How much RAM should a NAS have?

[Tzey]

Thinking about getting NAS setup but was wondering how much RAM is ideal for streaming HD movies to an Apple TV 2. Most of the ones I have seen have 512MB, is this sufficient to avoid choppy playback? Most of my content is from the itunes store but was planing on ripping my blu ray collection trying to preserve quality where possible.

Thanks!

 

[FreakinEurekan]

Is it a JB ATV2 or are you going through iTunes? If you're using iTunes, using a NAS for your library doubles your network traffic (movie has to stream from NAS to iTunes computer, then from there to the ATV) so i recommend local storage for your library rather than NAS if you can get away with it - with iMac or Mac Mini for example. If your computer is a laptop & external local storage isn't practical, NAS will work but network speeds are more critical.

As far as the original question, how much RAM, I don't think there is a set answer for that. Depends on the NAS and the OS it's using. A NetGear ReadyNAS Duo with 512MB RAM is fine, it's got a very minimal OS with not much overhead. A Synology that's also running Plex server might need more.

 

[Dalton63841]

Server OS'es need very little resources to run very well. As an example, Nas***** will run on 256Mb ram and does great. Back when Nas***** was Freenas 7 it worked with 128mb of ram.

With a NAS the most important thing is your network connection(not internet speed). The faster the better.