I need some advice please if anyone has some experience / knowledge in this field...I have decided its time to back everything up and make the home life / office a bit more streamlined and secure. Presently I back stuff up and have lots of drives floating around the place and even keep one off site. As time has moved on and storage has become cheaper my old 100GB 3.5 drives have been far surpassed by the 2TB ones I now get for $100.

What I am after.....

1. A digital copy / backup of everything
2. Central access to data - a shared drive for photos, music, movies etc that can be shared between 1 desktop, 2 laptops, 2 iphones and an iPad. So it needs to be relatively quick as I want the shared drive to take over the machines hard drives.
3. Access to shared drives from anywhere - when I am on line
4. Work stuff that is mirrored immediately
5. hot swapping of drives so its easy to upgrade and make copies for storage offsite
6. upgradeable as disc space becomes cheaper and bigger
7. Peace of mind and ease of use

Budget wise I would like to spend $600 approx. Why? Well I have seen several that seem to fit my requirements for under that - including 2 * 2TB drives. I presently have a Netgear modem / router that was brought in anticipation of this and hence is ready for the NAS to be plugged in. I am presently a heavy user of dropbox but do not want to store everything in the cloud.

I have been looking at a QNAP TS-412 4-BAY TURBO NAS and a NetGear ReadyNAS NV+ v2 which both come in around the $400 mark. Would you recommend these or suggest something completely different?

Any help / info would be gratefully received.

netgear has a good interface. the cheap WD is awfull.
Raid 5. still not foolproof. Best way 2 raid 5 Nas's one mirror image of other. May as well put an UPS in there also.

Ted
I setup a WHS (windows Home Server 2003 some years back now WHS2011) box on my LAN. This does everything U want and provides remote access via a MSoft VPN. I use different s/ware to do this but same principle.
Might be too involved for you.
The simplest - route think about buying CLOUD storage and backup - essentially you share this back to yourself - a non-public dropbox approach. +++ it is off-site by default. Alot of alternates - a less well known but ultra secure svs = WUALA (google).. Some svs run a back-up product.

A great low power setup for a server...
www.megabuy.com.au/hp-proliant-n40l-g7-microserver-p347479.html
If U read the options for what U can run on this (they have removed the bargain WHS2011 s/w deal!!!) but it is v.flexible. They mention FreeNAS perhaps a bit OTT.

I used to use a zip-backup to disk product which I removed off-site. I also bought a NAS - WD Elements because a store was shutting down and it was a bargain but still in the box (so may be not)

The WHS backup has the advantage - it does it all for you and if a PC goes AWOL U can fix it and then restore the image from WHS and off U go again.

Cheers
AP

Hi Ted,

I run 2 ReadyNAS Duo V2 systems, one for myself personally, and one I've set up for non-tech savvy parents home office. My personal setup is mainly as a low power media server to my TV, but the one I've set up for my parents I've put together as something more along the lines of what you are thinking.

Whilst the ReadyNAS does come with built in automatic backup software, I was too lazy to set that up, so instead I've got my parents working directly off the NAS, basically all their files etc sit on the NAS. On top of that, I have a GoogleDrive (similar to dropbox) folder in the NAS, in which all their accounting data sits, so basically everything they work on is mirrored on the two drives in the NAS itself as well as being backed up online.

Ted the Kiwi said...
What I am after.....
1. A digital copy / backup of everything yup + cloud backup
2. Central access to data - a shared drive for photos, music, movies etc that can be shared between 1 desktop, 2 laptops, 2 iphones and an iPad. So it needs to be relatively quick as I want the shared drive to take over the machines hard drives. relatively quick, should be good for regular office stuff unless you are doing video editing... both my parents machines are pretty barebones but with 128gb SSDs to help them boogy. I can access mine and watch videos, drag drop files etc with my android phone, however don't think idevices let you do that... i believe there is an itunes server you can run to share media, but don't think it works with other files, but never tried it, seems cumbersome
3. Access to shared drives from anywhere - when I am on line yep
4. Work stuff that is mirrored immediately yep, this is why I have them working directly on the NAS
5. hot swapping of drives so its easy to upgrade and make copies for storage offsite yep
6. upgradeable as disc space becomes cheaper and bigger yep
7. Peace of mind and ease of use only issue i've come across so far is that because my parents are still on windows xp (hesitant to migrate them from something they are familiar with) if they lose power which happens reasonably regularly, they need to remap the NAS as a network drive, which means they have to figure out the IP address of the NAS, easy enough really.... no such issues with win7

If you are happy with a 2-bay setup, the Duo works pretty good for the price $307 for NAS + 2 x 1TB drives. Obviously if you pay more you get a faster machine, better processor, more bays.

JIC anyone is getting fed up trying to remote access their LAN (on windows) - I have used Famatech's RADMIN product (provides a VPN) for about 10 years now - (does what we need so had no need to look at any other solution) it is not free - but very easy to setup and run with.
Your ADSL box (or equivalent) needs to be have the option to setup a pass thru to the target machine which you take-over, then same as sitting at your desk.

Talking of ADSL boxes - just bought another FRITZBox 7390 - worth a look LAN/FAX/NAS(limited)/W/less,/W/less phones / ansaphone / VOIP /ISDN(basic)/NBN (ready - so am I) .. yarda yarda yarda.

Cheers
AP

1. You
could try the new TRX configuration with optional cumulus nimbus partitions. The latest North by product combines the current Whip with the Wham to produce 2013 Wimp semi hard drive. If you store offsite at King storage you get lower level parking at a fraction of the cost.
2.
Using NAscar alternative will give you more speed but limit your download correction aka oversteer vulnerability. You can see my point.
But on the other hand a SATa Seagate/Breeze will offer unlimited viewing possibilities with auto-over correction using wired for sound random theory blocks of TB information.
3.
The non polarised AnosychraticDigitalSubriberLine
will allow hot swapping of hot wives in conditions with mirrors on the ceiling.
This will allow indeterminable dropbox at LANolin sites worldwide. Soft hands also.

Hope this helps

Nerds

nebbian said...
QNap is good.

Do not under any circumstances buy the equivalent Synology device. We have lost many tens of thousands of dollars of staff productivity with this piece of cr@p.

Replacing it with a QNap (6 drives in RAID 10, oodles of space) has meant no downtime.

I've even gotten a QNap to run a complete heavyweight CRM system that is used to run small to medium sized businesses. They're a sweet little device.

whay would you be running an entry level nas holding that much critical data .

Nothing wrong with synology or qnap boxes , you pay for peanuts you get peanuts .

Having said that though qnap do make some nice SME boxes . A good step up are infortrend boxes .

dusta said...

whay would you be running an entry level nas holding that much critical data .

Nothing wrong with synology or qnap boxes , you pay for peanuts you get peanuts .

Having said that though qnap do make some nice SME boxes . A good step up are infortrend boxes .

I don't make the decisions, the boss does

And putting the business application on there was just to prove to someone that it could be done, I actually argued for (and got) a decent rackmount server to run the business critical data on.