NAS Drive Secutiry & Permissions

[Morne]

Hi all

I'm seriously considering switching to a NAS drive as my "file server". Currently at home I'm on a small windows WORKGROUP (no domain). I have couple of pc's on the same WORKGROUP and one of the computers has an external USB shared as my file server. I just have 2 users with permissions on all computers. I'm connected to the internet with an ADSL router that gets a dynamic IP from my ISP which gets reset every night. From there I go through a switch and all computers connected to the switch. (its just a cheap unmanaged switch).

So the question is, if I now switch to a NAS, how do I set persmissions so that still, only my 2 users can connect to it? And if my computers are all switch off, what prevents some1 from messing around on my NAS via the internet while my switch and ADSL is switched on? I mean is it even possible for some1 to get on my LAN from the outside in the 1st place?

I'm NEW to NAS, so not sure how it all works. As far as I understand, the thing will run a very small Linux distro, or similar? But does it have its own firewall? How does it work? The NAS will be connected via LAN and not usb. I'm concerned about security.

Any thoughts?

[stellwagenc]

my experience: don't buy a NAS

they are very slow in comparison to a server. when you want a fast NAS you have to pay a lot of money.

@ the firm i have a 600 Euro NAS from Iomega for backups and more than 30 MB/s are not possible. With small files it go down to 10 MB/s or less...

@ home i have a small server with Intel Core i3-2100T, 16GB Ram, 300GB Intel SSD and 4 pieces 2TB HDDs (USB 3.0). with this server i can do 100 MB/s - more is not possible over gigabit network

Sorry for my bad english...

[Dariusz Makowski (Dadal)]

Dont go nas. Just convert one of render slave nodes to server... I'm planning on setting up my old quad core slave to server since I really need a centralized unit with databasa...

[Morne]

I want to avoid having ANOTHER pc switched on, when I just need to work of 1 pc. If 1 make another slave a server, then might as well keep what I have now since I'll still end up with 2 computers switched on and logged in and all the overhead of electricity etc

[andybot_cg]

Yeah, NAS is way too slow. Can you have your files on the computer you work on most of the time, and then have another computer be a backup location. Then, that backup can host whenever you need to share files over multiple computers, but otherwise, you don't need to have it turned on all the time?

Edit: OK - inexpensive, non-RAIDed, NAS is slow. Spend a grand or so and you'll get anything you want...

[t1t4]

I've been using NASs for years on my home network and they absolutely rock.

Permissions are easy to setup for the 3 NASs I have used and they support way more than 2 users. I think some of them may have limits but it's probably in the 255+ range if there are any so way more than you would ever need for a home or even a small office.

As far as speed goes it all depends on the NAS and raid configurations you get. I'm sure if you cheap out on the NAS you'll end up with a slower system but even then you should be able to get decent speed out of it if that's your goal.

Benefits of using a NAS:
- You can keep all of your data on it and allow every one and the computers to access it.
- You don't need to build/biuy a whole computer system to use it (though they really are specialized computer systems)
- They are usually much smaller and lower power usage than a sever would be
- They tend to be easy to setup and maintain

If you really want or need a server for your home network a NAS is not the way to go but I don't think most homes or even small businesses really need a dedicated server let alone a server running 24/7.

I have about 8 windows systems of various flavors (mostly my old desktops and laptops used as render nodes) plus, NAS(s), xbox360, PS3, HDTV, Wii, some Nintendo DSs, a few smartphones, a few wifi web cams and probably some other stuff on my home network and I have never run any any dedicated servers. I have a router with wifi and firewall. Also a switch for a few extra wired connections. I have my NAS and we keep ALL of our data (work, pictures, music, video, etc) on the NAS. Everyone has access to the data from any system. The NAS has media streaming as well as fun stuff like FTP, web streaming and so on. I share data over the web when needed though I tend to leave the web and ftp stuff off most of the time as an extra security measure. This is the one area where a dedicated server might come in handy but you would also need to have a good idea of what you were doing and want to maintain the server which I don't. I tend to run Vray render slaves and DR nodes on 5+ systems at the same time at home. All scene data is always on the NAS and everything has worked really well for the past 6 years of doing this. Again all NAS no server involved.

Recently I have been dealing with larger files and the write speed of my RAID 5 NAS has been a bottle neck so (I also ran out of storage space) so I upgraded and switched to RAID 10. Now I cap out my Gigabit Ethernet speeds and the bottle neck is now Gigabit Ethernet. In the cases where I want/need a huge amount of speed I copy temp files to my workstation but this tends to only be when editing HD and HD stereo 3d video in AFX. I don't network render AFX (tough I guess I could) so it's not much of an issue. And even in these cases most of the time the RAID 5 was fast enough and only in the most heavy layers and uncompressed video situations did I need to localize for editing when using RAID 5. Since my RAID 10 is a very recent addition I'm not sure how the heavy video editing will be. I have noticed uncompressed HD video is playing smoothly from the NAS now but before it would stutter. That is a good sign that I will probably have to do less localization in these extreme situations. The big win is I keep all of my data on the NAS and only have to back that up and don't worry about my work stations and the temp data on them. Though I do image my workstations to the NAS on a regular basis in case one dies so I can quickly get it back up and running.

What I'm getting at is that going with a good NAS can work out great and if speed is something you are worried about just make sure you go with a the RAID that makes the most sense for you. Of course setting up a good fast NAS with a lot of storage isn't cheap but I find it's well worth it and much easier to deal with than trying to maintain a network server of some kind.

On a side note while I have my NASs in redundant raid setups I also have them scheduled to backup regularly to an attached USB drive (a smaller USB raid in my case) and I also always have an off site copy. I have two USB backup drives, one attached to the raid that picks up the weekly scheduled backups and I swap it with a duplicate USB backup drive off site regularly. Always taking the onsite drive to the off site drive (so I never have all of my data and backups in one place) then bringing the off site drive back home, rinse and repeat. This way if I'm robbed, or the house burns down I still have a fairly fresh off site copy of all of my data. You could also do this with a internet/"cloud" based backup service as well. My new NAS supports web/cloud backups out of the box. I just find I don't want to pay a monthly fee forever and don't mind swapping my backup drives to my off site storage location. I also have a lot of data and if I had to recover it from the web it would take much longer than getting my off site backup. I still might do some limited cloud storage at some point though as internet speeds are getting faster every day. It's not cheap but it does make me less worried about losing any of my files.

So my advice is clearly go with the NAS, backup regularly and keep an off site or cloud backup. Servers while possibly more flexible and maybe a bit faster are more than you need just for storage or even things like FTP, web access and the likes. Oh, if you don't already have a router that has a firewall (which most do these days) you should get one of those as well.

[Dariusz Makowski (Dadal)]

t1t4 - howdy is the well managed nas for fast work in range of 2000£? Last time I was near NAS they cost 800£ + speeds were around 50mb...

[t1t4]

I got a QNAP TS-659 ProII with 6 x 3TB (18TB total) setup in RAID 10 for a total of 9TB of storage for just under $2000 US which looks like it's about 1600£.

I bought the QNAP and the drives separately to save money. Setup was about 10-15min of unwrapping drives, screwing them into the trays and sliding the trays back into the NAS. Powered it on, picked RAID 10 and about 15-30min later I logged onto the NAS from a web browser. Changed the default admin login, added a few users and did a few other basic setup type things and was good to go.

I think the same systems with drives included cost a lot more many times because they put in enterprise rated drives. With my first NAS going strong now for 6 years on desktop drives without a drive (or any other) failure it seems like enterprise drives are over kill for most home users. I bet even small businesses would be fine with regular desktop drives most of the time. The system I have says it can handle 512 connections at once. I think in an environment like that or if you were using it to host a web site (one of it's features) you might want to go with an enterprise drive since it would probably get a lot more wear and tear than most home or small business users would have.

I also think the way I set it up may be a bit of over kill for most of my needs but I'm loving it so far. Only time will tell if the new system will hold up as well as the old ones have.

I'm sure you could setup a good fast NAS for less than what I spent as well. Get smaller or fewer drives or a 4bay NAS instead of a 6bay or find one refurbished and so on. Most of the QNAP 2 and 4 bay systems are rated at over 100Mps read/write though I'm sure this depends on raid setup and how many users/systems are hitting them at once.

[Jerry]

+1 on the NAS !

Have been using a Synology DS-210+ & DS-211+ for several time. Works like a charm. Read/Writing speed is equal compared to our WD Velocipraptor disks in our Small Business server. Configuration is 2x WD 1GB Caviar Black RAID 1. Extra benefits are easy to integrate in SBS Domain ( user policies ) & easy to hide somewhere in the building (theft/burglary)

Also backupping is almost too easy; our DS-211+ is at the office. DS-210+ is at the boss's house. At both places fiber 100/100 mbit connection. Nightly Rsync 400 GB .... no problem !

Price for a DS-212+ & 2 WD Caviar Blacks should be around € 500/550,-

[AJ Jefferies]

+1 for QNAP - we've been using one for the last 3 years & it works beautifully.

Also, I just wanted to quickly say how good it is to see that you're still alive Jimmy! I still check boring3d every few months or so

[t1t4]

hee hee hee. Thanks. I try to update ever few months/years or so -;]