Family-Wide NAS

Nico371 · May 5, 2021

This is my first post, so here we go.
Me and my family were wondering if there was an easy way to have a main hub for all our pictures and videos that we could all access at any time, from anywhere. I suggested a NAS running RAID 1 but when asked for details, I came up short. I understand the premises of both but nothing about how I would go about setting one up, nor how I could allow for my family to access the data at any given time, from any given place. Would anyone help me to understand what exactly would need to happen for this idea to become reality?

LIGISTX · May 5, 2021

5 minutes ago, Nico371 said:

This is my first post, so here we go.
Me and my family were wondering if there was an easy way to have a main hub for all our pictures and videos that we could all access at any time, from anywhere. I suggested a NAS running RAID 1 but when asked for details, I came up short. I understand the premises of both but nothing about how I would go about setting one up, nor how I could allow for my family to access the data at any given time, from any given place. Would anyone help me to understand what exactly would need to happen for this idea to become reality?

Oh man. Lol. Yes, is the answer. But there is a lot involved in that yes. I would suggest looking into synology nas’s. There are many ways to skin this cat, but some are more complicated and some are more simplified.

Synology has good offerings for decent prices. And they are solid, tried and true units.

Nico371 · May 5, 2021

Thanks, I've looked into QNAP and Synology, both seem to offer relatively similar enclosures. Also, would it be better to go for a 4 bay enclosure, or do you think 2 is enough? How would I go about using an app or browser to access the data even if I was 100's of miles away? Sorry for asking so many questions, I just want to make it right the first time

Kc7vwc · May 6, 2021

9 hours ago, Nico371 said:

Thanks, I've looked into QNAP and Synology, both seem to offer relatively similar enclosures. Also, would it be better to go for a 4 bay enclosure, or do you think 2 is enough? How would I go about using an app or browser to access the data even if I was 100's of miles away? Sorry for asking so many questions, I just want to make it right the first time

I just setup a DS720+ (also for the first time) last week. The YouTube channel "NasCompares" has some good guides to follow for basic setup.

Once the Nas was setup, all I had to do was forward the correct ports on my network router, make sure Synology's quickconnect was setup, and I could access it remotely using the 'DS Finder' & 'DS File' mobile apps.

Then, just create a new user account (or general family account), and have everyone else log into the DS File app with the appropriate login to have remote access.