD defo

8

Thanks for the reassurance. I'll build something neat :)