Trying to decide on a NAS. Need help on decinding between the QNAP TS-453B and Synology DS918+

[Giga_Khan]

Hi everyone. Hope this is the right place for this. I'm currently in the market for my first NAS. Of course the two names that stuck out in my research so far is Synology and QNAP. 

I'm looking to run a 4x4TB RAID5. I plan to use it for file storage, media streaming (plex mainly), and torrents.  I know that NAS's can have many other uses as well and with this purchase I don't want to limit myself on features in case I want to expand it's use in the future.

 

From what I have read so far, Synology has a very robust interface and is easy to set up.  QNAP is not as polished, but has more features.  Another thing that stood out between the two is that TS-453B has an expansion slot for 10GBe where as with the DS918+ you are limited to 1GBe.  The TS-453B also has HDMI output which may be nice to use it as a HTPC as well since it will likely be located very close to the television. 

 

Another question I have is, how important is RAM for NAS systems like these?

 

Anything else I should be considering while deciding between these two?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!!

[Streetguru]

6 minutes ago, Giga_Khan said:

 

If you plan on doing some live encoding with plex, you might want a more powerful PC, what's your budget for everything and country?

Level 1 Techs has a ton of Info on NASeses and on free NAS for making your own.
 

 

 

[Giga_Khan]

Since both have a Celeron J3455 quad-core I figured encoding wouldn't be too much of an issue.

I'm in the US and the price point that both of the listed NAS's come in is about my target. 

$549.99 for the one by Synology http://a.co/2kifdVh

$622.58 for the QNAP http://a.co/0wjTeWC

[Streetguru]

1 minute ago, Giga_Khan said:

Since both have a Celeron J3455 quad-core I figured encoding wouldn't be too much of an issue.

I'm in the US and the price point that both of the listed NAS's come in is about my target. 

$549.99 for the one by Synology http://a.co/2kifdVh

$622.58 for the QNAP http://a.co/0wjTeWC

I mean for 1 720p, maybe 1080p stream it might be alright should look for benchmarks, of course you can do things with virtual machines and stuff with a system that has more cores, certainly more fun if you're into that kind of thing.

You'd be using freeNAS if you built a machine, and it would be upgradable and allow you to connect more hard drives naturally. Those kind of all in one machines aren't bad, but I think building your own FreeNAS box might get you more for your money, it's not like those have ECC memory anyways.
 

PCPartPicker part list: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/nrj6XP
Price breakdown by merchant: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/nrj6XP/by_merchant/

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 5 2400G 3.6GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($165.00 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: ASRock - AB350M Pro4 Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard  ($59.99 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill - Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3000 Memory  ($164.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Deepcool - TESSERACT BF ATX Mid Tower Case  ($36.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: Cooler Master - MasterWatt 550W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($44.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Total: $471.96
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-03-22 00:47 EDT-0400

 

 

[Giga_Khan]

Appreciate the responses.  I was originally considering building my own initially. Was originally considering an i3, 8gb ram and throw it into the node 304 case which i really like.

 

From what I read though, including on the forums here, is that those pre-built NAS's are really enough for what most people need. Hahah not making the decision any easier, but I appreciate the help.

[Streetguru]

7 minutes ago, Giga_Khan said:

 

I'd build you own and learn FreeNAS if you have the time to do so, anything that has you learn more skills is always good. AM4 is probably a better place to start, just get an 8 sata port motherboard with heatsinks on the VRM and decent sized case and you're good to go for a long while.

How many Plex streams do you need to do? Check if the NAS you were looking at can automatically compress files, as freeNAS can do Automated? lz4 Compression, whatever the specifics of that are.
https://blogs.serioustek.net/post/2013/08/30/freenas-91-lz4-compression-aspx

http://www.freenas.org/blog/freenas-worst-practices/

Otherwise probably Synology or Thecus, just check reviews mostly

AND 100% INVEST IN A UPS TO KEEP YOUR NAS RUNNING AFTER A POWER OUTAGE

[SupaKomputa]

that's a good price considering you can buy a celeron j motherboard for $65

 

 

This is for $300, 8 core, 12 sata

[Streetguru]

13 minutes ago, Giga_Khan said:

 

4 minutes ago, SupaKomputa said:

 

As a side note can't the Custom FreeNAS box double as an HTPC with it's HDMI/Display Port outputs?

The Qnap system does have HDMI though.

[Giga_Khan]

UPS is definitely a good call. Was planning on adding one shortly after I decided on the NAS situation.

 

It's a hard call though because as much as I love a DIY project like this, work has been consuming me lately and something that is ready to go is tempting. 

[Streetguru]

5 minutes ago, Giga_Khan said:

UPS is definitely a good call. Was planning on adding one shortly after I decided on the NAS situation.

 

It's a hard call though because as much as I love a DIY project like this, work has been consuming me lately and something that is ready to go is tempting. 

So long as you follow one of the FreeNAS guides on youtube it shouldn't take too long to set up.

[Giga_Khan]

Was playing around on PCpartpicker and if I were to build one, it would probably look something like this. https://pcpartpicker.com/list/csTGfH 

thoughts?

 

I am still curious though if anyone does have a recommendation between the two that I listed above

[Giga_Khan]

Also, according to their websites, they can do 1080p transcoding for multiple streams. More than likely I will be the only one streaming at any given time.

[Streetguru]

23 minutes ago, Giga_Khan said:

Also, according to their websites, they can do 1080p transcoding for multiple streams. More than likely I will be the only one streaming at any given time.

I'd go for AM4 so you have an upgrade path, you probably want 16GBs of RAM, and if you go ATX with an 8 sata port board/larger case it leaves you room to expand.

[Blebekblebek]

If I were you, I'd stick with one shop solution as in a pre-made nas box, I mean you already have the budget.

 

Reasons?

 

1. Time consuming, sure setting up is easy, but trouble shooting is not, most trouble/problems are random and it's vary from hardware to hardware even with almost same spec hardware.

 

2. Expanding is hard, it's not even a secret in ZFS community that adding pool/or storage is not an easy task, it sounds easy, until you personally had to do it, if you don't know any coding, tweaking etc, you'll be constantly browsing/looking a guide how to do it, that's why almost every build is already planned first without a plan to upgrade, even if they upgrading usually this people just building a new box and copy the rest of data from older nas to new nas.

 

3. Drive replacement also confusing, doable but still confusing, and the most annoying about it, the guide it self mostly outdated since most nas OS often change their GUI/Kernel or whatever changes they made to the OS.

For example this is the video I use to watch everytime I install my nas years ago.

Now it's outdated, sure most basic explanation is still valid, but the GUI changed dramatically since.

 

I can type all the problems that I get here but that's irrelevant.

Despite saying that, I do build my own nas, because I have no money, but plenty of time.

Currently using 2 NAS4Free box, 1 for business files, and 1 personal files.

This is for office

and this for home use

 

With NAS Box, instead of type of nas choose what services do you need from it?

SMB/CIFS?
iSCSi?
DLNA?

FTP?
Webserver?
Transcoding?
even maybe a media player.

or maybe you need more write speed than reading speed or even both?

 

 

if you can narrow it down, it will help you deciding your options.

 

PS: Don't get AM4 for nas, it will add more problems into your list for now, almost every ryzen based user that use it for nas end up having issues with it.

[LAwLz]

I recommend the Synology DS918.

It's cheaper than the QNAP.

The software is far more polished (in my experience, although that might have changed in recent years).

 

Yes, the QNAP has 10Gbps Ethernet option but chances are you will end up not using it.

 

 

9 hours ago, Giga_Khan said:

Another question I have is, how important is RAM for NAS systems like these?

Highly depends on what other software you are going to run on it. For just storage? Not that important.

 

8 hours ago, Giga_Khan said:

Since both have a Celeron J3455 quad-core I figured encoding wouldn't be too much of an issue.

I recommend avoiding transcoding as much as you can.

The only time I can see it being useful, is if you're going to stream movies stored at your house, to some other places, and your upload speed is bad.

For accessing movies at home? For example watch them on your smart TV, desktop, laptop or whatever? Just access the files over a regular network share. It will require next to no processing power on the NAS (since it's just sending the raw file) and it will look better (no reduced quality from transcoding).

 

 

 

8 hours ago, Streetguru said:

You'd be using freeNAS if you built a machine, and it would be upgradable and allow you to connect more hard drives naturally. Those kind of all in one machines aren't bad, but I think building your own FreeNAS box might get you more for your money, it's not like those have ECC memory anyways.
 

PCPartPicker part list: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/nrj6XP
Price breakdown by merchant: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/nrj6XP/by_merchant/

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 5 2400G 3.6GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($165.00 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: ASRock - AB350M Pro4 Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard  ($59.99 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill - Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3000 Memory  ($164.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Deepcool - TESSERACT BF ATX Mid Tower Case  ($36.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: Cooler Master - MasterWatt 550W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($44.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Total: $471.96
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-03-22 00:47 EDT-0400

Are you sure you know what you're doing?

1) Adding more drives to FreeNAS is quite complicated, at least if you want to expand the volume. It's not anywhere near as simple as on for example a Synology or QNAP NAS.

2) Your build goes against several of the FreeNAS recommendations. You should not deviate from the recommendations unless you are 100% sure what you are doing.

3) You can't compare the hardware of a NAS like the Synology to the hardware of a FreeNAS box, because they are completely different.

[Giga_Khan]

2 hours ago, LAwLz said:

I recommend the Synology DS918.

It's cheaper than the QNAP.

The software is far more polished (in my experience, although that might have changed in recent years).

 

Yes, the QNAP has 10Gbps Ethernet option but chances are you will end up not using it.

 

 

Highly depends on what other software you are going to run on it. For just storage? Not that important.

 

I recommend avoiding transcoding as much as you can.

The only time I can see it being useful, is if you're going to stream movies stored at your house, to some other places, and your upload speed is bad.

For accessing movies at home? For example watch them on your smart TV, desktop, laptop or whatever? Just access the files over a regular network share. It will require next to no processing power on the NAS (since it's just sending the raw file) and it will look better (no reduced quality from transcoding).

 

 

 

Are you sure you know what you're doing?

1) Adding more drives to FreeNAS is quite complicated, at least if you want to expand the volume. It's not anywhere near as simple as on for example a Synology or QNAP NAS.

2) Your build goes against several of the FreeNAS recommendations. You should not deviate from the recommendations unless you are 100% sure what you are doing.

3) You can't compare the hardware of a NAS like the Synology to the hardware of a FreeNAS box, because they are completely different.

Thanks for answering my questions! Appreciate the response! 

[Streetguru]

2 hours ago, LAwLz said:

3) You can't compare the hardware of a NAS like the Synology to the hardware of a FreeNAS box, because they are completely different.

Aren't the NAS boxes using off the shelf components? Basic Intel CPUs and DDR3L? Aside from it's networking options potentially, and the OS of course.

[LAwLz]

1 hour ago, Streetguru said:

Aren't the NAS boxes using off the shelf components? Basic Intel CPUs and DDR3L? Aside from it's networking options potentially, and the OS of course.

Yes the Synology and QNAP NASes just use off the shelf components, but the software operates very differently, especially ZFS vs ext4/btrfs.

[Streetguru]

18 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

Yes the Synology and QNAP NASes just use off the shelf components, but the software operates very differently, especially ZFS vs ext4/btrfs.

Can't freeNAS use those? namely btrfs, or is it better integrated in the AIO NAS solutions?

[Giga_Khan]

Any UPS recommendations for either a prebuilt NAS box or a custom one?

[Streetguru]

4 minutes ago, Giga_Khan said:

Any UPS recommendations for either a prebuilt NAS box or a custom one?

Newegg typically has sales for Cyberpower UPSes, no idea on their quality, mostly you just need something so you can shut down the machine properly during a power outage.

[LAwLz]

17 minutes ago, Streetguru said:

Can't freeNAS use those? namely btrfs, or is it better integrated in the AIO NAS solutions?

I guess you could hack around and get FreeNAS to use Btrfs, but the entire reason why people choose to use FreeNAS is because it uses ZFS.

[Spicedaddy]

I'd also recommend the Synology. Easy to set up, and very reliable.

 

One of my clients has an older model (415+ I think), and they have 30 people accessing it. It's in RAID10 with 4x4TB drives, but for home use I'd probably go BTRFS with Synology Hybrid RAID so you don't lose as much space.

 

For UPS, they have a Cyberpower CP1000PFCLCD hooked up to it.