NAS solution?

I want to get a NAS device to store all my DVDs on so I can get rid of the physical disks. What's the best one?

I've heard great things about Drobo. I got my parents a Synology NAS device a few years ago and it works well.

Thanks

I have had pretty good luck with a 7-8 year old ReadyNAS 4 bay drive...The power supply burned out after 4-5 years and I got them to send a new one free. One drive overheated--when I replaced it, the NAS rebuilt my RAID. I realized that the dust screen was clogged and figured out that I needed to clean it more than once every 5 years.

Synology is well regarded. I also believe QNap is pretty well regarded.

What ever you do, avoid Thecus units like the plague.

Yeah, I had a bad experience with a Thecus NAS a few years ago. Synology has been good to me. The reason I mention Drobo is that a friend who has an IT services firm swears by them. I like their "BeyondRAID" technology that lets you hot plug new drives of varying sizes without rebuilding the RAID array. But they are expensive - the cheapest one I can find with an ethernet port (instead of USB) is almost $1000.

Qnap is great!

I'd give it my vote.

I like the Synology web interface, VPN capabilities, and the build quality.

Agreed that Synology makes fine units; the Drobos for home use would probably be great too, and can be found without drives for <$500. Also take a look at the DROBO mini, holds 4 2.5" drives + an optional MiniPCI SSD, has enet interface and is about the size of a hardcover book. We started using these for dumping down raw video at remotes and so far they have been flawless. Iomega has some home units that have been pretty well reviewed as well. Also look at Smallnetbuilder.com, they have reviewed quite a number of business/home NAS solutions.

It sounds like the OP is pretty tech savvy, they could consider FREENAS running on pretty much any recent I86 PC. Load it up with WD Red or RE drives, install the software on a USB boot drive and you are good to go. Just be sure the PC you are using can accept a standard power supply as that is what is mostly likely to fail, (many PCs from Dell and HP do not accept standard PCs). It can run as a DNLA provider with the right add ons too.

Cheers

Another +1 for synology
Been using their products for 7ish years from the 2bay home units to the mid size office rack-mount units. They have technology similar to Drobo's 'Beyond Raid' called Snology Hybrid Raid (SHR) Just make sure you read up and understand how those 'Size don't matter' raid technologies work...
I've chose synology over qnap and drobo mainly because of features and expandability. Currently have a DS1812+ loaded to 18tb(6 drives) with some ISCSI and VMs running off it. I know in the near future I'll grow to needing 1 of the DX513 expansion modules.
Friend of mine here in Afghanistan as about 5-8 units in service, no issues and that is in a dusty environment with generator power and moderate AC.

Thanks - Drobo mini doesn't have ethernet. http://www.drobo.com/products/index.php

Synology gets the edge in features.

Thanks for all the input, everyone.

Go to newegg's website and do some searching. There are plenty of good NAS solutions out there. They're typically expensive. An external USB drive might be a better solution if you're just having one PC. Also, if you're going NAS, I'd suggest using a wired connection to your router and HTPC. Things play much better and moving files around is a snap.

Just remember RAID isn't backup. If you're not keeping the discs, then you really need RAID plus a backup for the RAID.

I just got a Synology RS812 for similar purposes and, thus far, I am really pleased with both the build quality and their built-in admin setup.

Since this is FlyerTalk, can we share some notes on how we travel with gear like this?

After trying SKB's Studio Flyer case (not deep enough for the RackStation) and also their shock mounted case (which was so large that, when I unboxed it, it made the blood drain from my face as I imagined hauling it around airports and repeatedly paying an oversized baggage fee), I settled on a concept of a standard 2U SKB case.

It's too big and square to carry it on, but I thought I'd use a TSA Locking strap to secure it a bit and then hand-carry the drives inside a Tom Bihn Brain Cell to mitigate the risk of data loss. Not thrilled whenever my electronics have to ride under the plane but, so far, I haven't come up with any better way to do this which ticks all the boxes for:

• Portable
• Sturdy
• Isn't "Fee Bait" for the Airlines

Curious — How does everybody here fly with their NAS gear?

My personal DS1812+ travels via a Pelican Storm IM2300. Its a solid little brick sans drives at 8.2kg(18#) w/drives (6*.75kg=4.5kg) 12.7kg(28#) it is carry on legal in size and weight* in the US w/Drives mostly...
In Europe yeah drives come out and you hope they don't weigh it as its about a kilo and a half over a few carriers limits
Drives get stored in static bags and t-shirts in those cases and carried on in backpack.

I have two ReadyNAS units here - both running mirroring, and they have been up and running for months without so much as a glitch. I recommend getting the Atom based units as they perform better (and have USB 3.0). Tons of extra apps for them, and good media playback support. I also use them as TiVo backup systems to backup my "keep" TiVo shows.

How big a NAS are you going to get at the start and how much storage do you see yourself growing to over time? Are you sticking with DVD as source? Are you going to transcode and shrink or keep ISO images? At some point, will you be ripping BluRay?

Also, what OSes will be mounting this NAS? Windows? Mac? Linux?

Do you want the share available to your mobile devices?

Sorry, you are correct, the Drobo mini doesn't have native ethernet, but they do have Thunderbolt so we are connecting to ethernet via a Thunderbolt>to>Ethernet adapter.

Cheers