What does a NAS do?

[Ethan97]

hey guys i keep seeing NAS pop up and please someone tell me what the hell is it used for and why?

[Lord Pantaloons]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network-attached_storage

[mr moose]

They tap your phone and read your emails. They also know what you had for Lu... Oh hang on that's NSA....   An NAS is a set of hardrives attatched to your netwrok that allow any computer (with network permissions) to use the hdd's for storage or content streaming.

[Ethan97]

They tap your phone and read your emails. They also know what you had for Lu... Oh hang on that's NSA....   An NAS is a set of hardrives attatched to your netwrok that allow any computer (with network permissions) to use the hdd's for storage or content streaming.

So could i get a NAS then put all of my files on it and all my games? and then my computer can use the NAS to play a game and then the NAS would just be a big storage solution?

[SuperOwnJK]

NAS stands for Network Attached Storage. Its a centralised storage solution for mainly residential networks. They commonly come with 2 bays that you have to put hard drives in, although Western Digital do do some plug and play NAS solutions with a single hard drives already in.

All the devices on your home network can access the hard drives in the NAS simultaneously but thats about it. The NAS can't run any programs, just network the storage for all devices to access.

Some NAS's have BitTorrent clients installed so you can leave it to torrent 24/7

[tycheleto]

So could i get a NAS then put all of my files on it and all my games? and then my computer can use the NAS to play a game and then the NAS would just be a big storage solution?

Haven't heard of anyone storing games on a NAS, any latency in the system should just be avoided. But a NAS is a great way of centralizing storage within a home. Some people store all their videos, pictures and files on the NAS, and just work straight from there. Prevents you from having 4 copies of the same file because every person in the family wants it.

However, as with anything centralized, you also increase your risk. If all your data is on the NAS and it failed, you now lose all your data. Managed correctly with the right backup, it basically provides mass storage for anyone on the network to access.

[Ethan97]

Haven't heard of anyone storing games on a NAS, any latency in the system should just be avoided. But a NAS is a great way of centralizing storage within a home. Some people store all their videos, pictures and files on the NAS, and just work straight from there. Prevents you from having 4 copies of the same file because every person in the family wants it.

However, as with anything centralized, you also increase your risk. If all your data is on the NAS and it failed, you now lose all your data. Managed correctly with the right backup, it basically provides mass storage for anyone on the network to access.

Could a NAS be used for storing games, would it be ideal?

[tycheleto]

Could a NAS be used for storing games, would it be ideal?

Have not tried, though I would personally would not recommend it. Local storage is probably a bit faster and just easier to work with.

[Ethan97]

Have not tried, though I would personally would not recommend it. Local storage is probably a bit faster and just easier to work with.

ok thanks for your help 

[tycheleto]

ok thanks for your help

No problem. Depending on your storage needs, you can also consider building a home server. The sticky on this forum about choosing storage devices gives some great info on this.

[mr moose]

Could a NAS be used for storing games, would it be ideal?

 

NO, It would be way too slow for a good experience.  a NAS is like an external hard drive, except that it's not exclusive to only one pc as every pc on a netwrok can use it.

[tycheleto]

NO, It would be way too slow for a good experience. a NAS is like an external hard drive, except that it's not exclusive to only one pc as every pc on a netwrok can use it.

That's not necessarily always true. A NAS is not that different from a home server, especially many High End NAS. And a home server isn't really that different from things that are beginning to come(Nvidia Shield, Nvidia Grid), where your things are processed at a centralized location and pushed out. It has been said that an SSD has almost no impact on game performance, and only affects loading times. How is having network storage really different from having things on an external drive, or even on a slower internal drive? The only real concern here is potentially latency, but depending on the setup, I doubt it is so bad that it makes for a terrible experience.

[mr moose]

That's not necessarily always true. A NAS is not that different from a home server, especially many High End NAS. And a home server isn't really that different from things that are beginning to come(Nvidia Shield, Nvidia Grid), where your things are processed at a centralized location and pushed out. It has been said that an SSD has almost no impact on game performance, and only affects loading times. How is having network storage really different from having things on an external drive, or even on a slower internal drive? The only real concern here is potentially latency, but depending on the setup, I doubt it is so bad that it makes for a terrible experience.

I said it was "like" an external drive, not "is".    The op just wanted to know what a NAS was not future applications for servers. 

[tycheleto]

I said it was "like" an external drive, not "is". The op just wanted to know what a NAS was not future applications for servers.

I know. Don't have any problem with that. Was just pointing that saying that it just cannot handle games was a bit of a generalization

[tbc]

I think it's very important to differentiate 'dumb' NASes from 'smart'/modern NASes.

the most basic units have their own chips that serve to run all the RAID calculations.    that's all they do, they act as a local 'Dropbox' - you put files in, you take them out, and everything is 'synced' between all your devices.

 

the smart NASes are really two separate devices in one chassis; one half is storage, the other half is a real computer.

 

their 'horsepower'(functionality) is something akin to a smartphone with external hard drives attached to it.  they can run torrent programs, they can transcode media, they can connect with apps on actual smartphones to make navigating the network simpler, etc.

[mr moose]

I think it's very important to differentiate 'dumb' NASes from 'smart'/modern NASes.

the most basic units have their own chips that serve to run all the RAID calculations.    that's all they do, they act as a local 'Dropbox' - you put files in, you take them out, and everything is 'synced' between all your devices.

 

the smart NASes are really two separate devices in one chassis; one half is storage, the other half is a real computer.

 

their 'horsepower'(functionality) is something akin to a smartphone with external hard drives attached to it.  they can run torrent programs, they can transcode media, they can connect with apps on actual smartphones to make navigating the network simpler, etc.

 

But can they run games? While technically yes, in my opinion the answer is no because the average domestic network (1gb) is not fast enough to make it an enjoyable experience.

[tycheleto]

But can they run games? In my opinion the answer is no because the average domestic network (1gb) is not fast enough to make it an enjoyable experience.

A gigabit connection works out to 125MB/s, which isn't really any different from what most hard drives do. The issue is not the bandwidth, it's the latency.

[mr moose]

A gigabit connection works out to 125MB/s, which isn't really any different from what most hard drives do. The issue is not the bandwidth, it's the latency.

 

So are you saying you would not notice a difference between running a game from hdd across a 1gb network and running a game of a local hdd?

[tycheleto]

So are you saying you would not notice a difference between running a game from hdd across a 1gb network and running a game of a local hdd?

I didn't say there was no difference. I said the difference is not the bandwidth, it is the added latency of having to send data back and forth across the network instead of accessing a local drive. Most normal hard drives do not run beyond 120MB/s, and the raw throughput isn't a problem

[mr moose]

I didn't say there was no difference. I said the difference is not the bandwidth, it is the added latency of having to send data back and forth across the network instead of accessing a local drive. Most normal hard drives do not run beyond 120MB/s, and the raw throughput isn't a problem

so the conclusion is that while you can run a game from across a network it isn't going to be the best solution.

 

And for the record I have a Samsung 840 and average random reads at at least 160MB and sequencial at 340MB.

[tycheleto]

so the conclusion is that while you can run a game from across a network it isn't going to be the best solution.

And for the record I have a Samsung 840 and average random reads at at least 160MB and sequencial at 340MB.

It isn't ideal, but to say it is not going to be a good experience is questionable. More testing needs to be done to confirm this.

I said hard disk, not SSD. I also said early on that supposedly SSDs to not affect your fps, just your loading time.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/battlefield-rift-ssd,3062-13.html

Based on that, there is little reason to believe that it is going to be a major problem.

And for the record I have a OCZ Vertex 4, I used to have a corsair force GT which I moved to my server, and I have put SSDs in every desktop and laptop in my house in the past two years. I know that they easily saturate gigabit, since they all saturate SATA 2(3gbps), but the evidence to prove that this affects gaming isn't really there.

[mr moose]

I said hard disk, not SSD. I also said early on that supposedly SSDs to not affect your fps, just your loading time.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/battlefield-rift-ssd,3062-13.html

 

I never said that they did. However we are gettting away from wht the op wanted to know, which was A - what is a NAS? and  B - can I install my games to it?

 

I think we have sufficiently answered that.

[tycheleto]

I never said that they did. However we are gettting away from wht the op wanted to know, which was A - what is a NAS? and B - can I install my games to it?

I think we have sufficiently answered that.

Yeah I think we got a bit carried away. We really should get someone to test what it is like running games of a NAS though, to truly answer the question

[LogicDeifying]

They tap your phone and read your emails. They also know what you had for Lu... Oh hang on that's NSA.... An NAS is a set of hardrives attatched to your netwrok that allow any computer (with network permissions) to use the hdd's for storage or content streaming.

I had a kick out of this one

[tbc]

it's been awhile since ir eally played games...have games completely stopped writing to the registry on install now?  cause if not, I don't see how it would even open since i don't know how an exe on the network is allowed to write to the local registry.