NAS Storage

[henton49er]

I am looking to upgrade my home wifi network to include some NAS storage, mainly for music and photographs, but also for domestic and financial documents. I therefore need the NAS system to be able to automatically back itself up.

What are my options? I am familiar with the concept of a RAID but never installed one. Am I better to keep the first copies of data on PC hard drives and use the NAS as a back up (might be cheaper than a RAID)? There are so many choices that I do not really know where to start. Any advice (or pointing me towards good and reliable information online) would be welcome.

 

[Cheshirechappie]

I'm not trying to funny or smartalec, but I can't help feeling that the safest way to store domestic and financial documents is in the form of a hard-copy in a small but good quality fire-safe.

Electronics and computer technology is great in many respects, but reliability isn't exactly superb, and advances render means of storage redundant and useless remarkably quickly. How many people still have stuff stored on floppy disks they can't now access?

 

[Racers]

Cloud storage, dropbox etc, just in case your house burns down etc.

Pete

 

[kinsella]

Mike
I have two NAS machines. I have musics and home files on one and then TV programmes etc on the other. The NAS connects to my Smart TV so i watch the programmes direct from the telly which are streamed by the NAS. Very handy bit of kit. I can remotely log on from work if i want to find a home document.
As noted above, it backs up material but if you have a fire or theft. Then its useless. Its always best to have another cloud store for key important documents. Photos would fit into that category. Who has hard copy photos these days and losing a video of you first daughter learning to ride a bike one day was lost long ago before i had a NAS and my PC hard disk failed, believe it or not exactly the same time that my external hard disk with the back up on failed.
If you look at PC World there are loads. You can spend a few £ or loads. My first one was £200 i think. It has 1TB of data on it. I now have circa 5-6TB on my home network. I use NetGear and have never had any problems. It even tells you when one of the disks is looking tired and you simply replace it and you have two copies again. I now use the dodgy one as a third backup but know its a last resort for that impossible time when they both fail at the exact same time (which has previously happened as above)

 

[nev]

If you have a NAS with cloud back up e.g http://www.symform.com/download/nas/ and run the NAS with a raid setup i.e. 2 hdd's you will have the original copies on the pc, 2 separate copies on hdd and a cloud copy accessible from anywhere. The chances of 4 hard drives all failing at the same time are slim I would suspect.
My only experience with a NAS is for storing and streaming movies, mine is a Zyxel (with WD hdd)which works 99% of the time but needs a reboot occasionally. Next one I buy will probably be a Synology or Qnap, which have a reputation for reliability.

 

[pcb1962]

Cloud storage, dropbox etc, just in case your house burns down etc.

And for the photos, burn a DVD periodically and store it at work / parents / siblings house. Doesn't matter how many backups you have if they're all in the house when it burns down.

 

[Cheshirechappie]

Cloud storage, dropbox etc, just in case your house burns down etc.

Doesn't matter how many backups you have if they're all in the house when it burns down.

That's what a fire-safe is for.....

 

[mseries]

duplication and off site storage is always better

 

[Titch]

I have a hp neo server. External hard drive I carry with me. Had work docs on aswell as photos. And carbonite auto backup

 

[Fatboy]

I recently bought a Synology DS213 NAS drive with 2 x 1TB drives set up as a Raid server so one drive mirrors the other as a back up. Works great for watching dvds stored on it through the smart player in the lounge. It comes with its own Raid software and is simplicity itself to install, no techy stuff at all.

 

[fiacha]

I have a 2series Synology which has a very simple user interface. You can install the cloud client on your PC and it will automatically keep the folders you select synch'd with a folder of the same name on the NAS. Handy if you have multiple PCs on your network. It also means that a file you modify locally is instantly backed up to the NAS (assuming you are connected to the LAN). You also have the option to backup your NAS to their Cloud service.

It comes with a load of useful applications as standard. I use their Surveillance Centre for my IP cameras. It's also a nice neat little package, which is easy to tuck out of the way.

For important documents, I have a number of encrypted USB thumb drives stashed in attic / shed that get updated as needed.

A proper belt, braces and bailing wire solution