I was just talking to OD about this the other day, without any immediate conviction. But I've just noticed upon queuing up some more keepers, I really am running ridiculously low on space.
Everything is on my HTPC at the moment. I have a relatively speedy 320GB primary drive, a 2TB drive and a 1TB drive. All are now full. My immediate reaction was to run down to Umart and grab a 2TB but there's no more drive bays, so I'd be replacing the 1TB.
Anyway, I thought I had better consider some long-term options. So I'm after some opinions and suggestions based on your research or personal experience, from the absolute budget options, through to the more comprehensive ones. Ideally, I'd like to ensure my data is always mirrored so if a drive fails I'm not left empty handed.
I'm starting to look at a combined NAS/HTPC. The AGP video card in my current HTPC died this week, just need the DGTEC PVR to die and I can spend money :)
The silverstone unit i grabbed for this: http://gamers-underground.com/tech-chat/29495-multiple-hdd-firewire-enclosures.html was/is excellent - hasn't skipped a beat. It should have a NAS rather than eSATA version.
Based on Jimmy's knowledge that most consumer grade NAS boxes are in fact shit, especially the software they run, he recommends I grab myself a bigger PSU, RAID card, and a case with lots of drive bays - and then convert my HTPC into a more comprehensive file storage solution than what it is now.
And that sounds awesome to me. In terms of flexibility, not having more boxes, and the cost.
the software you use with them is up to you - most will support whatever. that silverstone for eg: i dumped the backup app it shipped with and went back to smartsync. been brilliant. the unit itself is rock solid.
Thecus has a good name but never personally used it. Me personally I just stick with Synology - the software is continually updated and they don't nerf the software on the budget models as it seems to be a common platform across the entire range. I run a single drive Synology with 2TB for plain old backups, though planning to add a WHSv2 box when the final release comes out as well.
For storage just knock together a FreeNAS box. What I did was picked up off OCAU a VIA ITX board for ~25 and a small form factor Lenovo PSU ~30, then a 4 port Promise SATA card for ~30 off ebay (these are all inclusive of postage). I could not be happier :)
I've always wanted to get my hands on a Drobo FS. NAS storage, up to 5 HDDs of any capacity, speed or manufacturer. Hot-swappable. Automatic RAID with parity. You could literally just pull the drives out of your PC or other enclosures and stick them all in this. You'd need to back them up somewhere first though since this thing reformats them when they're first installed, but you could do it one drive at a time.
Still leaning towards beefing up my HTPC. Better performance than those NAS options, local storage instead of network storage, and more flexibility in terms of how it operates and what else I can have it do.
I bought the n7700 a bit over a year ago and it's fantastic, was a bit steep but the build quality is pretty damn good and I've yet to fault one aspect of it.
Ok for that price it's nearly viable. Still, got to add drives to that cost though.
Actually I've just realised that you guys have ISP quotas that make that kind of storage a realistic requirement. I'll stick to my method of backing up all my media in other people's hard drives.
mm that's a pretty nice price, I paid a lot more :( maybe I'll get another and put all the 1TB drives I'm taking out of my current one and put them in a new one :D Would like to see how it goes when adding them together, everything else has been pretty easy.
EDIT: Here's one for a 100 bucks less, it's not the n7700+ but if you're never going to upgrade to the 10gb NIC there's no difference
System Specifications ?Quanmax Industrial KEEX-2030 Atom 3.5" Mainboard (Intel Atom N270) ?2GB Crucial DDR2 PC2-5300 SODIMM ?Highpoint RocketRAID 2680 ?Serener 120w DC-DC PSU ?8x 2TB Western Digital Caviar Green 3.5" HDD ?320GB Western Digital Scorpio Black 2.5" HDD ?30GB OCZ Vertex Series SSD
The Silverstone GD01 has six drive bays, but is aesthetically questionable. There didn't seem to be any vibration dampening device on the hard drive bay either...
I use a Lian-Li A10B, has 5 Drive bays but 2x5.25" bays can easily be converted to 3x3.5" bays with the Lian Li adapter kit (Which are only like $20) so I currently have 8 drive bays and could easily expand that out to 11.
Oh FYI, after some research and recommendations, the raid card I'm getting is the Adaptec RAID 2820SA.
Then getting an additional four 2TB WD drives (five total). The fifth will be parity in a raid 5 setup (8TB usable space). Finally I'll have my speedy 320gb as my OS drive.
Will need a 650w PSU, but will get a 750w anyway. Silverstone's are about "50 for that (reliable, efficient).
Silverstone are the only guys doing HTPC cases with at least 6x 3.5" + at least 1 5.25" - and their cases look absolutely horrid. The best of the bunch is the LC20B-M, but it looks to be sold out everywhere (discontinued?). I can get it on eBay. Otherwise, I'd probably get this: Silverstone LC17 Black [LC17-B] - "19.00 : PC Case Gear
Edit: ugh. They're so ugly. Might get one of these instead: Corsair Graphite 600T Case [CC600T] - $259.00 : PC Case Gear
Or you could spend the extra and get a n7700 which has easy drive mounting, everything inside and installed for really not that much more when you think about it? I went down this exact path not that long ago and to be honest I would do it exactly the same again if in that position, plus you can change the processor to dual core and more ram if any of those things are a problem, lots of people do it no problem
Quote from feary;390787: Or you could spend the extra and get a n7700 which has easy drive mounting, everything inside and installed for really not that much more when you think about it?
If I get the 8-port RAID card with a new case/psu, it's actually going to cost the same as the n7700. But it'll be worth it as far as I'm concerned.
Ultimately, local storage > network storage in my opinion. I see no reason to have a seperate, dedicated network attached file serving device, when my HTPC (the device reading and writing to this storage) with good RAID card can do that same job just as well, with better performance, as well as everything else it already does.
I'm not saying you should - each to their own, but this sounds way better for my wants and needs.
I WOULDNT recommend getting a QNAP nas from what ive been through. I got a 809 Pro for work. I am currently on my 3rd for the year. First one DOA, second one dropped a HDD slot that never came back, and the third one hasnt had much use yet so i cant tell you whether this one will last. Each time they were sent back to almost 2 months before i had another one.
For the money i spent i should have built my own and fucked around with freenas or something else ( or like every one said last time buy a thecus) and saved my company a lot of money.
Quote from Bad Crispy;390812: Looks like you are on your way to what you want.
I WOULDNT recommend getting a QNAP nas from what ive been through. I got a 809 Pro for work. I am currently on my 3rd for the year. First one DOA, second one dropped a HDD slot that never came back, and the third one hasnt had much use yet so i cant tell you whether this one will last. Each time they were sent back to almost 2 months before i had another one.
For the money i spent i should have built my own and fucked around with freenas or something else ( or like every one said last time buy a thecus) and saved my company a lot of money.
MMM this is why jimmy isn't a fan of the soho/smb grade NAS. I sold a few qnaps at my last job. They sounded great, but when it comes to using them... this feature doesnt work quite right, flash updates constantly etc etc. Also dealt with NAS's from heaps of other vendors - all unimpressive experiences. Haven't had a Thecus experience to share though so they might be a winner - but i am eternally skeptical.
I appreciate that the soho/smb nas looks nice and fits in the corner BUT you can build your own file server/network storage for the same price or cheaper. It is more flexible, more reliable and you can run any OS you like on it. For me it doesnt matter that the box is slightly larger... im not buying it for its asthetics... When you start talking about features... lots of the soho/smb nas's have built-in FTP/torrent/blahblah/SCSI etc. All of these can be achieved from a variety of linux/windows OS's. There are also plenty linux based SAN/NAS OS's out there if you really want a storage server that acts like a SAN/NAS.
Good luck with the Thecus purchases guys - hope they perform better than the rest...
SilverStone LC13-E Black [LC13B-E] - "29.00 : PC Case Gear
I've realised that I can take the quiet 650W PSU I already have in the current box and spend the cash on a bigger case for more HDD space. This case in on my short list but I've not given up looking just yet either.
I have decided not to bother with VFD's though, so that'll help.