New NAS, need RAID advice

[sbddude]

I am upgrading to a new Synology 4-bay NAS. (currently have a 1-bay, with another drive attached by USB).

I have the following drives:
2x WD Green 1.5 TB
2x WD Green 2.0 TB
1x WD elements 1.5 TB USB 2.0 (probably another green inside)

I need advice as to which configuration to choose. I plan on two volumes - DATA for crucial content (photos, backups, documents, etc) and MEDIA for non-crucial (tv shows, movies timemachine backup)

Config 1
RAID 5: 3x1.5 TB = 3.0 TB usable space (media)
Single drive 2.0 TB mirrored to the other 2tb (which is stored offsite) (data)
5.0 total

Config 2
RAID0 or JBOD 2x2 TB drives = 4 TB (media)
2x1.5 TB RAID 1, third offsite for backup (data)
5.5 total

Config 3
JBOD: 3x1.5 TB = 4.5 TB usable space (media)
Single drive 2.0 TB mirrored to the other 2tb (which is stored offsite) (data)
6.5 total

 

[fhall1]

I would go with 1 or 2.....it'd be a shame to have a 4-bay Synology and use it simply for JBOD.

 

[reebzor]

Does the Synology support ZFS?

If so, you might want to look into that.

 

[blevins321]

I'd do Synology's Hybrid Raid (Pseudo-Raid5). It's the one that is most supported by their firmware. The Hybrid allows you to mix and match drives if one were to die. (Correct me if I'm wrong) but I think that regular Raid requires you to replace 2 drives at a time with identical model/firmware versions.