NAS Recommendations

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simon
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#16 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by simon »

My first NAS was a single bay QNAP Ray. It was fine till it started eating power supplies for some reason. That was quite a long time ago though.

This will be my third NAS - I don't tend to replace my IT frequently and would prefer to buy something with longevity. IT probably doesn't work like this though!
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Ali Tait
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#17 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by Ali Tait »

Had a Drobo for years now, can’t fault it. Not the cheapest new but there are lots secondhand on ebay. No worries about backups either, does it automatically between the hard drives.
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#18 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by simon »

As RAID 1 Ali? Not heard of Drobo before will have a look.

The Synology DiscStation DS220j seems well reviewed, but reading some user reviews there seems to be some compatibility issues with 2TB WD Red discs that I have. Not a good sign.
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#19 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by simon »

I tried to update the Zyxel's firmware earlier, but it's so end of life its not even listed on their end of life list! For a NAS that's only a few years old this is pretty poor I reckon.
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#20 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by Ali Tait »

simon wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 6:38 pm As RAID 1 Ali? Not heard of Drobo before will have a look.

The Synology DiscStation DS220j seems well reviewed, but reading some user reviews there seems to be some compatibility issues with 2TB WD Red discs that I have. Not a good sign.
They have their own system Simon, end result is the same. You can also hot swap drives.
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#21 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by simon »

Gotcha
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Ray P
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#22 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by Ray P »

simon wrote: Tue Jan 25, 2022 10:34 pm My first NAS was a single bay QNAP Ray. It was fine till it started eating power supplies for some reason. That was quite a long time ago though.

This will be my third NAS - I don't tend to replace my IT frequently and would prefer to buy something with longevity. IT probably doesn't work like this though!
My QNAP is a 2bay with 2Tb WD Red disks Simon - it's been running without missing a beat for more than 5 years. I've just bought a spare WD Red disk as the QNAP monitoring tool has reported some disk errors but that can't really be blamed on QNAP.

I now keep most of my stuff on the cloud and the NAS only hosts my music library and some rips of a few rare/art movies. As the data isn't very volatile now, about once a month I take a backup onto a portable USB drive which I store at my workplace.
Sorry, I couldn't resist!
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#23 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by simon »

Thanks for your experience Ray. There don't look to be too many players in the NAS world and QNAP is certainly an option.
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Nick
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#24 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by Nick »

May not be a problem, but spotted this yesterday

https://www.qnap.com/static/landing/202 ... nse/da-dk/
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#25 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by simon »

That's not good. I though the point of the NAS was that it sat behind the router and firewall and as long as ports weren't opened it should be secure. Or perhaps it's opening of the ports to allow the user remote access that's also allowed the ransomware in?

Oh waily waily as someone of this parish might say.
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Nick
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#26 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by Nick »

I have not looked into the details, I agree the firewall should protect it if there is one, but it was a thing I noticed yesterday.
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#27 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by Ray P »

I've had no issues but my QNAP sits behind my router firewall and I have never entertained the need to connect to it from outside - nowadays it it justs hosts my music library and some movie media files and anything I want to access from devices like my phone is on Google Drive or MS OneDrive.
Sorry, I couldn't resist!
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#28 Re: NAS Recommendations

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Having done a little research it looks like my WD Red drives are CMR type rather than SMR so I should be able to use Synology NAS. I'm leaning towards the higher specced DS220+, probably overkill for what I need.

I've been researching moving the discs and it might not be that easy... I imagine both Zyxel and Synology use Linux, but as I can't get to the files on the Zyxel I can't easily take a backup before migrating. I could possibly mount one of the drives in the aging glacial desktop Windows box but I suspect Windows won't read the drive? Anyone know if this is likely?

If it doesn't what might my options be?

As I have two mirrored drives I could perhaps try installing one in the new NAS and cross my fingers it reads it okay and doesn't trash anything.
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#29 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by simon »

Hmmm, or perhaps I try accessing from a Linux box? Not sure my old Linux nettop is up to it though. If it were could I write to an external backup drive that I could then access from a Windows machine? So many questions, so little understanding!
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#30 Re: NAS Recommendations

Post by Nick »

It depend on the file system used. If its a standard one the Linux should be able to mount it.
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