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Author Topic: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?  (Read 6410 times)

Bowdon

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What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« on: March 07, 2017, 07:44:05 PM »

I'm going to take the plunge and buy a nas drive. I might be backing up a lot so I'll need one that can take 2 big volume hard drives. Is it raid 1 that mirrors the 2 drives in the nas?

Any recommendations or experiences with nas drives appreciated.
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BigJ

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #1 on: March 07, 2017, 08:05:08 PM »

I've gone home brew running FreeNAS on a HP N54L with 4 drives configured and it's worked flawlessly for 3 years. It uses the ZFS filesystem and I've configured it as RAID-Z2 which is similiar to conventional RAID-6. In my layman's opinion, it's a great low cost option compared to a Synology or QNAP.

I used to run XPEnology (Synology on unofficial hardware) on the HP N54L but the worry of doing major software updates got the better of me.

Check out FreeNAS 10 which is currently in beta and nearing Release Candidate. Looking very nice :)

Yes, RAID-1 is mirroring. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

EDIT: corrected name of HP box and for clarity
« Last Edit: March 07, 2017, 08:10:41 PM by BigJ »
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jelv

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #2 on: March 07, 2017, 11:47:52 PM »

My first foray in to the world of NAS boxes is a QNAP.

I'm well impressed with what it does over and above being a NAS.
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adrianw

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #3 on: March 08, 2017, 01:52:38 AM »

I have 3 FreeNAS boxes - a FreeNAS Mini XL (8 * 6 TB WD Red), a FreeNAS Mini (4 * 6 TB WD Red) and a HP N36L Microserver ( 4 * 2 TB drives). The Microserver served me well, but the small foray I had with it into FreeNAS 10 showed it to be excruciatingly slow.

The PDF available via https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?resources/hardware-recommendations-guide.12/ is a good read, and possibly applicable no matter what 64-bit NAS software you intend to run.

I had been running my FreeBSD workstation as a sort of NAS (NFS and SMB shares), so a FreeBSD NAS appliance made sense to me. Other appliances are available  :cool:
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Chunkers

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #4 on: March 08, 2017, 07:49:54 AM »

If it was my first NAS or I wanted max data security I would buy a Synology or QNAP, I have two Synology units.
If I wanted cheap and less secure I would use an old PC and install FreeNAS or Xpenology (Xpenology is very cool but not very polished}. My Xpenology junk build is for non critical stuff like mp3's and security cameras.
My next NAS will be a self build probably with a cheap Ryzen and ECC RAM running FreeNAS or X pen, haven't decided.
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BigJ

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #5 on: March 08, 2017, 06:55:51 PM »

Hi adrianw

The Microserver served me well, but the small foray I had with it into FreeNAS 10 showed it to be excruciatingly slow.

They maybe long in the tooth now but the HP G7 Microsevers' are great little boxes and I was planning to keep using mine as a simple NAS for many, many more years. Did you run into performance problems with the Javascript heavy frontend and/or network throughput? N54L has more grunt than the N36L so I'm hoping that it'll suffice for my modest needs.
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adrianw

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #6 on: March 08, 2017, 11:25:54 PM »

Did you run into performance problems with the Javascript heavy frontend and/or network throughput?
I had patience problems with the front end starting so did not bother with performance checks.
I was bringing the machine back in to service, and thought I would try FreeNAS 10 on it first.
N54L has more grunt than the N36L so I'm hoping that it'll suffice for my modest needs.
Around 70% more grunt, so I hope so too.
http://cpuboss.com/cpus/AMD-Turion-II-Neo-N54L-vs-AMD-Athlon-II-Neo-N36L

Let us know how you get on with FreeNAS 10.
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Chrysalis

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #7 on: March 09, 2017, 03:25:54 AM »

HP N54L is low cost?

out of stock on amazon and 750 usd on new egg O_o

I did find this on partpicker which is a much more reasonable cost but pretty high wattage. (bear in mind £600 of it is for hdd's)

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/guide/Lc48TW/freenas-box-2016

It does seem tho self build is the way to go for a freenas box as the prebuilt stuff is very expensive for what you get.
« Last Edit: March 09, 2017, 03:32:17 AM by Chrysalis »
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Bowdon

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #8 on: March 09, 2017, 10:22:47 AM »

I'm still weighing up the NAS options. Some of the specialised units are quite expensive, and the hard drives get more expensive when buying 3 or 4TB times 2.

For now I bought a 3TB usb drive just so I can get an image of the computer seen as this system restore bug removes my safety net..

Still looking them up.

I didnt think to go to partpicker.. good idea!
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tickmike

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #9 on: March 09, 2017, 11:13:34 AM »

Just put luckybackup on your computer and you can set it up to back up to your USB drive, also you can recover files from it.
'Loukas' the chap who wrote it is very helpful.   https://sourceforge.net/p/luckybackup/discussion/
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BigJ

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #10 on: March 09, 2017, 05:26:00 PM »

HP N54L is low cost?

I should have said, "it was a low cost option". I think HP stopped manufacturing them roughly two years ago. Back in the day, HP would every now and then offer cashback/rebate up £100. I can't remember how much I paid but it was less than £100. It was such a fantastic price I got two ;D

It does seem tho self build is the way to go for a freenas box as the prebuilt stuff is very expensive for what you get.

I thought similarly when started looking into NAS's
« Last Edit: March 09, 2017, 05:43:27 PM by BigJ »
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BigJ

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #11 on: March 09, 2017, 05:30:55 PM »

Around 70% more grunt, so I hope so too.
http://cpuboss.com/cpus/AMD-Turion-II-Neo-N54L-vs-AMD-Athlon-II-Neo-N36L

Ah, there's hope for me yet! Thanks for the info.

Let us know how you get on with FreeNAS 10.

Will do. Was thinking of waiting until the FreeNAS 10 release candidates were out.
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Chrysalis

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #12 on: March 09, 2017, 09:50:51 PM »

I should have said, "it was a low cost option". I think HP stopped manufacturing them roughly two years ago. Back in the day, HP would every now and then offer cashback/rebate up £100. I can't remember how much I paid but it was less than £100. It was such a fantastic price I got two ;D

I thought similarly when started looking into NAS's

can you find another great deal for us today? :)
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adrianw

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #13 on: March 09, 2017, 10:25:26 PM »

HP N54L is low cost?
out of stock on amazon and 750 usd on new egg O_o
The N54L is the obsolete Gen7.

You can get a current HPE ProLiant Gen8 G1610T 819185-421 4GB RAM MicroServer from Ebuyer for £132.98 after cashback.
Its Celeron G1610T / 2.3 GHz is about 30% faster than a N54L, and more than twice the speed of my N36L.

I sometimes wonder how many people are caught out by obsolete machines being sold at inflated prices, I assume that the vendors take the stance that if you want it you must be desperate, and scarcity costs.

Mainly for my own benefit, if I were getting one I would add:
£144 2 * 8GB ECC memory (https://www.mrmemory.co.uk/memory-ram-upgrades/hp/proliant/microserver-gen8-g1610t)
£13 2 * Cruzer Fit 16 GB USB Flash (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cruzer-Fit-Flash-Drive-SDCZ33-016G-B35/dp/B005FYNSZA)
£57 ILO Essentials licence key (https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Business-Office-Licences/HP-512485-B21-Essentials-Integrated-Lights-Out/B001O5I6ZG)
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BigJ

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Re: What NAS drive do you guys use/recommend?
« Reply #14 on: March 09, 2017, 10:33:47 PM »

Just beat me to it Adrianw :)
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