nas NAS solution for large office

[Gogeta8p]

In the past, I have worked with a small home NAS solution such as freenas, and just plain nextcloud on Ubuntu for my personal home use. Now someone I know is asking me to set up a storage server solution for an office consisting of 120 members. Now if solutions like freenas applicable for this kind of tasks? what kind of hardware will be needed? for my home, I just use a corei3 with 8gb of ram which may be overkill. Will I need something like an 8 core ryzen of threadripper. It's not like they all will be accessing the server at the same time and moving huge files. It is for an architecture firm. So they won't be moving huge media files. If I setup a freenas with an 8 core ryzen 32 GB ram will it be enough to get the job done? 

[Theguywhobea]

A high end Synology or QNAP nas would probably do fine

[Gogeta8p]

3 minutes ago, Theguywhobea said:

A high end Synology or QNAP nas would probably do fine

I do have that in mind. But, I was trying to go for a custom build as it will be cheaper.

[Electronics Wizardy]

11 minutes ago, Gogeta8p said:

I do have that in mind. But, I was trying to go for a custom build as it will be cheaper.

please don't, just get a dell/hpe/lenovo, easier to work with, has extra management features like the drac, good rails, lots of nice features.

 

Do you have a IT dept, let them manage this, this is how you get bad IT.

 

Are you on a domain?

[Mikensan]

If you go custom are you going to support it anytime there's questions or changes needed? Are you going to be available at 2am when the owner is on travel and needs his files? I would absolutely avoid custom anything. FreeNAS is fine but buy their hardware + support.

 

120 users is really tiny, almost anything you buy will suffice. The two determing factors to help make a suggestion: budget and type of data.

[Theguywhobea]

12 minutes ago, Gogeta8p said:

I do have that in mind. But, I was trying to go for a custom build as it will be cheaper.

True, but the software seems to be much more mature, which is where your money is going to. I haven't personally used the opensource alternative though. One thing to keep in mind is that for a business they will likely highly value technical support directly from the vendor, which you don't get at all with a custom built system.

[Pixel5]

5 hours ago, Gogeta8p said:

I do have that in mind. But, I was trying to go for a custom build as it will be cheaper.

the thing is if someone is asking you to do this for an office with 120 people that means they dont have any people with knowledge about this and also that they are not willing to hire someone that has this knowledge.

 

this means they need something that is as plug and play as it gets so you wont get around Synology or Qnap.

[leadeater]

Self builds and businesses generally don't mix. Businesses can also afford much more than they are willing to admit, if they need something and value it's function towards the business they will fund it even if it's expensive.

 

Anything will do so long as it comes with support, that could be a QNAP/Synology or a ZFS/FreeNAS appliance or even a low end Dell/HPE server running Windows/ESXi + Windows VM.

[jake9000]

Something you should consider, is what's the cost of failure? 

What kind of data is being stored on this? 

Does this device control data used for payroll? 

Does the data need to be insured? 

Does your industry have specific requirements? 

Is there an ActiveDirectory domain present? Do some folders need access control?

Would you ever want to be able to audit who does what and when? 

If the data disappears entirely will the business still be solvent? 

If the device fails, how are you planning to support it? Will the CEO approve of your plan to have all the employees sit on their hands while you wait for replies to an LTT thread? 

 

Get a synology or a qnap. 

If neither of those meet your needs then get a Dell or HP server with plenty of drive bays and set up windows server file services. 

Whatever you spec out, get an entire second one for your backups. 

Consider hiring a managed services provider to operate this for you. The business would seriously benefit from having someone with experience architect it. From there you can maintain it easily. 

[dalekphalm]

As others have said, do not custom build for a 120+ person office.

 

Depending on whether there's any need for a full blown Windows Server, I'd echo everyone else:

Buy a Synology or QNAP.

 

Buy 2 of them, and configure Backups from the Primary to the Secondary (do not simply mirror them - do a proper snapshot backup from one to the other. This will preserve file history/versioning, and ensure a single crypto or malware infection doesn't kill all your files - or if some idiot accidentally deletes a bunch of important files).

 

The 2nd one can either live on-site, or ideally, off-site somewhere with a good internet connection.

 

If you don't know what you're doing, contract an IT specialist (there are typically IT consulting firms that will handle this) to do the initial config for you. If you're comfortable with the whole thing? Fine - but leave your ego at the door, and know your limitations when it comes to someone else's business.

[Gogeta8p]

On 6/1/2019 at 2:16 AM, Pixel5 said:

the thing is if someone is asking you to do this for an office with 120 people that means they dont have any people with knowledge about this and also that they are not willing to hire someone that has this knowledge.

 

this means they need something that is as plug and play as it gets so you wont get around Synology or Qnap.

Synology or QNAP NAS is not sold in my country so it is not an option from me. 

[Gogeta8p]

On 6/4/2019 at 10:37 PM, dalekphalm said:

As others have said, do not custom build for a 120+ person office.

 

Depending on whether there's any need for a full blown Windows Server, I'd echo everyone else:

Buy a Synology or QNAP.

 

Buy 2 of them, and configure Backups from the Primary to the Secondary (do not simply mirror them - do a proper snapshot backup from one to the other. This will preserve file history/versioning, and ensure a single crypto or malware infection doesn't kill all your files - or if some idiot accidentally deletes a bunch of important files).

 

The 2nd one can either live on-site, or ideally, off-site somewhere with a good internet connection.

 

If you don't know what you're doing, contract an IT specialist (there are typically IT consulting firms that will handle this) to do the initial config for you. If you're comfortable with the whole thing? Fine - but leave your ego at the door, and know your limitations when it comes to someone else's business.

 

On 6/4/2019 at 10:37 PM, dalekphalm said:

As others have said, do not custom build for a 120+ person office.

 

Depending on whether there's any need for a full blown Windows Server, I'd echo everyone else:

Buy a Synology or QNAP.

 

Buy 2 of them, and configure Backups from the Primary to the Secondary (do not simply mirror them - do a proper snapshot backup from one to the other. This will preserve file history/versioning, and ensure a single crypto or malware infection doesn't kill all your files - or if some idiot accidentally deletes a bunch of important files).

 

The 2nd one can either live on-site, or ideally, off-site somewhere with a good internet connection.

 

If you don't know what you're doing, contract an IT specialist (there are typically IT consulting firms that will handle this) to do the initial config for you. If you're comfortable with the whole thing? Fine - but leave your ego at the door, and know your limitations when it comes to someone else's business.

I have a lot of limitation as I live in a third world country. Synology or QNAP is not officially available here. I can make the arrangement to import a unit but imagine something goes wrong and I will have to send the unit back to Singapore(I will buy it from Singapore) will take more than a month to complete the repair. At that time the whole office will come to a halt. And I don't need a server in which users will continuously upload and download files. It will be a read-only server. After a project is over it will be saved to that server for taking reference. Nothing more than that. The engineers will submit their files after a project is over and admin will simply upload the files to the server so everyone can take a look at it if necessary. Currently, they are just taking the old files and putting it into external HDDs. They have like 10 external HDDs in the office just for these files. They are just looking for a BACKUP solution. And they need access to the old files rarely. Though they submit and share their ongoing work on a windows share created by a windows server. I am not getting paid from this work. I just know the owner of the company and he asked for my help that's all. I know my limitation but what I really wanna do is to learn more about it. Every challenge I face increases my experience and therefore I learn more.

Now, I need your suggestions. Synology and QNAP are out of the equation. What kind of solution should I go for just to create a read-only backup server? And I will also add that there are 55 workers in the office, not 120. I was given the wrong information. Please help me out.

[Gogeta8p]

On 5/31/2019 at 8:53 PM, Electronics Wizardy said:

please don't, just get a dell/hpe/lenovo, easier to work with, has extra management features like the drac, good rails, lots of nice features.

 

Do you have a IT dept, let them manage this, this is how you get bad IT.

 

Are you on a domain?

Currently not on a domain. But will be on a domain soon. They don't have an IT department. And some people in the office use windows 7 because they think it will be an extremely hard task to move to Windows 10. Currently, they are keeping old files in a bunch of external HDDs.

 

[Electronics Wizardy]

5 hours ago, Gogeta8p said:

Currently not on a domain. But will be on a domain soon. They don't have an IT department. And some people in the office use windows 7 because they think it will be an extremely hard task to move to Windows 10. Currently, they are keeping old files in a bunch of external HDDs.

 

If you want to go local ad domain you got a lot of work in front of you. id get a dell server or two, run hyperv/exsi/ anouther hypervisor, run a few vms for different tasks, move local accounts to domain accounts, replace the hdds with network shares, setp something like redir users or backups to keep users files safe.

 

id run win server 2019 on most of the vms for file serving, makes permissions easier and just works better in a domain eviroment.

[dalekphalm]

37 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

If you want to go local ad domain you got a lot of work in front of you. id get a dell server or two, run hyperv/exsi/ anouther hypervisor, run a few vms for different tasks, move local accounts to domain accounts, replace the hdds with network shares, setp something like redir users or backups to keep users files safe.

 

id run win server 2019 on most of the vms for file serving, makes permissions easier and just works better in a domain eviroment.

Agreed - though the OP will need to be incredibly careful, thorough, and thoughtful when doing this. Ideally it would be better to get an IT contractor to do the setup.

 

I would 100% go with Dell, HPE, or Lenovo for this. Whichever one offers official support in the OP's country.

 

I question why the server would be read only? Users should be working directly off of the server, unless there's some performance reason not to. It also allows all important files to more easily be backed up (vs backing up every single workstation independently).

 

Ideally you'd use AD here to set permissions based on which folder a user needs access to. That way you can allow people to see what they need, and not be able to delete stuff they don't need.

 

Having the engineers submit their files to an admin to "upload" to the server is a waste of everyone's time, including the admin.

[Electronics Wizardy]

15 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

Agreed - though the OP will need to be incredibly careful, thorough, and thoughtful when doing this. Ideally it would be better to get an IT contractor to do the setup.

 

I would 100% go with Dell, HPE, or Lenovo for this. Whichever one offers official support in the OP's country.

 

I question why the server would be read only? Users should be working directly off of the server, unless there's some performance reason not to. It also allows all important files to more easily be backed up (vs backing up every single workstation independently).

 

Ideally you'd use AD here to set permissions based on which folder a user needs access to. That way you can allow people to see what they need, and not be able to delete stuff they don't need.

 

Having the engineers submit their files to an admin to "upload" to the server is a waste of everyone's time, including the admin.

Did I say read only? I don't think I meant it.

 

I kinda have a similar permissions problem at my work. Fairly small company, so there aren't many people who have a simmilar task, so you can't go everything by group. I almost have to do permissions on folders manually, as everyone use is different.

 

I haven't had many issues with people delete a ton of files in their depertmant or messing a lot up, so Im not too worried about giving read/write access to folders in their department. I don't see a need for a write then approve here as it hasn't been a issue for me. 

 

 

[dalekphalm]

2 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Did I say read only? I don't think I meant it.

You didn't. The OP did. Apparently the way it works (or will work? Not clear) is that the engineers submit their completed project to an Admin, who uploads it to the "NAS" for read-only access.

 

I presume all work is done locally on each workstations local HDD.

2 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

I kinda have a similar permissions problem at my work. Fairly small company, so there aren't many people who have a simmilar task, so you can't go everything by group. I almost have to do permissions on folders manually, as everyone use is different.

It can be a challenge. We also have permissions challenges at work too. Though we're slowly working towards a better system.

2 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

I haven't had many issues with people delete a ton of files in their depertmant or messing a lot up, so Im not too worried about giving read/write access to folders in their department. I don't see a need for a write then approve here as it hasn't been a issue for me. 

Internal departmental access being unrestricted is typically fine. Just make sure stuff like the Engineers don't have access to Accounting/HR, and so forth.

 

The big issue we have is people trying to "double click" on a folder - somehow screwing that up - and accidentally moving the folder into some other folder.

 

So then we end up having to hunt down the new location (Or worst case, restore the entire folder from backup).

[Mikensan]

Keep in mind any solution you buy has the same issue - you're down until you can repair or replace that part. A pre-built NAS the same components, motherboard / power supply / disks / backplane. Both of which you can order or warranty parts and have them shipped to you.

 

The difference and the one we're trying to point out is - phone support. At 1am it updates and crashes - you can call QNAP or Synology and they will fix it. A custom built solution: you post on here, reddit, facebook, and everywhere and wait 1-3 days for a helpful reply (assuming there's even a solution). You're alone with a DIY, and at the mercy of us willing to try and help.

 

But if you made up your mind then there's nothing to convince you until disaster hits. Since this is a tiny office likely on a 1gb network - any solution you come up with will be fine. There are 100s of threads in this forum discussing NAS builds, all of them will work.