Which NAS do list members prefer?

[fcormier]

And here I am with hard drives inside my primary machine like some ludite...

I thought you just used an old machine you have kicking around for a NAS? Unless you suddenly need purpose built performance. I was actually thinking of doing this very thing with an old machine one of these times. My main Mac Pro tower has 4 3.5" and 2 5.5" drive bays though so I'm not short on space.

Any opinions on WD vs Seagate nowadays? (Or anyone else. Toshiba?)
My sense from reading reviews, using them myself, and servicing other machines is 6 of one and a half dozen of the other at this point. In other words, but the enterprise model with the 5 year warranty with the best price today. WD isn't even making their 'Black' models anymore. I don't see anyone just reading Seagate the riot act anymore either.

Anyway, the last drive pair I just bought was a Seagate 10TB Exos 7200rpm and then a WD 10TB Elements USB for its backup.

Like I said previously, I'm using an old computer with OpenMediaVault as a NAS.

As for drives, my NAS was originally equipped with four WD Red 6TB drives. In a four month period, three out of four died (only one was still under warranty). I replaced the failed WD Red drives with Seagate Ironwolf drives. All those are NAS specific drives.

 

[jimfisheye]

All my NAS hard drives are HGST Enterprise-rated drives. They are very reliable. I had a bad experience with Seagate a few years ago and won't buy them.

That's funny. I remember when Hitachi turned into HGST and I saw a string of drive failures from them. See what I'm saying?

I don't know...
I'm shopping for enterprise grade with 5 year warranty and at least a recognizable name at present. We'll see what happens.

 

[gene_stl]

I have usually left my computers on 24/7 . I got my first one at home in 1990 (very late actually considering my first Fortran course was 1968. I also had an S100 CP/M system at work in 1978)
I have only ever had one Hard Drive Failure that I can recall. It happened to be a Western Diegitial. But I don't hold it against them. I think they all can have failures and we tend to remember what our own experiences have been.

Most of my video content is on DVD but I am gradually getting some Blu Rays though since physical media is somewhat going away perhaps I will never have so many BDs. I don't find handling physical media objectionable but I also can see the advantage of both having it backed up , and also having it available at the touch of a screen.

I am interested in running back ups of my two computers in case I somehow catch some malware or have a HD failure again.

 

[LuvMyQuad]

I don't find handling physical media objectionable but I also can see the advantage of both having it backed up , and also having it available at the touch of a screen.

I am interested in running back ups of my two computers in case I somehow catch some malware or have a HD failure again.

Pretty much any network connected NAS will do that for you.

I have come to prefer file based playback by a wide margin. No disc handling, instant selection, and lyrics presentation for most tracks. Even if the original disc versions did not include lyric sheets !!

 

[Madman Riley]

QNAP?

I have 2 8-bay QNAPs and, before them, 2 5-bay QNAPs. I prefer them because I am comfortable with the QNAP environment.

From Steve Gibson's podcast (Security Now! #813 - 04-06-21) this excerpt from his "Show notes" https://www.grc.com/sn/sn-813-notes.pdf

QNAP — Just Say No!
For this podcast, I've been trying to avoid talking about QNAP, sort like I try to avoid talking about ransomware. By this point we all know that it exists and it's bad, and “what are ya gonna do?” But every indication is that QNAP is a BAD company which produces BAD — meaning insecure and in many cases insecurable — products.

Yet they are the #1 Chinese supplier of Network Attached Storage (NAS) devices and they hold, by some accounts, about a 69% share of the NAS market globally. So, when something really extra bad happens, and continues to happen, we have to talk about it here.

Few things are more important than the security of Network attached storage. It's "Network" and it's "Attached" and it's "Storage." Presumably it's storing things that its users might like to be kept secure and perhaps even confidential. And given that the new attacks are "pivot style" where an attacker gets into a device on a private network LAN boundary which forms a bridge between that private LAN and the public Internet, it's not so much that someone's laundry list might become public as that an intruder can leverage their position on such appliances as just the start of much more devastating and serious intrusions.

So what happened?

Security researchers at SAM Seamless Networks published their report last Wednesday containing news that they had been sitting on for months in an attempt to be responsible.
But QNAP was not. New vulnerabilities discovered allow access to user data and complete takeover - SAM Seamless Network
SAM's report is titled: “New Vulnerabilities Allow Complete Device Takeover"

In summary, the SAM team reported two serious vulnerabilities to QNAP on October 12, 2020.
Other than an "automatic reply with ticket number" on Halloween, it wasn't until January 26th -- when the team notified QNAP that the "grace period" for public exposure of the vulnerabilities was soon to expire -- that QNAP's Helpdesk said, "the problem is confirmed but still in progress."

The grace period expired on February 12, 2021.
And still the SAM researchers held off publicly posting their findings another 6 weeks, until March 31st!

Steve concludes:

Hopefully, this public disclosure may finally work to get QNAP’s long overdue attention. No good would come from SAM’s more full disclosure. Given the nature of attacks, I’d argue that there would never be any reason for them to disclose. But if they don’t convincingly threaten to do so, it appears that QNAP’s irresponsible behavior will continue.

As I started out by saying, I’ve been avoiding talking about QNAP and have already let many similar stories go uncovered here. And PLEASE everyone take this to heart when you’re choosing a NAS supplier. And if you already have QNAP devices, find some use for it inside your network. Remove it from the public Internet.

To be honest, there is not a lot to them as far as daily interaction. You seldom have to do anything with/to the NAS. I have a 4 bay QNAP.


2. Get a brand that provides regular updates. Both QNAP and Synology offer frequent firmware updates and OS patches. You still have to worry about viruses and such infecting the NAS. Frequent updates help with this. The same advise goes for modems.

Sure would be interested in YOUR take on Steve Gibson's thoughts!

 

[gene_stl]

I am glad to see that Steve Gibson is still around.

 

[gene_stl]

I have come to prefer file based playback by a wide margin. No disc handling, instant selection, and lyrics presentation for most tracks. Even if the original disc versions did not include lyric sheets !!

One thing I have noticed is that as my disc collection grows it becomes a bit harder to put my hands on a particular disc than it used to be.

 

[LuvMyQuad]

One thing I have noticed is that as my disc collection grows it becomes a bit harder to put my hands on a particular disc than it used to be.

Most of my disks are in storage totes in my utility room.

 

[fcormier]

That's funny. I remember when Hitachi turned into HGST and I saw a string of drive failures from them. See what I'm saying?

I don't know...
I'm shopping for enterprise grade with 5 year warranty and at least a recognizable name at present. We'll see what happens.

I remember when Hitachi bought the storage division of IBM, manufacturer of the DeskStar drives (DeathStar in reality) to which I lost 30 GB of data in 2003 (all the pictures, music and schoolwork I had) which was not backed up (disk space was expensive back then and I was a student). I swore to never get a drive from them again and the year after, I made my first file server with RAID 1 disks (before NAS became a common term) when I finished school and got a full time job. It started with 80 GB, then 160 GB, then 2 TB and now 12 TB.

 

[Madman Riley]

Sometimes I'll just read Steve Gibson's full notes but listening to the podcasts is great when cleaning the kitchen or otherwise distracted with domestic chores!
Quite a bit more in that podcast:

I am glad to see that Steve Gibson is still around.

Yeah, not only still around but as valuable as ever -- ESPECIALLY on security these days!

I tried (and failed) to point J.Pupster in Steve's direction, recommending Gibson's phenomenal SpinRite software first Possible HDD going bad-maybe? for resolving his HDD problems instead of going through all the time-consuming hoops.

Oh, well...maybe all it takes is seeing it in action.

 

[HomerJAU]

Also note that you will want to run a RAID scheme, which can double the storage requirements depending on the RAID scheme chosen (ie: 2TB will be required to store 1TB + its mirrored backup copy).

RAID is a must. It will allow one disc to fail without losing any data. There are different RAID levels (two most common):

RAID 1: 2 discs, with 1 the 2nd a duplicate of first. (Like @LuvMyQuad ).Your usable space is 1/2 the total
RAiD 5: 3 or more discs. Date is duolicated across all discs. Your usable space is total. - 1 disc. I use this with 3 drives (examples: 3 x 10TB gives 20TB usable - 4 x 10TB gives 30TB usable.

I think RAID 5 gives a better compromise between price and protection.

I know some that do RAID 5 with 6 drives which protects against 1 drive failure, but the more discs the higher the possibility that 2 drives will fail, causing a loss of everything. So I RAID 5 in both my 12 bay and 6 bay NASs.

RAID 6 can a handle 2 drive failure but your useable space is Total - 2 x Disc

 

[fizzywiggs41]

Scratched my knoggin trying to figure out what type of Quad Equipment or Hardware a NAS was.

Kinda figured it must be computer adaptive from reading the posts , so I googled it. NETWORK ATTACHED STORAGE.

Silly me thinking it was some Quad or Surround Equipment (Hardware). Hope no one else reading that title gets confused.

 

[LuvMyQuad]

RAID is a must. It will allow one disc to fail without losing any data. There are different RAID levels (two most common):

RAID 1: 2 discs, with 1 the 2nd a duplicate of first. (Like @LuvMyQuad ).Your usable space is 1/2 the total
RAiD 5: 3 or more discs. Date is duolicated across all discs. Your usable space is total. - 1 disc. I use this with 3 drives (examples: 3 x 10TB gives 20TB usable - 4 x 10TB gives 30TB usable.

I think RAID 5 gives a better compromise between price and protection.

I know some that do RAID 5 with 6 drives which protects against 1 drive failure, but the more discs the higher the possibility that 2 drives will fail, causing a loss of everything. So I RAID 5 in both my 12 bay and 6 bay NASs.

RAID 6 can a handle 2 drive failure but your useable space is Total - 2 x Disc

Actually when I installed the final two drives (4 total) to the NAS, it suggested I configure it to RAID 5, which I did. It took about 8 hrs.

 

[gene_stl]

Scratched my knoggin trying to figure out what type of Quad Equipment or Hardware a NAS was.

Kinda figured it must be computer adaptive from reading the posts , so I googled it. NETWORK ATTACHED STORAGE.

Silly me thinking it was some Quad or Surround Equipment (Hardware). Hope no one else reading that title gets confused.

Sorry about that. It actually took me a while to get the terms straight a while back. Maybe two years ago.

A question about RAID.

Are the files stored in a Windows compatible format. Can you just put the drive in another computer and read them.
I had bad experiences with DOS "Backup and Restore" and also Backup software. I developed a preference for just having plain hard drives added to the computer and storing the files in FAT or NTFS or whatever is current. Or copying folders to CDs and DVDs

If one of your RAID drives fails, do you have to come up with an identical one or just one that has the same or more capacity.

 

[gene_stl]

Sometimes I'll just read Steve Gibson's full notes but listening to the podcasts is great when cleaning the kitchen or otherwise distracted with domestic chores!
Quite a bit more in that podcast:
View attachment 66817



Yeah, not only still around but as valuable as ever -- ESPECIALLY on security these days!

I tried (and failed) to point J.Pupster in Steve's direction, recommending Gibson's phenomenal SpinRite software first Possible HDD going bad-maybe? for resolving his HDD problems instead of going through all the time-consuming hoops.

Oh, well...maybe all it takes is seeing it in action.

View attachment 66820


View attachment 66818

View attachment 66821

Shows you how old I am getting. I couldn't remember the name "Spin Rite" even though I used it many times when HD would be suspected.

Is there a security scandal with Ubiquiti?? I need to know about that if it includes the Amplifi Mesh Network.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/3/31/...response-whistleblower-cybersecurity-incident
https://krebsonsecurity.com/2021/03/whistleblower-ubiquiti-breach-catastrophic/
As RoseAnne Roseanadana used to say; "It's always something!"

 

[fizzywiggs41]

Sorry about that. It actually took me a while to get the terms straight a while back. Maybe two years ago.

That's ok , Gene.

Guess I'm just "Living In The Past".

Ranting over with. Just wanted to hear myself think .

 

[fcormier]

I stick with RAID 1 because from what I read, if a drive fails in a RAID 5 array with large disks, it takes way too long to rebuild. I have a secondary NAS for testing, it has 4x 160 GB drives in RAID 5 and it takes several hours to rebuild. I don't remember how much time, but I can unreliably say that it takes as much time rebuilding a 480 GB RAID 5 array as a 6 TB RAID 1 array.

 

[LuvMyQuad]

Sorry about that. It actually took me a while to get the terms straight a while back. Maybe two years ago.

A question about RAID.

Are the files stored in a Windows compatible format. Can you just put the drive in another computer and read them.
I had bad experiences with DOS "Backup and Restore" and also Backup software. I developed a preference for just having plain hard drives added to the computer and storing the files in FAT or NTFS or whatever is current. Or copying folders to CDs and DVDs

If one of your RAID drives fails, do you have to come up with an identical one or just one that has the same or more capacity.

Mine does not require identical drives.

Homer will hopefully chime in on this, and it may depend on the RAID scheme chosen. But the RAID volume may well be a disc image, So it would need to be copied to a new drive... is my suspicion. I also keep a large, portable USB HDD plugged into the NAS for backups. That may well be the best way to restore everything. I hope I never have to find out.

 

[Madman Riley]

Shows you how old I am getting. I couldn't remember the name "Spin Rite" even though I used it many times when HD would be suspected.

Is there a security scandal with Ubiquiti?? I need to know about that if it includes the Amplifi Mesh Network,
......
As RoseAnne Roseanadana used to say; "It's always something!"

From Steve's 'Security Now' Show Notes:

Security News
The Ubiquiti Coverup
.....
With many of our IoT devices phoning home to Chinese cloud
services, there can be no true security if those devices are allowed to sit on the same network as the family's or small business's LAN.
IoT devices =MUST= be given their own isolated network.

And at the time the Ubiquity was the only cost effective solution for doing that. Today, many consumer WiFi routers have one or two guest channels which support explicit inter-network isolation. When I'm unable to reach my Sonos speakers from my iPad it's because my iPad is on the wrong WiFi.

Since we so often talked about Ubiquity, it should be no surprise that many of our listeners have made sure that I knew of the mess that has recently erupted. It was fresh last week as this podcast was taking shape, and it seemed as though Brian Krebs, who was in the middle of it all, was still getting to the bottom of what was going on.

We know much more today:
It now appears clear that Ubiquiti has been covering up the extreme severity of a data breach that put their customers’ networks at significant risk of unauthorized access.

Brian Krebs has cited an internal and unnamed whistleblower from within Ubiquity. In January, Ubiquity seriously downplayed what it said was <quote> “unauthorized access to certain of our information technology systems hosted by a third-party cloud provider.”

While that was literally correct, it was also quite vague. The notice said that, while there was no evidence the intruders accessed user data, the company couldn’t rule out the possibility that they obtained users’ names, email addresses, cryptographically hashed passwords, addresses, and phone numbers.

-----

There's quite a bit more in the 'Security Now' show notes here https://www.grc.com/sn/sn-813-notes.pdf

 

[esimms86]

I had a QNAP system but it failed on me so I switched to Synology DS412+ and never looked back. Has worked great for over a decade with no issues. Of course, this is all just one anecdotal account and it should be viewed as such.