Recommend a NAS box that won't break the bank

[FixedGear]

Hey guys, this is a follow up to me thread about HDDs yesterday. I have been running a DNS-323 NAS since 2011. It works fine for what I need (simple home file serving) so I've had no need to upgrade it. However, in removing the HDDs, I pulled too hard on one of the rear drive eject levers and broke it. This is in addition to the button on the front plastic cover which is broken as well.

The unit still works fine, but I'm wondering if I should take this opportunity to upgrade now. Can anyone point towards small NAS boxes that are reliable and cheap? I've got 1TB that aren't full, going to increase to 2TB now so I just need something small and cheap. If not, I'll just stick with the DNS-323 as it works well.

Thanks!!!

[ExtraSlow]

Interested in similar usage scenarios too. Subscribed

[suntan]

I have a Synology 211j that has served me well. It uses very little electricity (15 watts total) and I can torrent off of it. You can run all sorts of services off of them.

[colsankey]

These guys are pretty cheap. But are you looking for the NAS to just hold some storage? Or run some services like couch potato, transmission, etc?

[FixedGear]

I'm not looking to run services, I just access files on the NAS from laptop, tablets, tv sticks, etc.

[schocker]

I would say you couldn't go wrong with a 2 bay qnap or synology. If you are doing anything more than file storage though, it is worth checking the cpu and memory as some of the processor can be weak arm ones while others will have better x86 processors. I have a DS213J by synology which I previously used for storing movies, which seemed to work OK but now use it only for storage (Switched to 4 bay qnap). It works well though for that purpose. Both synology have a good web based interface and are very easy to use and set up. It does seem that memory express is now only special order on the synology nas units. They do qnap on their daily deals though from time to time.

[colsankey]

I'd just get one of these guys and call it a day then:
https://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX49062

[schocker]

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I'd just get one of these guys and call it a day then:
https://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX49062

Isn't that essentially an external hard drive though with some software and no redundancy?

[FixedGear]

yea the redundancy is critical for me, it's what saved my ass when one of the disks failed over the weekend. This disk has all of my photos since about 2001, as well as a ton of early 90s through late 00s hip hop that is likely impossible for me to replace in any format.

[schocker]

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yea the redundancy is critical for me, it's what saved my ass when one of the disks failed over the weekend. This disk has all of my photos since about 2001, as well as a ton of early 90s through late 00s hip hop that is likely impossible for me to replace in any format.

If that is your case, I believe on both qnap and synology, there is the feature to upload to cloud storage as well like amazon glacier and the like to make sure your stuff is protected in case anything happened to the NAS itself.
https://www.synology.com/en-global/k...Sync/cloudsync
https://www.qnap.com/solution/cloud_backup/en/

[Asian_defender]

Synology 216J. It's special order from memory express but it'll serve you well.
Personally I'd spend the extra money and go 4 bay, not only for the extra HDD space but the extra CPU and Ram. I started out with a 4 bay but ended up going to an 8 bay in about a year. Internet hoarding is a real thing

[TYMSMNY]

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I would say you couldn't go wrong with a 2 bay qnap or synology. If you are doing anything more than file storage though, it is worth checking the cpu and memory as some of the processor can be weak arm ones while others will have better x86 processors. I have a DS213J by synology which I previously used for storing movies, which seemed to work OK but now use it only for storage (Switched to 4 bay qnap). It works well though for that purpose. Both synology have a good web based interface and are very easy to use and set up. It does seem that memory express is now only special order on the synology nas units. They do qnap on their daily deals though from time to time.

bought a qnap TS-451+ 4bay on sale. couldn't be happier. It's relatively easy to use and excellent for backing up multiple devices.

[FixedGear]

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Internet hoarding is a real thing

Haha wow, i'm glad I googled this, I had no idea this was a thing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_hoarding

[taemo]

running a QNAP TS-469L for a couple of years now and happy with it.

I primarily bought it for the 4-bay (4x2TB) drive as storage, for about half a year now I've also configured it to sync and backup my photos/videos on Amazon Prime and OneDrive for Business.
Recently I have also configured it as my OpenVPN server.

I'm happy with QNAP and my buddy is happy with Synology.
From my experience, I've had bad luck with D-Link NAS, couple of them failed all of a sudden although I have one that has been running for almost 10 years and so far only 1 drive failed.
Still have an extra DNS-325 that I'm thinking of maybe re-using one day, just that the features are very limited compared to QNAP and Synology

[schocker]

TS-451A is on sale today at memory express.
http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX63674
4-bay. I have the TS-451 (Old version I guess) and have been very happy with it. It appears though that this processor is slightly slower than the my version. "Intel® Celeron® 2.41GHz dual-core processor (burst up to 2.58GHz)"
Specs

Model Number TS-451A-2G-US

Processor 14nm Intel® Celeron® N3060 dual-core 1.6GHz (up to 2.48GHz)
System Memory 2 GB DDR3L RAM
Memory modules pre-installed: 2 GB x1
Maximum memory: 8 GB
Memory slots 2 x SODIMM DDR3L (For dual-DIMM configurations, you must use a pair of identical DDR3L modules.)
Flash Memory 4GB, pre-loaded with QTS system

[ExtraSlow]

Wanted to bump this because my Old DNS-323 died this week. Seems like it's just the power supply, so maybe I can fix it, but really, it's probably time for an upgrade. I'm really hoping my disks are okay and I can recover the data, but it not the really crucial stuff is backed up online.

Requirements are relatively basic. Right now we use Spideroak for online backup of less than 100gb of crucial data. NAS currently is two 1Tb drives mirrored (I think that's Raid 1?) It's not anywhere near full, although I assume 2 TB or larger is a logical plan for new hardware.

Would be nice to be able to run some simple stuff right from the NAS, like the spideroak software, maybe a torrent program, serving up some media files.

See that some NAS hardware also have some kind of associated cloud backup too. If that gets me out of spideroak I'm okay with that, although spideroak has worked well for me.

Starting point for comparisons is this:
DiskStation DS216play Multimedia-Optmized 2-Bay NAS Server https://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX59716 $385
And two of these
WD Red 3TB NAS Desktop Hard Drive, SATA III w/ 64MB Cache https://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX40404 $140 each

Grand total $665.

Discussion or critiques?

[Asian_defender]

I'd go with 4TB. For some reason, with WD and Seagate the 3TB drives seem to be more prone to failures.
I'd also spend a little but more and do a 4 bay but if that's enough to serve your needs then going to 4TB is my only suggestion

[revelations]

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yea the redundancy is critical for me, it's what saved my ass when one of the disks failed over the weekend. This disk has all of my photos since about 2001, as well as a ton of early 90s through late 00s hip hop that is likely impossible for me to replace in any format.

Redundancy in a NAS is really used for minimizing downtime. If you're relying on a RAID 1 setup NAS, it wont matter if the thing gets an electrical jolt, accidental mass deletion, virus/malware/ransomware as ALL your data can be lost very easily.

You need online or local offline backups.

[blairtruck]

i have a qnap ts-251 hooked to my network behind my tv. It has hdmi out and it runs kodi. so my main computer does the downloading of stuff using sickbeard and couch. then moves it to the nas. then the nas plays kodi. works perfect and it does so much stuff i havent even looked at yet. had it for a few years now.
EDIT: looks like they have a new + version. https://www.qnap.com/en/product/model.php?II=195

[RealJimmyJames]

Just do cloud backup right from your computer and skip all the extra hardware and expense.