Seagate Central or WD My Cloud EXT HDD

[DP187]

Firstly my apologies if this has been posted before, but I did do a search on this forum and came up with nothing.

I need to get a central HDD connected to my small home network. Reason for this is my personal laptop broke, and now using my work laptop with all my personal stuff is on there and I have a few HDD with pictures and video stored in them but I want to keep them centralized and accessible from all my digital devices. Devices I have are Samsung Galaxy S4, Samsung LCD Smart TV, 2 work Laptops (wife's and mine) and also plan on getting a Galaxy Note instead of another Laptop.

My question is, which device is gonna do the job better, the Seagate Central or the WD My cloud. I researched both devices, but i need some input on people who have used either one, or better yet has experience with both. Please Advise, and Thanks for your input in advance.

DP

 

[Sonic2k]

I have a Seagate Central.. it works pretty darn well.
Its a full blown little Linux box actually

 

[ITCynic]

Busy backing stuff up now to a new WDMyCloud device for a client. Nice design, software web interface easy to understand but the device is very slow.

The drive has a 1 Gig network interface and my network also has. Using teracopy, copy speeds are 10 megs a second. Copy to a straight hard drive on USB 2 is +/- 30 megs a second.

My personal setup is a spare computer with 3 x 2Tb hard drives which I use as storage on my network including wireless access for my laptop.

The WD MyCloud device is a good idea but if you want more out of your hardware rather use a server type setup, maybe even an HP Microserver would be better.

 

[Sonic2k]

Busy backing stuff up now to a new WDMyCloud device for a client. Nice design, software web interface easy to understand but the device is very slow.

The drive has a 1 Gig network interface and my network also has. Using teracopy, copy speeds are 10 megs a second. Copy to a straight hard drive on USB 2 is +/- 30 megs a second.

My personal setup is a spare computer with 3 x 2Tb hard drives which I use as storage on my network including wireless access for my laptop.

The WD MyCloud device is a good idea but if you want more out of your hardware rather use a server type setup, maybe even an HP Microserver would be better.

Heard a lot of complaints that WD's network drives are slow. Even Garyvdh can comment.
On the flipside, the Seagate Central is surprisingly fast.

If you want more speed, a micro-server is the ticket. I have a network with 5+ smart devices, no issues to report.

 

[DP187]

Thanks Koosi. By any chance are you using the DLNA feature? basically streaming Video in particular to a Smart TV wirelessly? I need to know if this works, and there is no stutter on video playback. I have already setup the Samsung TV to connect to my S4 and my laptop using smart link.

Also have you plugged in another ext HDD into the USB port on the central? does this work seamlessly on the network?

 

[DP187]

This is an extremely small network, and to be honest I am looking at the least expensive way of setting up a centralized storage unit. I was going to buy a 2 bay NAS drive with RAID 1 (which is working out too costly for now, but I already 2nd backup all my stuff on DVD's and store them. My main things here is to make use of DLNA on my smart TV, and to basically keep my photo's, videos and music backed up and in a central place on my network for the wife and I to use.

 

[Sonic2k]

Thanks Koosi. By any chance are you using the DLNA feature? basically streaming Video in particular to a Smart TV wirelessly? I need to know if this works, and there is no stutter on video playback. I have already setup the Samsung TV to connect to my S4 and my laptop using smart link.

Also have you plugged in another ext HDD into the USB port on the central? does this work seamlessly on the network?

Yes I am using the DLNA feature, my Blu-ray player popped up an icon when the drive was installed on the network. It plays from that with no issue. The only issue is the encoding of some of the video files.. but that's what you get from the interwebz LOL.
This drive does not like the ethernet being plugged out while its working, that's the only issue really.

It works with the following:
Samsung Galaxy Note
HP 200 Media Player
Sony Blu-ray player
Samsung TV sets also pick it up (ones I've had in my house to repair for people)

 

[DP187]

Thanks again Koosi. Makro has the 2TB for R1299, probably going to get one this afternoon. Have you connected another ext HDD to the USB port on the Central?

 

[Sonic2k]

Thanks again Koosi. Makro has the 2TB for R1299, probably going to get one this afternoon. Have you connected another ext HDD to the USB port on the Central?

Yes I have, the problem is the external HDD powers down when not being accessed, and that causes issues with the firmware. This happens with those Transcend external HDD that Rectron sells.
With flash drives, it works perfectly.

As for the price, that was the "promotional" price they sold them for over Christmas.

 

[DP187]

cool stuff Koosi. They have it on promo again, i think it's their Easter promo. Was going to buy it at incredible connection yesterday at R2399.95 :wtf:Lucky i wanted to research it online first and did not just rush into it.

 

[DP187]

Just my update regarding this for anyone who may be interested in a cheap solution for NAS drives.

I purchased the Seagate Central yesterday. Setting it up was very easy. It works seamlessly with my network, DLNA works perfectly with my TV, the android app works great.

My only gripes are
1. transfer speeds are low. I was getting around 6MB/s - 9MB/s, but i was working on a wireless network and transfering from another ext HDD via USB, then Wireless to the Central.
2. I tried downloading a few pics from the Central onto my cellphone via the mobile app, I click on download, and I
have no idea/or even know if it did download onto my phone. I need to double check this though.
3. I connected another ext HDD via the USB port on the Central itself, from a computer you can see the drive and it's files, but connecting via DLNA via the TV does not work. I cannot see the drive at all and all my videos are on there Even from the mobile app I cannot access the second ext HDD.
4. Also when i did connect via the laptop the files were read only. I could not edit/move/delete any of the files. Tried changing the security properties on the secondary ext HDD connected via USB and this does not work at all. Maybe someone can advise on this?

I know it sounds like I am complaining alot about the Central but honestly I am not. I am actually fairly happy with it. I wanted a central location for my personal stuff, accessible between my wife and I, I wanted something that connects to my android and TV seamlessly. Connection to the TV is actually pretty quick, probably because both are on a wired network. The mobile app is fantastic, I have my whole music library on my cellphone, along with every photo I have taken in the last 14 years . My other ext HDD which has all my movies and series connects directly to the TV via a USB port and that has been working out for me so I am not too perturbed about that. All in all I think it was a good buy, and recommend it to anyone looking for a cheap and basic NAS solution.

 

[Bosvark@]

Collected a WD My cloud on Thursday. So far very good. Just wish I went for a larger drive...

Would be nice if it had more redundancy built in e.g. RAID without breaking the bank.