New to the NAS game - need advice

[BetteBalterZen]

Hi everyone! 

My next upgrade to my home setup will be a NAS, and I have decided for it to be a Synology NAS. 
I need the NAS to be able to hold up to 4x HDDs. More than 4 would be awesome but they very expensive, so 4 will do. 
I will mainly use it to store data. I would like to experiment with Plex but I am not buying a NAS for plex. 
I would like the hardware to be pretty good but doesn't have to be top spec. 

Currently I have my eyes on the DS920+. I like it because of the Quad core CPU it comes with, it has dual Ethernet, can have up to 4x HDDs. Also, which is not as important but, I like how it looks. 

Would the DS920+ be a good choice or?
Is 4GB of RAM enough? 

Thanks

[jaslion]

Honestly synology stuff is just very mediocre stuff and from all the ones I've had the misfortune of interacting with my experience is just bad.

 

They do work but are rather slow, have been a fair few models with psu failiure issues which are expensive to replace and they are also just very expensive.

 

Also there is no i5 in a ds920+ it's a celeron j4125 which has the performance of a first gen i3 330m roughly.

 

Either way for a simple computer nas at home I just recommend a generic desktop pc with truenas, freenas, windows, linux,... any flavour you like and call it a day.

[BetteBalterZen]

3 minutes ago, jaslion said:

Honestly synology stuff is just very mediocre stuff and from all the ones I've had the misfortune of interacting with my experience is just bad.

 

They do work but are rather slow, have been a fair few models with psu failiure issues which are expensive to replace and they are also just very expensive.

 

Also there is no i5 in a ds920+ it's a celeron j4125 which has the performance of a first gen i3 330m roughly.

 

Either way for a simple computer nas at home I just recommend a generic desktop pc with truenas, freenas, windows, linux,... any flavour you like and call it a day.

Thank you 

Alright, doesn't sound good. All people I know that have been using NAS' and so on, all recommends Synology? Hmm... 

Yes, there's no i5 - that was a mistake hehe. It's Celeron but a Quad core. 

And I don't want a full PC as a NAS. Too much wattage waste, and I like the idea of a small, good looking NAS box. 

[BetteBalterZen]

@jaslion

So if I said it must be a NAS like the DS920+ but doesn't have to be a Synology, which one would you recommend?

Yes I know, you already gave your thoughts to me with the first comment - understand if you don't wanna use more time on this  

[jaslion]

2 minutes ago, BetteBalterZen said:

@jaslion

So if I said it must be a NAS like the DS920+ but doesn't have to be a Synology, which one would you recommend?

Yes I know, you already gave your thoughts to me with the first comment - understand if you don't wanna use more time on this  

I mean honestly select synology and qnap stuff is the least bad of the consumer range stuff. There are enough beware of model x y and z out there for both :p. Easiest filter is psu failiure and half of synologies products fall away :p.

[BetteBalterZen]

1 minute ago, jaslion said:

I mean honestly select synology and qnap stuff is the least bad of the consumer range stuff. There are enough beware of model x y and z out there for both :p. Easiest filter is psu failiure and half of synologies products fall away :p.

Wauw okay, I didn't know it was this bad with consumer NAS's. I understand why you wanna build your own PC / NAS instead... 

You have given me something to think about for sure. Thank you  

[jaslion]

57 minutes ago, BetteBalterZen said:

Wauw okay, I didn't know it was this bad with consumer NAS's. I understand why you wanna build your own PC / NAS instead... 

You have given me something to think about for sure. Thank you  

Keep in mind I'm jaded as I get these over the floor weekly with basically always the same issue. 2-3 year old synology and qnap stuff either has psu failure or a volume failure (not because of the drives those issues are not counted here).

 

I mean at least they aren't iomega with their storecenters. Those were very popular for being cheap and decent enough but man they SUCKED. Their os was installed ON THE HDDS IT CAME WITH. So if they went out or something went wrong tough luck it's bricked. There was no easy way to get it back so if anyone wanted to upgrade you had to clone the drives to bigger ones and hope for the best. Or you had to do a whole linux setup, flash a hdd with the rom and hope it works.

 

I to this day have 4 of em they work just fine no os tho since a hdd died but man are they nice bookshelf holders :p. Like no joke I use them to hold my books up.

[BetteBalterZen]

18 minutes ago, jaslion said:

Keep in mind I'm jaded as I get these over the floor weekly with basically always the same issue. 2-3 year old synology and qnap stuff either has psu failure or a volume failure (not because of the drives those issues are not counted here).

 

I mean at least they aren't iomega with their storecenters. Those were very popular for being cheap and decent enough but man they SUCKED. Their os was installed ON THE HDDS IT CAME WITH. So if they went out or something went wrong tough luck it's bricked. There was no easy way to get it back so if anyone wanted to upgrade you had to clone the drives to bigger ones and hope for the best. Or you had to do a whole linux setup, flash a hdd with the rom and hope it works.

 

I to this day have 4 of em they work just fine no os tho since a hdd died but man are they nice bookshelf holders :p. Like no joke I use them to hold my books up.

Roger that, to everything. Why you do you get so many NAS'es?

Do you by chance know if the Synology NAS'es that usually die, have the users kept them running 24/7/365?

My plan is to always have the NAS turned off and only turned on when I need it. Would this extend the lifetime for a NAS? 

[BetteBalterZen]

21 minutes ago, jaslion said:

they nice bookshelf holders :p. Like no joke I use them to hold my books up.

Can you share a picture of that

[BetteBalterZen]

@jaslion No matter what type of NAS I end up getting, would 4GB of RAM be enough for good general file transfer? Or would I see an improve by upgrading RAM? Yes I know an SSD cache would help greatly but that is something I'm not interested in to begin with

[jaslion]

8 minutes ago, BetteBalterZen said:

Roger that, to everything. Why you do you get so many NAS'es?

Part time computer repair. I literally repaired 2 storecenter ix2's in 2014-15 something for a big do it yourself shop and word got around. Now years later I still get requests about repairing nas systems AND STILL THOSE DUMB IX2'S. (I totally do not hate em). They got super cheap and were everywhere so when they all started failing it kept getting them in which then evolved to repairing all kinds of crap.

 

11 minutes ago, BetteBalterZen said:

Do you by chance know if the Synology NAS'es that usually die, have the users kept them running 24/7/365?

My plan is to always have the NAS turned off and only turned on when I need it. Would this extend the lifetime for a NAS? 

 

DO NOT TURN A NAS OFF AND ON A LOT. This MURDERS them so quick :p. They are not designed to handle this and are meant to be on forever. So just let it rip. Stuff goes into sleep mode anyway when not being used so power usage is minimal. This is funnily enough another big issue why I get a lot of requests about network gear. It's not meant to be turned on and off a lot at all :p.

 

 

[jaslion]

3 minutes ago, BetteBalterZen said:

@jaslion No matter what type of NAS I end up getting, would 4GB of RAM be enough for good general file transfer? Or would I see an improve by upgrading RAM? Yes I know an SSD cache would help greatly but that is something I'm not interested in to begin with

The ram is there basically as a small cache, handling access and doing all sorts of operations. More ram does help depending on what kind of storage type you use (raid, zfs,...) but 4gb of ram for generic data dump nas is fine.

[jaslion]

13 minutes ago, BetteBalterZen said:

Can you share a picture of that

I do not wish to do that since that shelf is quite known around me and I do not wish to cross over accounts.

[BetteBalterZen]

15 minutes ago, jaslion said:

Part time computer repair. I literally repaired 2 storecenter ix2's in 2014-15 something for a big do it yourself shop and word got around. Now years later I still get requests about repairing nas systems AND STILL THOSE DUMB IX2'S. (I totally do not hate em). They got super cheap and were everywhere so when they all started failing it kept getting them in which then evolved to repairing all kinds of crap.

 

 

DO NOT TURN A NAS OFF AND ON A LOT. This MURDERS them so quick :p. They are not designed to handle this and are meant to be on forever. So just let it rip. Stuff goes into sleep mode anyway when not being used so power usage is minimal. This is funnily enough another big issue why I get a lot of requests about network gear. It's not meant to be turned on and off a lot at all :p.

 

 

Ah alright, cool, cool. And copy that to not turning off the NAS!

[BetteBalterZen]

14 minutes ago, jaslion said:

The ram is there basically as a small cache, handling access and doing all sorts of operations. More ram does help depending on what kind of storage type you use (raid, zfs,...) but 4gb of ram for generic data dump nas is fine.

Thank you

[BetteBalterZen]

15 minutes ago, jaslion said:

I do not wish to do that since that shelf is quite known around me and I do not wish to cross over accounts.

Totally fair

[jwwagner25]

my vote is for qnap DS 451 D2. buy the model with 2GB ram and upgrade yourself, it's cheaper. CPU is only dual core celeron but it has quicksync for hardware transcoding w/plex. I have my 13TB library on it; runs like butter. also using as backup for two PC's and my smartphone via Qsync (automatic phone backup/sync). Set it, and forget it. 

I understand people advocating a DIY solution but there's something sweet about that compact little box (giggity) holding 4x HDD (mine are 14TB shucked seagate/WD easystore) in that comact form factor, with the OS that just works, no need for complex configuration. However the option is there to dig into settings and really get into the weeds, IF YOU WANT TO, but you don't have to! I upgraded mine to 8GB ram, no idea if it's really necessary or not. 

 

The model I mentioned has its' own HDMI port for local management if you choose, it can basically function as a standalone PC (albeit very low end). 

[BetteBalterZen]

1 minute ago, jwwagner25 said:

my vote is for qnap DS 451 D2. buy the model with 2GB ram and upgrade yourself, it's cheaper. CPU is only dual core celeron but it has quicksync for hardware transcoding w/plex. I have my 13TB library on it; runs like butter. also using as backup for two PC's and my smartphone via Qsync (automatic phone backup/sync). Set it, and forget it. 

I understand people advocating a DIY solution but there's something sweet about that compact little box (giggity) holding 4x HDD (mine are 14TB shucked seagate/WD easystore) in that comact form factor, with the OS that just works, no need for complex configuration. However the option is there to dig into settings and really get into the weeds, IF YOU WANT TO, but you don't have to! I upgraded mine to 8GB ram, no idea if it's really necessary or not. 

 

The model I mentioned has its' own HDMI port for local management if you choose, it can basically function as a standalone PC (albeit very low end). 

Thank you for your input  

Good point with Quicksync support and the HDMI output. The HDMI output certainly is a handy feature for sure. I will take a look at the DS 451 D2.