Looking for low-cost, low-maintenance NAS production storage

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watchdogx

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Dec 13, 2012
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Hey folks,

I've trolled Google, retail sites, and here at Tom's looking for a solution to my need. Nothing definitive came up, so I'm asking directly for guidance....

I have two LaCie 1TB drives, 1 NAS & 1 USB, that I've been using as my primary and secondary storage for years. Started doing more video production now and I need more storage. My priorities at this point are LOW COST (as close to $200 as possible) and LOW MAINTENANCE (as close to plug-and-play as possible on my 64-bit Win 7). I need to work on my work, not the storage for my work. Based on what I've read here, it seems a RAID 1 setup hits neither of my priorities unless I've missed the right posts. The only 3TB drive I could find on Amazon with a 4-star average is a Buffalo LinkStation 410. Are the good choices really that limited? If anybody has another low-cost, low-maint option for me to consider I'm definitely interested. Thanks for your interest!

- DK
 
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watchdogx

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Dec 13, 2012
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Hi Tim, thanks for the response. Sorry, I should have been more specific - The LaCie NAS that I currently have is a stand-alone drive w/ CAT5 connection to my router. Had problems with it dropping off of my network every couple of weeks from the beginning but wasn't a big deal. Then it became a daily problem. Which is more motivation to upgrade my storage configuration.

- DK
 
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choucove

choucove

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May 13, 2011
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I guess one thing I wish to try and clarify is do you specifically need NAS (network attached storage to be accessed from several networked devices) or DAS (direct attached storage to be accessed primarily from a single device.) There are several good quality NAS devices out there, many take very little maintenance or configuration to set up, and if you're only needing 3 TB of storage space with no redundancy then you don't even need something supporting multiple bays. However, a good quality NAS with a 3 TB hard drive is going to run you more for cost then a 3 TB hard drive in a USB 3.0 hard drive enclosure. A USB 3.0 connection can give you greater throughput than a gigabit network connection, so you possibly could have greater performance there, but this is directly connected to your computer instead of the network.
 
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watchdogx

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Dec 13, 2012
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I have found it very helpful to work from a couple of different computers, like when I'm rendering out an animation or long video which takes all of my system resources for hours (need a new graphics card too - someday!). I switch over to another computer to keep working on other stuff, which is where the NAS really comes in handy. It seemed like there where a dozen choices for stand-alone NASs when I first made the switch several years ago. Just so surprised that now almost everything is RAID and $$$$$! A company making a reliable, affordable PnP NAS drive could really clean up with home users and college kids, as the market is so thin. Wish I had the funding so I could do it! Thanks for the input.
 
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