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Best NAS for me

F

FuriousD

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 26, 2008
110
39
UK
Currently have an iMac with over 10,000 photos, about 60GB of apple lossless music files which is growing and about 60GB of movies. The HDD on the iMac is 320GB. I stream the music to a Sonos ZP90, and movies to the PS3.
I want to free up space on the iMac and centrally locate the photos, music and movies so i can access from the iMac, work laptop, stream to sonos and PS3 without the iMac being on. Also to use Time Machine for document back up from the iMac.

I am looking a 2 x 2TB drives NAS and using RAID 1, one that can power down to save energy. Currently i have no back up of anything and once i have transfered the files to the NAS i dont want to loose them either, i know that RAID is not a back up, but the photos, music and movies will not change just be added to. I will then get an external HD to connect to the NAS for extra back up.

For Time Machine i was thinking of allowing 500GB of space leaving 1.5TB for media related stuff.

I have been looking at a number of difference NAS's but keep going round in circles. Readynas Duo, Readynas Ultra 2, Synology and Qnap.

What is going to be best for me.
Thanks in advance, i have read a lot of different threads on here but like i say i keep going round in circles.

Cheers
D
 
I am pretty similar to you, including Sonos and PS3. I have the ReadyNAS. Very very happy with it. The new Plex support for ReadyNAS looks pretty tempting as well.
 
I have a QNAP and it works great with my iMac and for streaming music and video. It also serves very well as a 'personal cloud': with the QMobile app I can watch photo's and movies and listen to music everywhere on my iPhone as long as I have WiFi or 3G.

I think you can't go wrong with either of those three brands. Carefully expect the specifications and features because there's were NAS'es often differentiate.
 
I have a Synology DS111 and I'm very happy with it. My first NAS and I've yet to have any issues with it. It works great with my iMac.
 
For your uses, a Synology DS211j is perfect. Two bays, fully supports RAID, scheduled power etc.

Synology products come in three flavours, denoted by a suffix after the model. j is the base, no suffix is mid-range, and a + is the top end. For home use, the j is easily enough, and the higher models get expensive, fast. Synology themselves market the j as home/home business, the mid-range as being a small business orientated product, and the + for professional/medium business use.

Time Machine works fine with Synology products.
 
Thanks All,
Sounds like the Synology would be a good option then.
I will look at them in more detail. Part of the reason for looking at the ReadyNAS Ultra 2 was the speed. I guess this is not needed for my applications then?
Is the Synology suggested faster than the Duo?

Cheers
D
 
FuriousD said:
Thanks All,
Sounds like the Synology would be a good option then.
I will look at them in more detail. Part of the reason for looking at the ReadyNAS Ultra 2 was the speed. I guess this is not needed for my applications then?
Is the Synology suggested faster than the Duo?

Cheers
D
Click to expand...

For your use, you don't need ridiculous speed - particularly at the price premiums charged by the companies for the faster writes. The Synology and Duo are probably on a par in terms of raw figures, but I prefer Synology's UI and ease of use.

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/storage/2011/01/23/synology-diskstation-ds211j-review/1
 
Cool, OK.
Does the Synology allow me to back up to external HD?
I know i can back up information for an external HD or stick to the Synology but cant find anything concrete suggesting the other way.
D
 
The Synology's support Time Machine. Just works once you turn it on. They also support rsync and you can add USB devices (cameras, printers, Flash drives, HDDs) to them.
 
blueroom said:
The Synology's support Time Machine. Just works once you turn it on. They also support rsync and you can add USB devices (cameras, printers, Flash drives, HDDs) to them.
Click to expand...

Thanks, i realise this but can i backup the Synology to an external HD and keep the external drive offsite?
Just thinking about 2 x 1TB drives and not using RAID then backing up to an external drive to keep off site.

D
 
I'm considering the synology vs. the QNAP and to be honest I'm liking what QNAP has to offer except for the price.

What do I get in the QNAP for 350 that I won't in synology for 199?
 
Just a warning - there are known issues with Synology working with Time Machine with pre-release Lion currently, so upon release of Lion, Time Machine might be broken for those who upgrade, until Synology figures out a fix. This might affect other NAS vendors as well.
 
Good point, I wonder if QNAP has this issue.

Off to the google to find out

Edit:
Looks like QNAP is affected as well. Lion breaks AFP with linux based NAS which QNAP is one of them. I'm not sure if Synology uses linux or not
 
AFAIK, it does. Clearly Apple have broken NAS functionality, though I'm sure it'll be fixed soon enough, be it by Apple or the NAS makers.
 
maflynn said:
I'm considering the synology vs. the QNAP and to be honest I'm liking what QNAP has to offer except for the price.

What do I get in the QNAP for 350 that I won't in synology for 199?
Click to expand...

Are you comparing the right models?
As far as I know, there is not that much price difference between QNAP en Synology.
 
ReadyNAS Duo user here, works great with time machine, just check the box in the admin console to enable time machine and set up how much space you want to give it.

Also auto shuts down during certain hours (i.e. from 10pm to 6am) and you can also auto shut down on idle (i.e. after 10 mins).

Only cons I can think of are - noisy fan (some users have replaced them with quieter ones), and the CPU in it is not as fast as it could be so if you do a bunch of things built into your NAS i.e. the bittorrent client or newsgroup downloader, you can start to see some of the short comings of it's processor...

With that said, for raw file storage, and time machine backups it's awesome... I keep all my media on it and use XBMC on my AppleTV to play it.
 
lexvo said:
Are you comparing the right models?
As far as I know, there is not that much price difference between QNAP en Synology.
Click to expand...

I'm comparing the DS211j against QNAP's TS-211P+. I could compare the DS211 or DS211+ but the only differences appear to be that the higher end synology models have more ram and are faster.
 
I am liking the ReadyNAS ULtra, do to the speed difference.
Decisions, decisions...
D
 
I opted for the QNAP TS-219P+ While no slouch the Synology was a great option, but for me I think the QNAP was the best fit.

I ordered a pair of hitachi drives and I'm waiting for newegg to deliver it. I'm guessing between friday and monday.
 
maflynn said:
I opted for the QNAP TS-219P+ While no slouch the Synology was a great option, but for me I think the QNAP was the best fit.
Click to expand...

Good choice I think. I myself have the 1-bay version of that model, the TS-119P+. It is fast and has all the features I want and more.

In general, what I've read in various forums QNAP and Synology are leaders in the market.
 
lexvo said:
In general, what I've read in various forums QNAP and Synology are leaders in the market.
Click to expand...
They seem to be.

I found both had the most options and performance. By going with either product you gain a level of peace of mind. I found that the features of the 219P+ fit very well with my requirements.
 
maflynn said:
I opted for the QNAP TS-219P+ While no slouch the Synology was a great option, but for me I think the QNAP was the best fit.

I ordered a pair of hitachi drives and I'm waiting for newegg to deliver it. I'm guessing between friday and monday.
Click to expand...

Which hitachi drives did you order?
 
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