Prebuilt vs custom NAS solution

[habowh43]

Hello storage gurus!

I'm looking to get a NAS at some point in the near future and I was debating whether to get a prebuilt Synology 2-bay NAS (DS212J) or to build my own NAS (for roughly the same price) and set it up using FreeNAS. I'm already aware of most of the pros/cons of running a prebuilt vs custom solution but I've heard ton of people praising Synology's software so it kinda makes the solution appealing even though I'm "limited" to two bays (having more than 8TB of centralized storage seems of questionable utility for me and my parents) but then again building a custom solution would be a cool little project. Right now, software is pretty much my only concern as hardware is pretty much taken care of and I'm happy with both solutions. So, does anybody have some insight on FreeNAS or Synology's software? Which one should I pick? How do they compare in functionality and ease of use? I'd like something that would be relatively easy of use for backing up data, streaming videos and accessing files at home or away. I'm only going to use it for basic NAS stuff, nothing too fancy involving either illuminati magic or taking over the world and since I'm not exactly a network demi-god (I still know my way around software and hardware) ease of use and setup simplicity would be appreciated.

Extra info that may or may not be useful: I plan on having this little puppy run in my room 24/7/365.25

Thanks for your feedback/insight and sorry about the long question!

-François

[LIGISTX]

I have a custom built nas, but I run openmediavault. I looked into freenas, but the ZFS file system it uses, while AMAZING, needs 1 GB of RAM per 1 TB of harddrive space. Which normally not a huge issue, I have a 7x3tb RAID 6 array, and planning to add more soon, so RAM was an issue for me. Besides that tho, I definitely say build your own, its much more expandable in the future, such as adding more drives.

[tycheleto]

Well you may think that 8TB seems a lot, but if it's a 2 bay NAS you either run RAID 1(with just 4TB which can disappear quickly) or JBOD with no data protection. Find it just too risky in my opinion.

Definitely recommend a custom NAS, it's a lot more flexible hardware and software wise, and as long as you are prepared to do a bit more work maintaining and troubleshooting, you can get a lot more value out of it for similar cost

[Blackterror25]

Well you may think that 8TB seems a lot, but if it's a 2 bay NAS you either run RAID 1(with just 4TB which can disappear quickly) or JBOD with no data protection. Find it just too risky in my opinion.

Definitely recommend a custom NAS, it's a lot more flexible hardware and software wise, and as long as you are prepared to do a bit more work maintaining and troubleshooting, you can get a lot more value out of it for similar cost

dis

 

you could maximum get 4 tb with redundancy so I'd say get a 4 bay NAS or go custom, If you're up for it I'd advise to go custom build.

[565465464]

@looney can probaly help.

[habowh43]

Wow guys! Thanks a lot for the replies! It really help out a lot.

I'm definitely going to go down the custom route now and {EAC} Shoot em UP, I took a look at OMV and it seems to be better for my NAS needs.

Again thanks a lot guys, each and everyone of you are awesome!

[LIGISTX]

Wow guys! Thanks a lot for the replies! It really help out a lot.

I'm definitely going to go down the custom route now and {EAC} Shoot em UP, I took a look at OMV and it seems to be better for my NAS needs.

Again thanks a lot guys, each and everyone of you are awesome!

If you need any help with it let me know. I am not a master of it by any means, but I have been using for a while now and really like its functionality. Also, when you do get it set up, set up a XFS filesystem not a EXT4 (the current linux distro OMV is using only allows EXT4 arrays to be 16 TB or smaller). This might not seem like a size you will ever reach, but in case you one day do... better start with an option that will let you then be in trouble later