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I recently bought the Synology DS210J NAS Box plus a couple of Seagate Barracuda ST32000542AS 2TB 3.5″ SATA II Hard Drive, this was to give me a shared network storage space of 4TB (well under 4TB once formatted) and be able to store all of my data requirements for now and in the future. I agree that 4TB will be used up and as this is only a 2Bay device – no way to expand internally but we shall cross that bridge when we come to it.
Posts tagged NAS
Synology DS210J NAS Device
Goodbye Pogoplug – Hello proper NAS
Today I finally had enough of this device they call the Pogoplug and went back to the store to explain I needed my money back. It was hard to explain that although it was not broke, it did not do what it was supposed to do and in the end I just agreed with the store clerk and said yes, it was indeed broke. While it does have some use somehow and maybe might suit some people, it was not the device for me. I did email the people at Pogoplug with a link to this site and my thoughts, if they want to send me a review unit for in-depth testing at there expense, then I will continue to report on it but I shall not hold my breath.
PogoPlug – A Tech Review
After seeing various reviews littered about the web and watching video’s of people using and unboxing a pogoplug, there was not enough detailed write up about how it works on a day to day unit rather than just something to shares your files across the internet. I had spotted this device in a local store for £79, the retail price was £99, so a saving of £20 to be had. Was this a cheap NAS box that could suit my needs or would it turn out to be something slow and unusable.
Icy Box Dual Disk RAID Gigabit NAS IB-NAS3221-B
I have been looking into NAS and this one device I have seen which interests me. The website is HERE and we shall go through what it is, what it does and why you might want one (or something similar). First of all let us explain that NAS is Network attached Storage and this allows a box dedicated to sharing space across the network so that any computer can get at the information stored. Some boxes just share the drives but some come with a whole range of extras such as Web Server, Torrent client and iTunes Server.
Acer Aspire E700 NAS Box
As per my other post abut NAS Drives – yesterday I took it upon myself to build a NAS box from parts I already had and thus save myself spending any money. The goal if you recall was to have a system that was able to be upgraded in space later such as adding 1TB or larger Harddrives as needs arose. This journey took a while to get everything ready and was the end result worth the effort involved?
Network Attached Storage – DIY or PreBuilt?
If you own more than one computer, you may find that some items would just work better if they were held in one central location and each computer could access these files no matter which computer was on – such as your MP3 Collection for example. This can take the form of dedicating one computer as a server if you like and left on 24/7, you could build your own NAS box or buy one of the many off the shelf – all are good but have a downside normally. I plan on jotting down my thoughts to give each idea a good going over and seeing how it look at the end – join me on my journey into NAS.
Multi Computer organisation
I am going to try and explain what I have learned over the many years of using many computers – to try and present what I feel is a good layout for your media so that you stop loosing important files by silly mistakes. While this is not the be all and end all of how to use a computer, it will help you stop having duplicates, needing to keep backing up multiple times and pay for services online.
Sarotech Gigabit Raid Network Drive 2000GB 2TB
This is the ultimate network hard drive. Simply connect the unit to your PC via USB or directly to your router, switch or hub via Ethernet and you’ve got plenty of room to back up and save your valuable data, music, photos and movies and instantly share them with everyone else on the network.
As well as FTP and Samba, the drive can act as your iTunes server – this way you do not need a computer to server your music to iTunes compatible devices. Add to that the ability to use it as a BitTorrent client to download your torrents without the need of a computer and the Print server to share your USB printer with anyone on the network and you end up with a very complete and stable must have network drive.
Furthermore with the built in Raid, setting up the drive as a safe mirrored data vault or a performance file server is entirely your choice making this one of the most versatile stand alone network storage appliance.
Darkstar USB-to-NAS Bit Torrent Magic Single Port
I spotted this device on ARIA and the idea sounds good, it allows you to plug in a USB Hard drive at one end, A Network lead on the other (which would go to your router let us say) and now you have a NAS box but also combined with this is a Bitorrent client which is on 24/7 and allows you to queue up and download torrents to the attached HD. The Price is: £32.14 inc. VAT- seems cheap enough right?
Belkin Network USB Hub
I spotted this device while out some time ago and the idea looked good, plug in various USB Devices such as Hard Drives, Printers and the like and have them shared out across the network. I choose not to buy this device at the time even if it sounded like what I needed as I like to make sure the device does what I think it should do.
