Network storage drive enclosure

[MichiganHolly]

Hi Brian;

Reading through some older threads I see that you like the Synergy brand of NAS, is that still your recommendation in 2021? We have a Windows environment here at work and I want to put a copy of my photo library in a shared location for a coworker to be able to access and I thought a NAS would be the perfect solution. My plan would be to edit locally, not on the NAS. There would only be two users. OneDrive is storage limited and slow to use - I hate it. And don't get me started on SharePoint. 

I had a look on Amazon, what do you think of this configuration?

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0855LMP81/ref=ox_sc_act_title_2?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07H289S79/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1 (x2) 

[Brian]

Personally, I'm not a fan of Seagate HDs. I've replaced that brand more times than I care to mention over these past 28+ years that I've been a tech. I've had them physically smoke on me and generally avoid Seagate as much as I can. In addition, 4TB isn't that much these days. It might sound like a lot, but with today's high megapixel cameras, and there will be more MP, 60MP-100MP, Raw file sizes are just going to increase. My D850 produces Raw files around 100 megabytes...each. That's only 45MP!

I do recommend the Western Digital Gold Line of Hard Drives. They are "Enterprise Grade" which means they are built for Data-centers and heavy usage. Overkill for home use, but I like overkill with it comes to my data; I do not cheap out on my hard drives.

In terms of NAS, A 2-Bay is a good place to start, but I'd go for a 4 or 5 bay NAS. You can always start out with two drives, and have room to grow, of course at a higher price-point.

Keep in mind of the type of RAID setup. Two 4TB Drives in a RAID 1 will give you 4TB, but those drives will be mirrored, which gives you redundancy. RAID 0 will combine two 4TB Drives and give you 8GB, but if one of those drive fails, the whole thing goes and you lose everything. So if you are looking to setup RAID 1, keep in mind, you will need larger HDs to compensate for the Mirroring. Personally, 12TB is a good place to be in 2021.

One more thing. Even though I like Synology's stuff, and I would purchase their line of products...it seems that the quality of plastic has gotten worse over time. Expect that two spinning hard drives in cheap plastic housing / trays will be noisy and loud. So if you have a computer / Server Room at work, or a "Phone Closet," put the NAS in there. Next to your desk may not be a good option.

[MichiganHolly]

Thank you, Bran, this is very helpful!