- My Forums
- Tiger Rant
- LSU Recruiting
- SEC Rant
- Saints Talk
- Pelicans Talk
- More Sports Board
- Winter Olympics
- Fantasy Sports
- Golf Board
- Soccer Board
- O-T Lounge
- Tech Board
- Home/Garden Board
- Outdoor Board
- Health/Fitness Board
- Movie/TV Board
- Book Board
- Music Board
- Political Talk
- Money Talk
- Fark Board
- Gaming Board
- Travel Board
- Food/Drink Board
- Ticket Exchange
- TD Help Board
Customize My Forums- View All Forums
- Show Left Links
- Topic Sort Options
- Trending Topics
- Recent Topics
- Active Topics
Started By
Message
NAS Primer: Best Company, Best Resources?
Posted on 2/9/26 at 12:27 pm
Posted on 2/9/26 at 12:27 pm
Does anyone run a NAS, and if my media count is just growing constantly, I'm assuming it's the right way to go from here on out?
Best way to start?
Best way to start?
5
Posted on 2/9/26 at 2:50 pm to Freauxzen
It sounds like you're not a super geek, but prepare for a bunch of suggestions to build a home brew rig with a custom Linux build.
Anyway, I've owned two Synology units, two 5 bays. Very easy to use. I used to *always* have a RAID 1 inside my tower(s), which I'd been doing since maybe 1999. Be aware that if you buy, say, four drives from the same manufacturer, they will have been manufactured within minutes of each other on the same line. This means when one drive starts to go, the other ones tend to start failing soon after. This is background for my drive strategy below.
I currently have a storage pool of about 40TB, with 5 drives, one of which is a hot spare.
1: WD 9.1TB
2: WD 9.1TB
3: WD 10.9TB
4: Seagate 12.7 (hot spare)
5: Seagate 12.7
The next drive to fail will probably be one of the 9.1TB (because they're older and got more use.) When I start getting errors, I will hit up Newegg or Amazon and buy whatever NAS rated WD or Seagate that is about $250 (right now that'd be 12TB,) and replace it. It gives me manufacturing diversity, and how I slowly expand my storage pool (I'm just under 50% usage.) Rinse, repeat for years.
I won't automatically use the hot spare, because then I *have* to replace the failed 9.1TB drive with one as big as, or bigger than the hot spare, which may force me to buy a $300+ drive to use as the new hot spare.
Note: I have tried to use a desktop rated drive in a NAS once, and it failed within three days. Could be a coincidence, but the NAS drives are designed to absorb the vibration of other four drives and the increase heat that is in close proximity.
ETA: I didn't buy all five drives at once. I had drives 1&2, then added disk 3 a year later, and added 4&5 18 months after that.
Anyway, I've owned two Synology units, two 5 bays. Very easy to use. I used to *always* have a RAID 1 inside my tower(s), which I'd been doing since maybe 1999. Be aware that if you buy, say, four drives from the same manufacturer, they will have been manufactured within minutes of each other on the same line. This means when one drive starts to go, the other ones tend to start failing soon after. This is background for my drive strategy below.
I currently have a storage pool of about 40TB, with 5 drives, one of which is a hot spare.
1: WD 9.1TB
2: WD 9.1TB
3: WD 10.9TB
4: Seagate 12.7 (hot spare)
5: Seagate 12.7
The next drive to fail will probably be one of the 9.1TB (because they're older and got more use.) When I start getting errors, I will hit up Newegg or Amazon and buy whatever NAS rated WD or Seagate that is about $250 (right now that'd be 12TB,) and replace it. It gives me manufacturing diversity, and how I slowly expand my storage pool (I'm just under 50% usage.) Rinse, repeat for years.
I won't automatically use the hot spare, because then I *have* to replace the failed 9.1TB drive with one as big as, or bigger than the hot spare, which may force me to buy a $300+ drive to use as the new hot spare.
Note: I have tried to use a desktop rated drive in a NAS once, and it failed within three days. Could be a coincidence, but the NAS drives are designed to absorb the vibration of other four drives and the increase heat that is in close proximity.
ETA: I didn't buy all five drives at once. I had drives 1&2, then added disk 3 a year later, and added 4&5 18 months after that.
This post was edited on 2/9/26 at 3:13 pm
Posted on 2/9/26 at 7:37 pm to Freauxzen
Synology is probably the gold tier reccomendation. You'll pay a premium for it, and they've made some business decisions in the last few years that have eroded some of their trust, but for the most part they are rock solid and about as easy to use as that kind of tech can be.
I just had my first one, a DS412+ die on me about 2 months ago. The last two numbers are the year, so i got 12 years out of it which is kind of crazy. My current one is a 920+ and while its starting to show its age a bit its still got plenty life on it. You can run extra services besides just file storage, but serving files is its bread and butter. My rec is to get something like a 4 bay and depending on how much data you have to store, if there's a size disk that can hold all your media, get two of them. It'll keep them cloned in case one dies. If you choose the option called SHR if you need to expand later on you can just buy another drive and shove it in and expand the pool out. Note you wont get the full size of the disk. Synology has a tool online to help you understand what drive pairings will give you how much available space.
You'll also want to keep in mind you should also have a backup of the data. At a minimum you'll want an external HD that can fit the entire capacity and plug it in to back up (there's a built in tool) quarterly or whatever your loss tolerance is. You can also back up to cloud services n such too.
I just had my first one, a DS412+ die on me about 2 months ago. The last two numbers are the year, so i got 12 years out of it which is kind of crazy. My current one is a 920+ and while its starting to show its age a bit its still got plenty life on it. You can run extra services besides just file storage, but serving files is its bread and butter. My rec is to get something like a 4 bay and depending on how much data you have to store, if there's a size disk that can hold all your media, get two of them. It'll keep them cloned in case one dies. If you choose the option called SHR if you need to expand later on you can just buy another drive and shove it in and expand the pool out. Note you wont get the full size of the disk. Synology has a tool online to help you understand what drive pairings will give you how much available space.
You'll also want to keep in mind you should also have a backup of the data. At a minimum you'll want an external HD that can fit the entire capacity and plug it in to back up (there's a built in tool) quarterly or whatever your loss tolerance is. You can also back up to cloud services n such too.
Posted on 2/9/26 at 11:41 pm to Freauxzen
Incredibly helpful from you both. Thank you.
Posted on 2/10/26 at 12:17 am to Freauxzen
My only advice is to leave a NAS as a network storage device and leave running more accelerated software to machines better suited for that.
No point in trying to build an everything machine.
No point in trying to build an everything machine.
Posted on 2/10/26 at 6:53 am to LSshoe
quote:
You can also back up to cloud services n such too.
I use Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage Buckets, or make AWS Glacier the target if the data isn't going to change much.
Posted on 2/17/26 at 7:03 pm to LSshoe
quote:
Synology is probably the gold tier recommendation
The Linux OS on Synology is really the best, For businesses <50 workstations, I stopped using Windows Server products completely, Synology is a snap to install and maintain, I set up a company with 27 users in a few hours, the last Win Server of similar size too me a weekend with help.
Very rarely have to go onsite, and that is usually for a windows issue.
The only downsides are parts, rarely need, and that the Chinese are likely listening in.
Posted on 2/18/26 at 1:50 pm to Freauxzen
Ugreen DXP4800+ with quad 12TB WD Reds
App and setup could not be any easier. Only complaint is that it doesnt have a dedicated Plex app yet
App and setup could not be any easier. Only complaint is that it doesnt have a dedicated Plex app yet
Posted on 2/18/26 at 2:36 pm to Dallaswho
quote:
My only advice is to leave a NAS as a network storage device and leave running more accelerated software to machines better suited for that.
No point in trying to build an everything machine.
Or if you want that, build your own NAS PC.
Page 1 of 1
Popular
Back to top
Follow TigerDroppings for LSU Football News