NAS - network storage

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Tacet

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Anyone know of a decent NAS at a fair price? I'm looking for one for home use - it should take at least one SATA 3.5" up to 1.5 TB. Two disks would be better, if the increased in price isn't too much.

Esquire sells one for R 1,129.00 (excl VAT, SATA 3.5", 1.5 TB max, GE lan). Is that a fair price?
http://shop.esquire.co.za/ProductDescription.aspx?id=846401
 
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PotShot-RSA

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Tacet

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quovadis said:
If you've got some old hardware lying around you can build your own and use something like Openfiler:
http://www.openfiler.com/
Click to expand...

I've considered that - but I don't have an old PC lying around, and I don't want to sacrifice my laptop. The idea is to have the NAS sit next to my router. Add to that an Xtreamer (does the same as a Media8ter, just cheaper) and you can skip the HDD in the Xtreamer. As most of my family uses laptops, it would be an easy way to increase the storage space of all the laptops in one shot, and much cheaper than buying a bunch of 2.5" laptop HDDs.

http://www.incarpc.co.za/pricing.shtml
Seems like their cheapest is about R1800, excluding VAT. It looks quite good, though.
 
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ALFAHOLIC

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Are you looking at redundancy? What type of media will you store? I have a nice growth projection tool (spreadsheet) we use at work, not sure if I can share it, but I'm sure you can search Google as it will help you ALOT in determining what you need!
 
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Tacet

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wetkit said:
How about this one?
http://www.scoopdistribution.co.za/product_info.php?cPath=29&products_id=993
Any good?
Click to expand...

It really looks good! I especially like the wireless access - useful for those times when you move the router for a LAN or something. Won't use it for permanent connection, but temp it will be very nice. The print server will also be useful, we currently have to boot a pc each time we want to print something.

ALFAHOLIC said:
Are you looking at redundancy? What type of media will you store? I have a nice growth projection tool (spreadsheet) we use at work, not sure if I can share it, but I'm sure you can search Google as it will help you ALOT in determining what you need!
Click to expand...

Nope, it will basically be for personal use - i.e. non-essential data. I'm thinking about adding an XStreamer or Medi8tor to the network later one, so it will provide a centralized storage space, rather than my buying another HDD. So the data will be a few .docx files, photo archives, movies, music. Add to that the print server and music streamer (if I can my Nokia5800 to read a iTunes stream) and you get a very comfy home setup. So I'm looking at cheap rather than capabilities.
 
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steve-rsa

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I have used Synology stuff for about 4 years. It is great, the firmware is updated regularly and product support life cycles are quite long (http://www.synology.com/enu/products/status.php). Was a lifesaver when 7 PC's were stolen - all I had to do was a restore and all the users were up and running after a couple of days.

There were minor glitches as with any product - In fact one of the 406's I used (one of the first ones available) had 4x500Gb drives as suggested by them but would randomly shut down. They couriered me a new, stronger power supply from Singapore - at NO charge. IncarPC was who I used.

Look at the Synology forums for any problems before buying a particular model. I believe there has been a new range launched recently. The + range is slightly faster than the non-plus or e range.

If you can get a 40x series. 2HDD's will run cooler and there will be space later.
 
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Asha'man X

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Stay away from DLink NAS devices. Our school bought one last year, and it was a terrible thing. Slow as hell, even on a gigbit connection. It was painful. Funny thing was, plug it in as a big USB hard drive, and suddenly it was speedy. I was not pleased by how slow that thing was. In future I'll probably build my own and use FreeNAS for software.
 
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