For those of you that have a NAS in your place of living what path did you take? I've been thinking about going the DIY route with UnRaid because of the features and how it's geared more towards media use but then I'd be my own tech support on it. The con of pre-built though is for the cost I'd limiting myself to 2-3 bay and relying on traditional Raid.
If you picked one over the other, why?
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Pre-built or DIY NAS?
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frankspin's pick
Pre-built. HP WHS. Before that, a whole bunch of Linux-based NASs
Reason: Silence, compactness.
Reason: Silence, compactness.
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frankspin's pick
i thought about this last year then i got a great deal on Drobo FS.
The drobo was easy to use and great set up out of the box. basically slot the drives and i was up and running.
I have my 4TB i tunes library on it and have had no problems with it so far.
I did look at the HP WHS a couple years back and actually went so far as to buy it. I ended up taking it back. i liked the box and design but it was too slow for me i think had i chosen the top of the line instead of the bottom i may have still have had the box today.
so to answer your question i have gone pre built both times and have not regretted it. the Drobo support has been stellar and the ease of set up and use has been great.
now if i had the box and the time to set one up myself i would have considered it. but with the prebuilt it was unbox and start using.
The drobo was easy to use and great set up out of the box. basically slot the drives and i was up and running.
I have my 4TB i tunes library on it and have had no problems with it so far.
I did look at the HP WHS a couple years back and actually went so far as to buy it. I ended up taking it back. i liked the box and design but it was too slow for me i think had i chosen the top of the line instead of the bottom i may have still have had the box today.
so to answer your question i have gone pre built both times and have not regretted it. the Drobo support has been stellar and the ease of set up and use has been great.
now if i had the box and the time to set one up myself i would have considered it. but with the prebuilt it was unbox and start using.
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I actually have both - a simple 2-bay D-Link box (I forget the exact model #, DN-23 or something close to that) and a DIY box that was running FreeNAS but will be redone with UnRAID whenever I stop being lazy
I went with the pre-fab box as a way to transfer files from one system to another and to download large content. I built a couple of my systems without much extra storage, so the D-Link NAS is their storage drive. This way, everything I need is in one place. The problem is that I'm limited to 2 drives and whatever storage I can squeeze out of that.
So, I built a file server to store my truly massive amounts of media - movies, music, pictures. This also acts as the repository my XBMC box streams from.
I find i use the D-Link box as more of a safe keeping place for important files as well. Stuff I don't want in dropbox, but need a copy of somewhere. If my apartment burst into flames I'd be tucking the D-Link box under one arm and my macbook air under the other
I went with the pre-fab box as a way to transfer files from one system to another and to download large content. I built a couple of my systems without much extra storage, so the D-Link NAS is their storage drive. This way, everything I need is in one place. The problem is that I'm limited to 2 drives and whatever storage I can squeeze out of that.
So, I built a file server to store my truly massive amounts of media - movies, music, pictures. This also acts as the repository my XBMC box streams from.
I find i use the D-Link box as more of a safe keeping place for important files as well. Stuff I don't want in dropbox, but need a copy of somewhere. If my apartment burst into flames I'd be tucking the D-Link box under one arm and my macbook air under the other
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