NAS Drives

[mickytruelove]

I currently backup the synology NAS to Dropbox with versioned backups so can go back to a specific day for restoring files. Also means if there is a fire im good.

Working on bare metal backup for 4 computers to cloud too, so i can restore them as quick as i can. This is for small company that i own and run so its in my interest to make things safe.

But i am interested to hear recommendations people have for drives as i am about to replace a few. Got 4tb WD reds just now. looking to double it at least but need quick access.

[Murph7355]

mickytruelove said:

I currently backup the synology NAS to Dropbox with versioned backups so can go back to a specific day for restoring files. Also means if there is a fire im good.

Working on bare metal backup for 4 computers to cloud too, so i can restore them as quick as i can. This is for small company that i own and run so its in my interest to make things safe.

But i am interested to hear recommendations people have for drives as i am about to replace a few. Got 4tb WD reds just now. looking to double it at least but need quick access.

WD Reds still seem to be up there when Googling for test results. Mine have certainly seemed robust to date, but were purchased a while go.

Seagate Ironwolf disks seem to be the biggest competitor right now...from the specs/comparisons I've read there doesn't seem to be much in them.

I've tended to limit the size of individual disks I use in preference to simply getting an additional chassis (current largest I have in use are 2Tb. I have 4x chassis now). The latter is more of a pain in the rear to manage, but does give additional resilience if usage is thought through...I'm not entirely sure on the stats for failures during rebuild (maybe I've been lucky before when I've had to swap disks out....), but regardless you are most at risk at this point. And the bigger the disks are, the longer that process will take.

More generally, and to the OP mainly following some posts earlier, there is no universally "right" nor universally "wrong" solution with these things. Key thing is to understand what the tech does, what the limitations of each configuration are and to check it against what you are trying to achieve.

[Harpoon]

There's bit of an oo-oh about WD quietly putting SMR technology in the some of the Red drives. I think they've had a bit of a tidy-up on the models now but worth checking what you are buying if going for WD Reds:

https://www.servethehome.com/wd-red-smr-vs-cmr-tes...

https://www.servethehome.com/wd-red-plus-launched-...

[bmwmike]

Reading this thread with interest.

Do any of the 2 bay raid 1 devices work with S3 buckets via an API key?

I currently have a readynas duo and its way long in the tooth. Its backing up to AWS s3 manually, currently have around 200gb in s3.

Id like something we can all (laptops, ipods, iphones, android, etc) save data to, and that then backs up to s3.

Something that can stream audio and 4k would be nice. thx

[mikef]

bmwmike said:

Do any of the 2 bay raid 1 devices work with S3 buckets via an API key?

How-to guide on Synology: https://www.broadbandbuyer.com/features/2638-how-t...

[Crasher242]

mikef said:

bmwmike said:

Do any of the 2 bay raid 1 devices work with S3 buckets via an API key?

How-to guide on Synology: https://www.broadbandbuyer.com/features/2638-how-t...

Well i'll be damned. Thanks for the link - thats awesome Just what i need, and does away with my aging synology-to-usb-drive backup that i've been running for yonks.

[xeny]

Depends lots how big your NAS is, and how fast your upload....

[Magnum 475]

The structure I use at home(!) is:

Main NAS drive: Synology 4-bay unit in RAID 5 configuration with 12TB usable.

Backup NAS: Synology 2-bay unit with 2 6TB Drives, non-RAID so 12TB usable - this backs up the main unit using incremental backups. This unit is in a different building to the main NAS.

2TB Google Drive - stores encrypted backups of the most important files (encrypted because I really don't trust Google that much).

[bmwmike]

mikef said:

bmwmike said:

Do any of the 2 bay raid 1 devices work with S3 buckets via an API key?

How-to guide on Synology: https://www.broadbandbuyer.com/features/2638-how-t...

thank you for that.

edit to delete my question about sse-kms because it made no sense.

Edited by bmwmike on Thursday 9th July 23:11

[LeadFarmer]

So for a 2 bay NAS have I got this right....

Raid 0 - both drives are used separately as individual drives, no backing up from one drive to the other,
Raid 1 - both drives are mirrored, what goes on one drive automatically goes on the other.

[xeny]

LeadFarmer said:

So for a 2 bay NAS have I got this right....

Raid 0 - both drives are used separately as individual drives, no backing up from one drive to the other,
Raid 1 - both drives are mirrored, what goes on one drive automatically goes on the other.

Not quite.

JBOD - both drives are used separately as individual drives, no backing up from one drive to the other, If one fails the other is unaffected.
RAID 0 - both drives appear as a single larger drive. If either drive has a problem, you'll likely lose the lot.

Don't think of RADI 1 as backed up - I've had to do more restores for accidental deletions than for drive failures, and RAID 1 doesn't help with that.

[dapprman]

RAID 1 is mirroring so the disks keep in sync. Delete a file on one disk and it's lost on the other but it protects against not only disk failure but also disk corruption (though on the latter I'd look to replace a failing disk ASAP).

[eein]

Gad-Westy said:

OnaRoll said:

xeny said:

OnaRoll said:

Would a two bay drive drive be able to mirror (raid1) and still behave as a media sever, CCTV and back up for home use if I put two large drives in for enough storage?

Yes, but remember RAID isn't backup.

Confused even more now

If I were to backup to the NAS from my laptops and the NAS is setup RAID 1. If one of those drives fail I still have my DATA and just need to pop a new drive in????

That is my noob understanding as well. Maybe the reason you shouldn't rely on it as backup is that if you delete a file from one drive it is also deleted from the 'backup'. But in my OP example, Time machine would get around that issue as long as you had a reasonable size drive and realised the problem early enough.

Some responders are being a bit pedantic about terminology. RAID is a very useful feature and as you are already aware it does give you a 'backup' for the situation where a HDD fails. Personally I recommend it for home use even if you have other mechanisms - the reason is that without RAID if you loose a disk and have to restore from a cloud/stand alone there is a risk something has gone wrong with the sync to them, and it's a lot of hassle to restore and reconfigure. I have had a few NAS HDDs fail - probably one every 2-3 years - and it's just so much easier to just pop a replacement in.

A cloud sync is useful too, however the sync will sync a 'user error delete' (there are some mechanisms you can configure to allow you to catch this in the cloud, subject to realising in time and sufficient storage being available - obviously keeping everything ever will add up after a while).

A physical separate hard drive statically copied is also useful and guards against most issues, but quite a bit of manual effort.

How many of the above you do just depends on the value of what you don't want to loose, the probability of the mechanisms of failure and the speed /effort at which you want to be able restore.

[bitchstewie]

eein said:

Some responders are being a bit pedantic about terminology.

To be fair the pedantry is for a good reason.

Imagine you have your laptop setup to sync to a NAS that's configured with RAID.

You're super comfortable because your data is on your laptop and your laptop is syncing with a NAS protected by a RAID.

Then you get some malware or just have finger trouble and something on the laptop gets deleted or corrupted and you don't realise for a while and by that point the laptop has synced with the NAS.

Or you just go nuts one day and delete the music library you spent your lifetime building and store on your super protected RAID NAS.

RAID doesn't help you in those scenarios.

So sure it's pedantic but I think it's done with good intentions

[dapprman]

I would alway suggest going with RAID1 if using two disks and RAID5 or RAID6 if three/four or more (unless you need pure performance in which case RAID0+1). It will never protect against user error, which is why regular backs to else where are advisable as long as you have some form of home keeping on that destination else using an open ended store of some form. What it does protect from of course is hardware failure, in theory the RAID as well (though that can depend on hardware and PC/MAC RAID array cards used to be really unreliable) as disk.

Note the above is for personal and SMB. Once you start getting on to high end hardware all resilience and clustering is done behind the scenes and hidden from you so you're back to using just single presented disks.

[eein]

bhstewie said:

eein said:

Some responders are being a bit pedantic about terminology.

To be fair the pedantry is for a good reason.

Imagine you have your laptop setup to sync to a NAS that's configured with RAID.

You're super comfortable because your data is on your laptop and your laptop is syncing with a NAS protected by a RAID.

Then you get some malware or just have finger trouble and something on the laptop gets deleted or corrupted and you don't realise for a while and by that point the laptop has synced with the NAS.

Or you just go nuts one day and delete the music library you spent your lifetime building and store on your super protected RAID NAS.

RAID doesn't help you in those scenarios.

So sure it's pedantic but I think it's done with good intentions

Indeed, my point is that particular words mean different things to different people. "Backup" does not have a specific definition in context of IT so it's meaning can be many things. It is usually necessary to explain the use case and purpose to be clear.

[Mr Whippy]

Could you run a rasp pi with a usb backup drive on it, say in the garage, and set it up to turn on every week and sync with the nas?

[S6PNJ]

Mr Whippy said:

Could you run a rasp pi with a usb backup drive on it, say in the garage, and set it up to turn on every week and sync with the nas?

https://magpi.raspberrypi.org/articles/build-a-raspberry-pi-nas

[Mr Whippy]

I’m planning on a synology ds918 with 4x4tb RAID mirror, so 8tb storage.

Then an 8tb usb 3.0 drive to backup to.

It’d be cool to leave the 8tb backup offsite and offline except for a timely sync to the nas.

If a rasp nas can basically do that, then that’s handy.

[mikef]

dapprman said:

RAID6 if three/four or more

Foregive me, but I’m not sure how 3 disks would work with double parity. If 4 disks, then wouldn’t RAID 10 give better performance and equal capacity and resilience? RAID 6 starts to make sense to me with 5 or more disks and as 5 disk units are relatively uncommon, I’d be thinking 6 or 8 disks with hot standby. And that’s starting to get expensive