Looking for a good Mac NAS solution

[mackiwilad]

Hi All,
I want to get a good NAS for my iBook.

I'm looking at WD My Book World Edition WDG1NC7500A 750GB Network Storage System With Remote Access as I have always been a WD fan.
However it seems to necessitate using a PC to get it set up, which I have a pathological aversion to.

Does anyone know if it will be OK to set up with OSX or recommend another worthy NAS?
I would email WD, but you folks are so much nicer!

 

[gazfocus]

One NAS system I've always likes is the Icybox NAS4220 as it has a variety of servers including iTunes, Bittorrent, and FTP access. It comes as an empty enclosure so you can stick in whatever drive(s) you want (it takes upto 2 drives) and you can use a multiple of RAID configurations with it.

 

[JasonGough]

I'm in the same possition, trying to find a great multi purpose solution for my network storage.

perhaps my favourite so far is the Freecome Network Drive Pro

this badboy is a big old 1Tb, with a build in torrent client so you can get them files whilst you're macbook is out the house, remote access to your files (great for me with 80Gb of music and a 120Gb drive in my MBP) its Mac compatible, seems to a great price too!

the only thing i'm now worried about is the legitimacy of any TimeMachine backup on a drive that isn't the TimeCapsual. i've read a bunch of stuff about all these NAS drives backing up without Hard-Link which essentially means come the day you need to recover your files you can't be sure that they're all actually there.

on the other hand i've read soooooooooo many problems about TimeCapsual i don't know if its worth paying twice the money as any other 1tb drive. i've already got AirPort Extreme for my draft N... tricky

usually i'd just buy the apple solution for 100% no headache solution, this isn't quite the same

 

[OllyW]

Have a look on SmallNetBuilder, there's tons of NAS news and reviews to help you make your choice.

on the other hand i've read soooooooooo many problems about TimeCapsual i don't know if its worth paying twice the money as any other 1tb drive. i've already got AirPort Extreme for my draft N... tricky

usually i'd just buy the apple solution for 100% no headache solution, this isn't quite the same

Have you tried plugging a USB drive into your AirPort. I've got a WD 1TB plugged into mine and it works well. I'm not using it for Time Machine at the moment, but I have tried it out and it seemed to work ok.

 

[pilotError]

What do you need in an NAS?

Some folks think the WD MyBooks are NAS's...

Do you just need more disk space? Do you need expandability? Would you like a home centric solution that will serve everything in your house?

For pure Disk, the 2 disk solutions like the WD Mybooks? that come up to 2TB are a good solution and can be had for less than $300.

Next step is a 2-4 disk solution NAS like drobo or netgear readyNAS that will run an iTunes server, can do bittorrent, AFP, CIFS, Raid, etc.

These will run you in the $500+ range.

There's a few 5 disk solutions and they go up from there.

I currently have a 2TB Netgear ReadyNAS NV+ for the last year and it had been flawless up until the 10.5.6 update. The last update killed my Time machine backups. Not sure why yet though...

It does do everything else very well though. Both the Mac's and PC's in the house find it, as does the PS3. I have automated shutdown at 12PM and automated startup at 6AM, iTunes can use it for a shared iTunes library that all devices can use.

Drobo has had great reviews on here, does much the same as the ReadyNAS does.

HP just announced a device to be released "Soon" that supports the Time Machine backups as well. You might want to see what that will cost. There's a thread on here about it somewhere.

 

[FaustArp]

http://www.newertech.com/products/ministackNAS.php

 

[mackiwilad]

Thanks for all the tips guys!

I read a lot up on the Time Capsules, and for me the killer feature that was missing was the lack of partitioning. I don't think using a disc image to save space instead is a very robust solution.

I don't know about Jason, but I wanted a lot of storage that I can access on the road as well as use for backups etc. In fact if it made my dinner for me as well that would be great.

I will have a look at the links posted.. thanks a lot!

Does anyone know if you can use a Mac to set up the Buffalo Linkstations? The site is kind of vague on that..