Running a DS1821+ here, non Synology RAM & disk.
No issues here, the Synology statement about their disks & RAM is more for the rack based solutions.
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I read disk cartification affects all Plus enclosure models from DS225+ onwards. Most popular enclosure for home NAS most likely (2bay).
However the impact is more limited if you plug in drives from an older enclosure, or are using SSD.
WD Red Plus are certified and they are excellent spinny disks.
Looks like there are no certified third party SSDs for Plus enclosures. Very naughty.
There arnāt only skinny ones
Absolutely right Orac
Also important to factor in restore time as well - something you only discover when you actually have a failure. I had two drives fail on my main NAS a couple of years ago. I had two backups (one NAS on site and a NAS offsite at a family memberās house) updated daily automatically. And some key files were also backed up to cloud.
I had forgotten to monitor the local backup machine and it had reached 90%+ utilisation. Restoring from that local backup became a nightmare as it needed more disc capacity before it would operate properly. It was taking days and days to sort itself out before I could start.
Restoring from cloud would have taken months given my broadband speeds at the time. In the end I was fortunate to be able to bring the offsite NAS home and restore from that. I monitor the backup machines regularly now.
RAID drives will fail. It is only a matter of time. In fact it is more probable given you have more drives for the same disk capacity. And SSDās are also likely to fail as well. Had two of those go over the years. Mean time to failure is higher for SSD but it is still going to happen.
A reliable validated backup plan is key. A strength of Synology is their inbuilt backup technologies. Lots of choices that can be setup to run automatically and warn you if the backup fails. They also have local file versioning and backup versioning that should be switched on to protect against file corruption and / or ransomware attacks. And security features like two factor authentication, push messaging for login attempts/backup failure etc.
If I didnāt have synology I would personally want something with similar backup and security capabilities.
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Hi @badger1
You have described better than I some of the more critical aspects of a good backup regime. Sorry to hear about your difficulties whilst undertaking your restore process. At least you did have the backups available to you. It does however show the need as you say āto have a validated restore processā. I believe that the number of folks who actually validate their backups by undertaking a restore is pretty low.
I also use synology as part of my backup regime and am happy with their products.
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I have read with great interest all the comments and useful guidance. I wish I had the time to build and experiment but I donāt really, I have a kitchen to fit, and a house to finish as well as a full time job (I know).
So I looked on a well known website for options and found this - UGREEN NASync DXP2800
Does anyone have any opinions either way as to uGREEN in general and the DXP2800 in particular.
My thoughts are this - 2xNVME for raid NAS and the main slots as back up?
Again all advice is appreciated - this would be a significant investment to get it wrong!
The UGREEN NASync DXP2800 is āonlyā Ā£40 cheaper than the Synology DS224+ on the big river. That is what I am currently considering as I think the extra Ā£40 is a good comfort factor for a Top Brand YVMV
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Iād just stick with two normal mirrored SSD drives and backup to a USB hard disk thatās formatted ex FAT on a regular basis.
That way should the worst happen you have a copy of your music that you could move else where.
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thank you - this certainly has great reviews - have you spinning or SSDās in yours?
Have you added more ram?
thanks - Are you recommending standard SATA SSD instead of NVME? they are certainly less costly. I have some USB external drives for back up and so that is a good shout.
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Yup, pointless having your backup on a SSD, the first backup would take longer on a traditional disk but additional backups would be incremental.
Also if you have multiple USB drives you can cycle them.
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You can have as many backups of your music files as you like, but thatās only part of the story. It doesnāt give you a backup of the UPnP server, the hardware you run it on, etc. Itās just as likely that the NAS device will fail as it is that youāll lose the actual files. Then youāre only up and running again after youāve repaired or replaced your NAS, installed the drive, installed the server and copied the backup to it.
For me, a robust backup strategy has to include both hardware and software. This need not be costly or complicated. Just buy a cheap second NAS, use the freebie UPnP server on it, and run the automated backup of your primary NAS to it. Then if either NAS fails, you just open the other one in the Naim app and carry on listening to music, leaving you free to repair the broken hardware or software at your leisure.
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I am still trying to decide LOL but I have 2 of these spinning HDDās in my basket Along with the DS224+.
WD Red Plus 4TB NAS 3.5" Internal Hard Drive - 5400 RPM Class, SATA 6 Gb/s, CMR, 256MB Cache
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You donāt need to worry about the speed of the SSD/hard drive, particularly as you will only be streaming music and storing photos.
The Ethernet port on a streamer only works at 100MB/Sec.
From memory, Iām sure steaming Hi res is less than 1MB/Sec
Copied from PC World
Currently, the maximum speed for an NVMe PCIe 3.0 (aka Gen 3) SSD is up to 3,500MB per second.
SATA SSDs typically hit speeds of up to 500MB per second.
A 7,200 RPM hard-disk drive tops out around 160MB per second.
You donāt need to worry about the memory. Steaming music uses very little memory.
The most basic Nas from Ugreen, qnap or synology will work fine. Transferring data at a low bitrate is only a basic task.
If I was buying a Nas, I would be looking at which manufacturer guarantees to provide support for the longest period of time.
Are your music files currently on a PC? How do you intend backing up your files.
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My files are both real cds and flac on my Brennan.
Pictures are a mix of cloud and device, gopro,dslr,phone etc. So getting them backed up from the devices and then the nas backed up will be important. Looking at ssd for noise rather than anything else. I was thinking 2 bays at raid 1.
I like the thinking around support. I remember when the future was scsiā¦ lol
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Thatās what I do. Really ideally I should perform a differential back up policy, but I donāt. The change on my mirrored NAS is relatively minimal, so full back up into USB flash storage is fine for me. Remember to keep your back ups physically seperate from your NASā¦ perhaps in your garage if your NAS is in your house.
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does anyone have an opinion on QNAP TBS-464-8G i.e. a SSD M.2 2280 NVMe based NAS?
better sound quality (less moving partsā¦)?
or any other SSD based models worth considering (if indeed better to the legacy HDD based)?
On sound quality from a NAS, thatās something that Iām sure people have strong opinions on. Iāve run my Roon server (my chosen app) on a Synology, a windows PC and a macbook pro, all via slightly different network configurations. I canāt tell any sound quality difference. What you will notice is the sound of spinning disks if you have the NAS in your music room. I would suggest the best option is a wifi setup which allows you to wire the NAS into a wifi endpoint that isnāt in the music room if you donāt want the sound of spinning discs. I have my setup hard wired via structure CAT5 in the wall of my apartment in my case. You might mix wiring to the router (for the NAS) with wifi for the streamer for example.
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Our Synology DS sounds exactly the same over ethernet as our Uniti Core.
When we got our Core we tried ethernet and S/PDIF connection to DAC and couldnāt hear any difference. So extrapolating, weād expect our NAS to sound the same as an S/PDIF connected Core.
We obviously have separate streamer/DAC which might influence results.
This is true. Before I had one, I was going to consolidate everything in the lounge where I do most of the listening. But once up and running, the sound of the start / stop of the disks had me move it to my office. Itās not running all the time, but can be a bit distracting.