Robbie:

I found your incredible YouTube channel & website by searching for PLEX help topics. What an excellent resource!!

I'm hoping you can weigh in on my questions!

I have an extensive movie and music collection scattered among 4 Netgear ReadyNAS's:

RN516: Total volume 18TB, which holds 17TB of BluRay movies, in MKV containers; No 4K movies yet; RSync backups pushed to RNDP6350.

RNDP6350 ReadyNAS Pro (running OS6): Movie backup NAS (18TB total volume) with files at 17TB

RN214 - Approx. 2TB of high resolution FLAC music files feeding a SonicOrbiter ROON Server (https://www.smallgreencomputer.com/collections/audio-server/products/sonictransporter-roon-server-hqplayer?variant=31106712502341); this NAS also contains digital photos; Total volume of 11TB

RN102: 4TB NAS is Music NAS backup; 2TB in backup files

As you can see, this unwieldy setup has grown over the last 10 years. I'm rapidly running out of space on the ReadyNAS movie NAS's and have ordered 2 16TB drives to expand each NAS for extra space on an emergency basis.

I'm running X-RAID in a RAID-5 configuration. At one time, I ran Plex Media Server from the RN516 but have since moved this to the SonicOrbiter i9.

The Sonore SonicOrbiter i9 is really built for ROON but is also promoted as a PLEX Server. That was a mistake as I'm having issues running PLEX from it.

I only run Direct Play to the various screens in the house. I'm still experiencing a lot of buffering. If Direct Stream is checked off, movies simply will not play on the Plex clients.

I also plan to buy a NVIDIA Shield Pro at some point as a PLEX client/Netflix/Amazon streamer for my LG OLED screen.

So, I'm thinking it's time to replace all 4 Netgear NAS's with a new QNAP TVS-h1288X as it seems that QuTS Hero is the future OS for QNAP. I want a NAS that is most suitable for future-proofing.

The ReadyNAS will permit me to swap out one 4TB drive with a 16TB drive at a time. It will take several days to resync each drive but I will eventually have an expanded volume. This is a great feature as it makes volume expansion affordable.

Can you tell me if QNAP has the same ability as ReadyNAS? I'm hoping I can start with 4 bays with 4 TB drives and 2 bays with 16TB drives, slowly adding more 16 TB drives as budget permits. Would that work?

I'd like to replace using the STi9 as a Plex Media Server. I know it will be a nightmare moving PMS again ... this time from a Linux box (STi9) to QNAP NAS. I had no luck moving the metadata files from the ReadyNAS to the STi9 so ended up MANUALLY rebuilding the Collections library, etc ... what a headache.

Regardless, I am prepared for more pain ahead moving PMS from SonicTransporter to a powerful NAS that won't run out of space and has plenty of horsepower to play 4K files in the future.

The ReadyNAS's have been super-reliable workhorses for the last 10+ years. I'm hoping an investment in a new NAS, designed to run PMS, will do the same.

One more question: There are many advocates out there who recommend building your own NAS and PMS using UnRaid. While I'm proficient with hardware, I am very green with Linux systems. Regardless, I would appreciate an objective opinion about this.

Lastly, once a new QNAP PMS NAS is built and setup, what do you recommend for backups? Do I retain the RN516 and use it purely for backups from the QNAP, via RSync? Or, do I build a Unraid server from spare old PC's, etc for the backups only?

Anyway, I look forward to your opinion on this. Much appreciated.

All the best during the Holiday Season!

Cheers,
Herb ...

Discuss: Synology DSM vs QNAP QuTS Hero NAS - Virtual Machine Deployment <br><iframe width='560' height='315' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/sMXxAyIUQJ4' frameborder='0' allow='accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture' allowfullscreen></iframe>

Looking for a 6 Bay NAS (10TB HDD) with 10G UTP network and NVME for cache. I was erring towards QNAP, but a compatriot has complained about their support.

Currently running HP Microserver Gen8 (FreeNAS) and Synology DS411j

Discuss: Synology DSM vs QNAP QuTS Hero NAS - Surveillance and NVR <br><iframe width='560' height='315' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/zY3RCNTnJx4' frameborder='0' allow='accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture' allowfullscreen></iframe>

Hi, I'm very much an amateur at this NAS thing but love the potential and I want to learn more. Your website and videos have been instrumental! I've been using a synology DS216+II with 2 6TB HDD in RAID1 configuration and have run out of room and my system is slower than I want so I decided to make a big upgrade to the synology DS1621+. My question is about setting up the new system once it arrives. Do all of my new drives also need to be 6TB or can I populate it with 4TB HDD? I was thinking of getting four of the 4TB HDD that have a drive speed of 7200rpm and I was hoping that I could somehow transfer the data to those in either a RAID 5 or SHR configuration (more likely would do SHR if that is possible) and possibly get rid of the older/slower 6TB drives. Is this even possible? Or do I need to keep the older 6TB drives in the mix (I will have 6 bays so I guess I could...is there a downside to that?). l was hoping not to have to spend the extra money in buying all 6TB drives but will if I have no option.
Thanks! And pardon my ignorance.

Nice article. I do have a question regarding the processor. I'm looking at the AS5202T for my home network. I see the Celeron processor advertised as 2 core, but your article describes it as quad core. Can you explain the discrepancy?

Thanks for your passion in this area. Very helpful for those of us who are wading into this new area.

Allen

I'm planning on setting up a Roon Core server and want to store the Music Library on a NAS. I currently have a Thecus N4200PRO with 4 3TB WD drives in a RAID 5 configuration. I'm not sure Thecus is the best NAS provider for this purpose. There's a site (https://roononnas.org/en/roon-on-nas/ focused on setting up a Roon NAS and they suggest Asustor, QNAP & Synology products. Also, I've had my current NAS for over 5 years, it was set up for local backup of PC's & Mac's. So now I'm expanding it purpose and plan to rip and store my CD collection on it. If necessary or advisable, I'd buy a new NAS box and &quot;move&quot; my 4 WD drives to it and set it up for Roon service. You're advice would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your consideration, David

Discuss: NAS History - Synology DS213air NAS from 2012 <br><iframe width='560' height='315' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/G6CSdQA5gM4' frameborder='0' allow='accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture' allowfullscreen></iframe>

Hi,

I am in need of a NAS'device with the possibility to handle both windows, but mainly mac, for video post production purposes.

I will be handling large files over fileshare protocol AFP and SMB, and I have the possibility to change jumboframes in the environment.
I've been very interested in the ZFS devices, however, I've also been told that you can't expand a RAID group with new disks, hence my questions below.

Will I be able to use QuTS Hero (ZFS) to add a new Raid 1 group to an already created striped pool of RAID10, hence creating more space on the Striped Pool?
RAID 10 is basically 2x RAID 1 striped.

Technically, I can expand the Storage Pool with 2 disks at the time with RAID 1.


Im looking for a disk-solution which can give me 1500 MB/s read on HDD 7200 RPM spindles. (Sequential read on big files, but more interested on spindle throughput)
I am also looking for a capacity of 60 TB and drive resiliance that can withstand at least 1 disk failure and also not be in the danger of Unrecoverable read errors during rebuild.

Im not afraid of using EXT4 solutions, but Im also keen on data intregrity.
My biggest pain point seems to be the QNAP offering on number of bays before I have to extend to a disk enclosure, which I dont want to start with.

Thank you!

// Emil

I need a NAS for the following purposes:
1. To store FLAC audio files from ripped CD collection to play to Ruark R4 via DLNA.
2. To Store photo collection and site new photos from phones and Cameras
3. To provide a home cloud local shared file store so can access shared files on various home devices
4. If possible to connect to Smart TV USB and appear to be a simple USB storage device for Recording off air by the TV (LG LK6100). The manual recommends a USB Flash Drive of 32GB, or USB HDD of 2TB or less. It can read/write NTFS).

I also would like the device to be as silent as possible because the NAS would need to be near my Router and TV, both of which are near my Ruark Audio player.

I don't need to be able to transcode video for playing on mobile devices.

I realize that SSDs will be much more expensive, so wondering how quiet a 2 drive 2TB HDD Raid 1 set-up would be, or whether possibly a single bay NAS that is externally backed up to a noble device of the cloud might be a quieter and more economic option.

Was an IT professional years ago, but have never owned a NAS box.