NAS Setup Frustrations - Synology DNS212J

[BigMacAttack1]

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Without choosing SHR, you will have wasted storage, if you won't switch all hard disks at once.

Why did you choose RAID 1 instead of SHR again?

When my buddy set it up, he said there was only the option for RAID0 and RAID1. Is it going to be a huge deal? If I didn't get a Synology, I was going to do a RAID1. I tried to do the SHR. I want this done right even though I've been transferring data all night.

 

[monsieurpaul]

The 212j is a 2 bays NAS, therefore I don't think there is any difference between SHR and RAID1.

IMHO, the real question is why are you using RAID at all ? RAID is not backup.

What you could do is to put just one of the drive in the Syno (with a basic formatting) and plug the other via USB to the Syno. Using the backup module in DSM (Syno OS) all the data in your Syno will be backed up on the USB drive automatically, without the problem inherent of a RAID architecture. In addition, you will still have a bay available for future upgrade.

I own a DS212j and it's the best computer related purchase I've done in years. It's a bit confusing at the beginning, but it's simpler than it looks: you create one or several users with login and passwords, you create folders with specific rights for your users, you access these folders from anywhere with user's login and password.

 

[BigMacAttack1]

The 212j is a 2 bays NAS, therefore I don't think there is any difference between SHR and RAID1.

IMHO, the real question is why are you using RAID at all ? RAID is not backup.

What you could do is to put just one of the drive in the Syno (with a basic formatting) and plug the other to the syno via USB. Using the backup module in DSM (the syno OS) all the data in your Syno will be backed up on the USB drive automatically, without the problem inherent ot a RAID architecture, In addition, you will still have a bay availabe for future upgrade.

I own a DS212j and it's the best computer related purchase I've done in years.

Well, I plan on using 1 of the 2TB HDs to mirror the other and then plugging my external HD in as a back-up for those. How does that sound?

 

[fhall1]

The 212j is a 2 bays NAS, therefore I don't think there is any difference between SHR and RAID1 .

There's no difference as far as the RAID level of the disks between RAID1 and SHR on a Synology...they both provide drive mirroring. The advantage of the hybrid RAID is if you have two 2TB disks installed now (2TB of usable space after RAIDing)...with SHR (I'm simplifying) at some point down the road you can remove one of the 2TB drives and insert a 4TB disk and the array will rebuild...then replace the other 2TB with a 4TB and it'll rebuild again and you'll end up with a NAS with 4TB of usable space. With a RAID1 setup you have to back up the NAS to something, remove the two 2TB drives, insert the two 4TB drives, build the volume, then copy all the data back.

 

[monsieurpaul]

The advantage of the hybrid RAID is if you have two 2TB disks installed now (2TB of usable space after RAIDing)...with SHR (I'm simplifying) at some point down the road you can remove one of the 2TB drives and insert a 4TB disk and the array will rebuild

Yes, except that you will still have only 2 To of usable space.

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Well, I plan on using 1 of the 2TB HDs to mirror the other and then plugging my external HD in as a back-up for those. How does that sound?

It's a bit too much IMHO. If you plan to back up your NAS data with an external HD, you shouldn't need RAID.
What could be useful is to have a "cloud" backup solution such as Amazon Glacier for your most important data.

 

[BigMacAttack1]

It's a bit too much IMHO. If you plan to back up your NAS data with an external HD, you shouldn't need RAID.
What could be useful is to have a "cloud" backup solution such as Amazon Glacier for your most important data.

Thanks--I'll look into Glacier. The reason that I'm also planning on backing up to the external is so that when I travel, my music is up to date, and I can play it all in iTunes. After I'm done transferring my data, I'm going to create a 2nd music library for my NAS (I have one now for my EHD).

 

[fhall1]

Quote:
Originally Posted by fhall1
The advantage of the hybrid RAID is if you have two 2TB disks installed now (2TB of usable space after RAIDing)...with SHR (I'm simplifying) at some point down the road you can remove one of the 2TB drives and insert a 4TB disk and the array will rebuild

Yes, except that you will still have only 2 To of usable space.

Of course you will only have 2TB....until you change out the other 2TB for a 4TB as my post stated. The advantage with SHR is that it will work with two different capacity drives installed - try that with "regular" RAID1 and see what happens.

 

[BigMacAttack1]

I current have all of my media files and my time machine back-ups on the same volume. Is this okay or should I start all over from scratch and try to set-up the Hybrid Raid and have one volume for data and another volume for time machine back-ups? Pros/cons?

 

[537635]

You have a 2 bay NAS, therfor it is more or less the same.

If you make a new setup and put two volumes on a disk group, consisting of two disks, you don't gain anything in terms of security.

A two volume setup makes sense in applications, where it is neccessay to have two data sets on two different volumes. One example would be Time Station.

 

[Calvinator666]

Well, my buddy came over tonight and got me all set up. It took about 3 hours, casually working on it. I ended up with RAID1 instead of the Hybrid RAID. That should be fine, yes? 1 volume and one folder for TimeMachine (about 533GB allotted) and the other for my Media. The only thing we didn't figure out was remote access. Any help on that one? And w/remote access, are you able to sync up your music via iTunes remotely or is it only to access your files over the internet? Thanks again--glad it's up and running! Any specific features I need to explore?

I had my DS213 for about a little over 2 months now, and it was indeed a little confusing at first. But after you have got around to it, everything now seems to make sense.

If my understanding is correct for Remote Access, you would need to set up your Router Configuration, WebDAV and DDNS.

 

[Calvinator666]

I had my DS213 for about a little over 2 months now, and it was indeed a little confusing at first. But after you have got around to it, everything now seems to make sense.

If my understanding is correct for Remote Access, you would need to set up your Router Configuration, WebDAV and DDNS.

Router Configuration:

 

[Calvinator666]

Router Configuration:

DDNS setup:

 

[537635]

Everything looks ok.

1. Why do you have so many ports forwarded? For remote, you only need 5001 (DSM) and 5006 (WebDAV). Maybe 80 if you have a web server.

2. Don't use port 5000 to access DSM via internet!!

 

[bobright]

Yes, except that you will still have only 2 To of usable space.

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It's a bit too much IMHO. If you plan to back up your NAS data with an external HD, you shouldn't need RAID.
What could be useful is to have a "cloud" backup solution such as Amazon Glacier for your most important data.

Is that right so you wouldn't recommend going that route I mentioned, when you get the chance can you offer me your thoughts on my thread you responded to a few days ago? How about RAID0 is this the same as not using RAID?

 

[537635]

Is that right so you wouldn't recommend going that route I mentioned, when you get the chance can you offer me your thoughts on my thread you responded to a few days ago? How about RAID0 is this the same as not using RAID?

RAID:

1. First of all - IT IS NOT A (complete) BACKUP.
2. You can continue work, if a disk malfunctions.
3. It will save your data if a disk malfunctions.

4. It won't save your data if a user malfunctions (accidental delete) or a RAID malfunctions.
(?)5. It will protect you against bit rot, if you have same data written on three different disks (SHR-2).


BACKUP (to an external disk)

1. When it is not connected directly or is connected via service such as Time backup it does protect you against user stupidity.

It is best to have a combination of both. RAID0 is actually worse than no raid, because it increases the probability of data corruption by 100% (any one of two disks will more likely malfunction that one disk by itself).

 

[fat jez]

There's no difference as far as the RAID level of the disks between RAID1 and SHR on a Synology...they both provide drive mirroring. The advantage of the hybrid RAID is if you have two 2TB disks installed now (2TB of usable space after RAIDing)...with SHR (I'm simplifying) at some point down the road you can remove one of the 2TB drives and insert a 4TB disk and the array will rebuild...then replace the other 2TB with a 4TB and it'll rebuild again and you'll end up with a NAS with 4TB of usable space. With a RAID1 setup you have to back up the NAS to something, remove the two 2TB drives, insert the two 4TB drives, build the volume, then copy all the data back.

No you don't. I migrated drives using raid-1. I started with 2x1TB drives. I broke the mirror by removing 1TB drive and inserting a 2TB. The Sinology asked me if I wanted to mirror, I said yes. When mirroring completed, I did the same again and had a 1TB volume mirrored on 2 2TB drives. At this point the Sinology notified me I had wasted space and did I want to expand the volume to fill it, so I said yes.

End result, I migrated from 2 mirrored 1TB drives to 2 mirrored 2TB drives without having to copy off any data.

The Synology is a smart piece of kit.

 

[bobright]

RAID:

1. First of all - IT IS NOT A (complete) BACKUP.
2. You can continue work, if a disk malfunctions.
3. It will save your data if a disk malfunctions.

4. It won't save your data if a user malfunctions (accidental delete) or a RAID malfunctions.
(?)5. It will protect you against bit rot, if you have same data written on three different disks (SHR-2).


BACKUP (to an external disk)

1. When it is not connected directly or is connected via service such as Time backup it does protect you against user stupidity.

It is best to have a combination of both. RAID0 is actually worse than no raid, because it increases the probability of data corruption by 100% (any one of two disks will more likely malfunction that one disk by itself).

I understand well here's what I was planning on doing. I initially wanted to go RAID1 and do local backups through Synology to an External HDD. I keep reading though if I will be doing backups and not running a business where if one drive failed I'd need to be running at ALL costs then it's useless.

I hear that if I will be doing backups then I am better off just going RAID0. I will be using this NAS for mainly video and sharing purposes to a Raspberry Pi/HDTV.

So am I understanding this correctly, should I go ahead and go RAID0?

 

[537635]

So am I understanding this correctly, should I go ahead and go RAID0?

I would never use RAID0. Well, except maybe for a torrent buffer.

Disks fail quite often for one reason or the other. If I were in your situation, I would just use two separate disks for backups. First week first disk, second week second disk, etc...

Even if you have all the backups in place, it's still bothersome to restore data. With a proper RAID, when disk fails, you just replace it like nothing happened.

 

[bobright]

I would never use RAID0. Well, except maybe for a torrent buffer.

Disks fail quite often for one reason or the other. If I were in your situation, I would just use two separate disks for backups. First week first disk, second week second disk, etc...

Even if you have all the backups in place, it's still bothersome to restore data. With a proper RAID, when disk fails, you just replace it like nothing happened.

So you're saying go RAID1 then do a local backup weekly with an External HDD to keep offsite? What do you mean by backup the first disk then the second disk?

I thought if going RAID1 both hard drives acted as one?

 

[fhall1]

So you're saying go RAID1 then do a local backup weekly with an External HDD to keep offsite? What do you mean by backup the first disk then the second disk?

I thought if going RAID1 both hard drives acted as one?

He's saying use two separate external backup drives to backup the RAID set and alternate them weekly, not backup the two RAIDed drives separately.

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No you don't. I migrated drives using raid-1. I started with 2x1TB drives. I broke the mirror by removing 1TB drive and inserting a 2TB. The Sinology asked me if I wanted to mirror, I said yes. When mirroring completed, I did the same again and had a 1TB volume mirrored on 2 2TB drives. At this point the Sinology notified me I had wasted space and did I want to expand the volume to fill it, so I said yes.

End result, I migrated from 2 mirrored 1TB drives to 2 mirrored 2TB drives without having to copy off any data.

The Synology is a smart piece of kit.

Been a while since I looked at the differences since it "just works" and I don't touch it unless I have to (I'm still on the DSM 3.2.x version), but what you described above sounds like what SHR is supposed to do....maybe SHR does it with a little less manual intervention?

 

[fat jez]

The manual intervention is still needed for swapping physical disks. other than that it was simply a case of clicking ok while logged into the GUI

 

[bobright]

He's saying use two separate external backup drives to backup the RAID set and alternate them weekly, not backup the two RAIDed drives separately.

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Got it thanks for the input guys. I have a couple more questions.

1. Does anybody know if there's a refresh on new Synology's coming soon?

2. When I get the the NAS I was planning on placing it in my next room over away from where my main computer/router is by running a long ethernet cable through the wall. Is it bad to run a long LAN cable say around 15ft long? Will there be lag of any sort?

I think the DS213j can do wireless with a wifi dongle but I usually like to stick to a wired connection, it seems like a bad idea to go that route.

 

[Pompiliu]

This is why I will only consider the Time Capsule for my wireless backup needs. Setting up and maintaining network storage is not fun.

Time Capsule? LOL. They are so so slow, no raid, just one disk.
For home i use a 24-bay NAS. Beat that with your TC.

Yeah, it's no fun setting it up. But it's easy, you do it once and that's it. It's not rocket science ffs.

 

[fat jez]

Got it thanks for the input guys. I have a couple more questions.

1. Does anybody know if there's a refresh on new Synology's coming soon?

2. When I get the the NAS I was planning on placing it in my next room over away from where my main computer/router is by running a long ethernet cable through the wall. Is it bad to run a long LAN cable say around 15ft long? Will there be lag of any sort?

I think the DS213j can do wireless with a wifi dongle but I usually like to stick to a wired connection, it seems like a bad idea to go that route.

1) doubt it, new models tend to launch earlier in the year.
2) in Ethernet terms, 15ft is short, it will be fine.

Wifi is a slow and lousy option for moving data around compared to Ethernet. Apple seem to miss this point when they removed Ethernet ports from the Macbook Pro.

 

[537635]

Actually, I have just recently switched from Gbit ethernet to Wifi (n) when working with Synology NAS.

For majority of users it is not a problem, because most data is transferred inside the NAS and from NAS to and from internet. As long as users perform major file copy actions inside the Synology DSM, they won''t even notice the lower speed of wifi.

Added bonus is, that when moving data around a network share, data is not copied to and from the computer.

So for basic home activity, photos, movie streaming, torrents, incremental backups... 20MB/s is more than enough.


For users, who move a lot of data regulary to and from the computer, video editing, etc., I completely agree with you.