I have been using a 2-bay NAS since 2015. I have to say that I went through 8 HHDs since that time. I used to exchange both drives when one failed since most drives came off the same manufacturing batch. Unfortunately, I had to use 3rd party software to extract data twice. I had 7 drive failures I had twice loss of raid configuration and the drives had to be extracted using 3rd party software. One Raid loss happened without knowing how it happened. I could no longer access data. The other time, I maybe was to afraid to trust the NAS doing its job. I backed the data up to another drive. However I have changed my strategy now to reduce costs: - only replace a drive when defect - have one drive spare - don't rely on one HDD manufacturer. - Have another USB HDD ready for occassional backup use. Don't rely on a 2-bay NAS.
@@GeorgeGogoladzeGG nas are running on their own hardware and operating system, so the drives are formatted for their system. You can then mount them as network drives. This way it doesn't matter how they are formatted.
Thank you for the review, well appreciated. Nevertheless would not store the data and the backup on the same device, with that you create a single point of failure. For me storing the data on the 1Gb network would be to slow, but the NAS approach for a family backup serves very well. I'm on Synology 1821p with 4 drives RAID 5 for backup and spare drives after having almost experienced a two-out-of-four disk outage half a year ago...
Thanks for the review Patrick. I use a 3TB NAS, the Personal Cloud 2 built by Seagate, that I use for storage and backup. That has allowed me to purchase base model Macs and save a bunch of money up front.
Thank you. A NAS is a great option, but we must also have a backup solution too. My understanding is that the issue with a 2 drive mirrored system, if one drive fails the other will mirror that and you lose all data. For photos, RAID 5 or RAID 6 would allow respectively 1 or 2 drives to fail without any data loss.
Yes RAID 0 is not redundant just improves read performance. You are 100% correct that there needs to be a “backup” solution to the NAS which is really only meant for redundancy and convenience.
Hey Patrick! Thanks for the clear and concise video. Was wondering if you could elaborate on setting up multiple time machines? I noticed on mine, within services>AFP>Enabl Time machine support. You had to choose 1 location at a time. How do you jig the settings so its multiple? thanks again!
I’d love to see a review of your back up strategy that incorporates your family back up. We have kids and I went in my wife’s laptop and noticed she has over 70,000 photos and over 5,000 photos in her apple photos library. This is taking up over 700gig and is only backed up to the cloud. Which I think is a problem because at that level just takes absolutely ages to download all those photos and videos if the worst happened. My only experience if a nas was apple time capsule and it was so slow it’s put me off for life I think. Although I’m sure things have improved.
Great video Thoughts on this model vs Synology ds220+? I’m stuck between the two I’m a photographer and light graphic designer. Mostly would use for archiving.
NAS devices are awesome but if you don’t have the money for a new device you can repurpose and old computer if you have one available and attach it to the network with a storage device. This will act as a NAS and doesn’t even need redundancy if you can’t afford it a single disk will suffice. That being said this thing is very economical for what you get out of it and will suit the needs of 90% of us.
Wait… You don’t have to leave a time hooked up… You can plug the external into it and run it whenever…. Once a week… Twice a week… etc. Time Machine backs the computer automatically once it’s set up
This is amazing!! Exactly what I was looking for. So can you access files from the NAS quickly? Or does it spin up and such when you're clicking through the files.
Thanks Patrick, this is a great overview. What are your thoughts on offsite backup - in case of flood or fire damage. Can you back the NAS itself up to the cloud? Or periodically take out one of the hard drives to keep offsite?
Think of the NAS as just another drive. But be careful not to consider this a backup but rather a drive with redundancy. You really should have at least one other backup copy preferably two with the second one offsite. There is a very real chance your NAS drives can still fail.
I was configuring my new Mac online and by the time I was done it turned into a PC and the price reduced by 60%.😂 No hate my wife loves Macs and I think they’re sweet but I just love the hardware flexibility that comes with a PC.
There is always a very light whirring from the drives spinning etc, but only when it's put under stress, the fans really kick off. I don't keep it near my desk.
Great video Patrick. How much does it cost and where is the best place to buy it? I had a WD network drive that died on me and WD no longer supports it so I need a new one to back up my MAC. Thanks
This is really cool. Great video. Is there a way to use this as the main location of an iPhoto library? For me, that’s the biggest thing. I have like a 2 TB account, but for some time I’ve been having to move off files.
Great video. I think this is my next evolution. I’ve got so many grey G-RAIDS and portable SSD’s. With the storage, how fast is the access? Could I edit from it? Or is this just a cloud based Time Machine?
I've edited from it before. It won't be as fast as an SSD of course. Let me get back to you on the speed, I'll run a black magic test when I get back to the office
A NAS "seems" like a good idea but it can absolutely leave you hanging. Home NAS boxes (even those with medium price tags) typically have crappy power supplies. I had a Netgear ReadyNAS NV+ and the PS died 3 times. Five years down the line, will you still be able to get a PS for your NAS? Probably not. Can you take the disks out and mount them on another NAS or even Linux server? Probably not. The only way to make NAS reliable is (a) buy at least two NAS boxes and keep one in the closet as backup (or at least a few power supplies), (b) setup a NAS server with software RAID. At least you'll be able to move the disks to another system. Home hardware RAID is a joke -- products reach end of life much faster than your hard drives will die. And if you are going to get home NAS, make sure to find an alternate way to mount the drives.
NAS will fail as well, is more expensive and as you said, you need to keep your laptop connected 24/7 for backups.....but you can't with a NAS if you travel or go places. Get the SANDISK externals. 30 IT guy here.
Hi, Patrick! Great video :) Question... Am I able to back up my data/TimeMachine when I am away from my home? like, if I go to the library and connect wifi from there, and I am finished with my work, can I back up my data while I am far away from the device?
You can back up the drives or use redundancy which , in my opinion , is what makes a NAS system worth owning. Let’s say you have a 4 bay NAS, you’d use two drives for storage, and the other two as copies of the first two. If a drive fails, the redundancy drive is there with all the copies. You can then simply buy a new drive and copy all files back from the redundancy drive.
This is so helpful! I have been using Drobo but they are no longer making or servicing their products . I have about 5 TB of data and photos I need to back up.
Hi Steve! Yes NAS drives typically come empty. Some brands may have partnerships and offer combo deals but normally they are bought separately. The cost depends entirely on the types of drives you decide to install (brand, storage volume, etc). I installed HDDs but the die hard speeds freaks will choose SSDS, adding to the cost considerably. Asustor NAS drives are quite reasonably priced, compared to the competition. There's a link in the description if you want to check current prices. In terms of drives to add, I recommend Seagate as they are a well established brand. There are cheaper ones too but I don't like taking risks when it comes to my data.
It blows my mind the hoops Mac users jump through to get their rig usable. Dont get me wrong I appreciate the positives Apple offers but damn there are so many down sides that I just can’t see myself ever getting one again. With my pc’s (win and Linux) I’m swimming in ports, RAM, storage upgrade ability. I’m not in the creative field though so there’s that.
that good but I have 2 usb ext drive. One is formatted time machine, the other formatted for pc This is if my Macbook fails. This is incase I unable to replace the old one with a new macbook at the moment, or have to use a PC if a Mac us unavailable and Mac is 7yrs old. So how does this system work in this case
Hi there im currently backing up all of my data. I have a hard drive for media, one for my files/photos and another that im backing up my mac with through time machine. I have second hard drives for my media hard drive and files/photos hard drive that act as backups. My question is whether time machine can mirror my media hard drive and files/photos to their counterparts and keep them synced? Or would i need to purchase an external tool like carbon copy cloner?
I definitely love to get a NAS system but we are all WiFi. The fiber optic is install in the bedroom with Alienware router and mesh system. I definitely don’t want the system in the bedroom, wife would kill me since she’s a light sleeper. Can the system be used to back up iPhone photos instead of using the iCloud? And is there a WiFi option?
Hi Patrick! Love the videos! Why does everyone push external, physical media over cloud storage? I think a video about the strengths/weaknesses of cloud would be great!
I guess because cloud storage is too slow for a lot of things (like video editing) and people like to have their files on their own servers, rather than someone else’s. I advocate having your own with a cloud backup.
I bnought a Synology NAS and I never got the damn thing to work correctly and I gave up - I still have the drives would you recommend just getting this NAS instead and slotting those seagate drives from my synoogy into it? I just need something that works and is easy. I'm an artist not a IT Tech.
Does anyone know if you have to pay a monthly fee or the like to access it via the cloud? I'm not speaking about backing the entire thing up to the cloud, just to access it in my house when i'm on the road or something...TIA
Why in 2023 are people still using spinning hard drives in the NAS equipment? I understand SSD's can slowly degrade over time, but the latest ones are much better with that and managing bad sectors. Having an always on, constantly spinning NAS drives is just asking for trouble in a couple of years. Q: Is it possible to use an adapter tray to install high quality (and blazingly fast) SSD drives in this Asus unit?
I have been using a 2-bay NAS since 2015. I have to say that I went through 8 HHDs since that time.
I used to exchange both drives when one failed since most drives came off the same manufacturing batch.
Unfortunately, I had to use 3rd party software to extract data twice.
I had 7 drive failures
I had twice loss of raid configuration and the drives had to be extracted using 3rd party software. One Raid loss happened without knowing how it happened. I could no longer access data. The other time, I maybe was to afraid to trust the NAS doing its job. I backed the data up to another drive.
However I have changed my strategy now to reduce costs:
- only replace a drive when defect
- have one drive spare
- don't rely on one HDD manufacturer.
- Have another USB HDD ready for occassional backup use. Don't rely on a 2-bay NAS.
what happened? both drives failed simultaneously in the 2-bay config? why did you need 3rd party software to recover data?
NAS drives are awesome, they can do so much more than backup and storage. They can be used as a media center to be used from anywhere.
Exactly. Underrated tech!
@@PatrickRambles hi Guys, thanks for video. Can you use device for Windows and Mac together? you don't need to format drive? how does it work?
@@GeorgeGogoladzeGG nas are running on their own hardware and operating system, so the drives are formatted for their system. You can then mount them as network drives. This way it doesn't matter how they are formatted.
Thank you for the review, well appreciated. Nevertheless would not store the data and the backup on the same device, with that you create a single point of failure.
For me storing the data on the 1Gb network would be to slow, but the NAS approach for a family backup serves very well. I'm on Synology 1821p with 4 drives RAID 5 for backup and spare drives after having almost experienced a two-out-of-four disk outage half a year ago...
Thanks for the review Patrick. I use a 3TB NAS, the Personal Cloud 2 built by Seagate, that I use for storage and backup. That has allowed me to purchase base model Macs and save a bunch of money up front.
Exactly. Very underrated tech IMO.
Thank you. A NAS is a great option, but we must also have a backup solution too. My understanding is that the issue with a 2 drive mirrored system, if one drive fails the other will mirror that and you lose all data. For photos, RAID 5 or RAID 6 would allow respectively 1 or 2 drives to fail without any data loss.
What do you mean, that the second drive would mirror the failure?
Apologies, my mistake in confusing with RAID 0. RAID 0 would lead to total loss of data. RAID 1 is best for a 2 bay NAS, as it provides redundancy.
Yes RAID 0 is not redundant just improves read performance. You are 100% correct that there needs to be a “backup” solution to the NAS which is really only meant for redundancy and convenience.
Hey Patrick! Thanks for the clear and concise video. Was wondering if you could elaborate on setting up multiple time machines? I noticed on mine, within services>AFP>Enabl Time machine support. You had to choose 1 location at a time. How do you jig the settings so its multiple? thanks again!
I am in this channel from the beginning and I see it every day growing.
I really appreciate your support ❤️
Super interesting, well made and important video!
Thanks for sharing.
Greetings from a new subscriber in Sweden
Thank you! 🤝
I’d love to see a review of your back up strategy that incorporates your family back up. We have kids and I went in my wife’s laptop and noticed she has over 70,000 photos and over 5,000 photos in her apple photos library. This is taking up over 700gig and is only backed up to the cloud. Which I think is a problem because at that level just takes absolutely ages to download all those photos and videos if the worst happened. My only experience if a nas was apple time capsule and it was so slow it’s put me off for life I think. Although I’m sure things have improved.
Also as well loads of late teens/20’s don’t even seem to back up their data that I know. They’d be gutted if they lost all their selfies
😂
im good on that ill keep using my time capsule
Great video Thoughts on this model vs Synology ds220+? I’m stuck between the two
I’m a photographer and light graphic designer. Mostly would use for archiving.
NAS devices are awesome but if you don’t have the money for a new device you can repurpose and old computer if you have one available and attach it to the network with a storage device. This will act as a NAS and doesn’t even need redundancy if you can’t afford it a single disk will suffice. That being said this thing is very economical for what you get out of it and will suit the needs of 90% of us.
Wait… You don’t have to leave a time hooked up… You can plug the external into it and run it whenever…. Once a week… Twice a week… etc. Time Machine backs the computer automatically once it’s set up
Yeah sure you can do that. But you won't have snapshots of anything when your drive isn't hooked up.
@@PatrickRambles that’s true… I may have to get one of these… How much do they run
@@CaseyFleetMedia there's a link in the description to the nas and the drives I use but you can of course opt for different HDDs
@@PatrickRambles thank you!
Got to get me a NAS for sure. Good video!
🙏🏻
This is amazing!! Exactly what I was looking for.
So can you access files from the NAS quickly? Or does it spin up and such when you're clicking through the files.
It might spin a moment after being idle for a long time but generally it's very snappy and low on noise.
Exactly what I was looking for. Thank you so much!!
That's awesome. Thanks!
Thanks Patrick, this is a great overview. What are your thoughts on offsite backup - in case of flood or fire damage. Can you back the NAS itself up to the cloud? Or periodically take out one of the hard drives to keep offsite?
Think of the NAS as just another drive. But be careful not to consider this a backup but rather a drive with redundancy. You really should have at least one other backup copy preferably two with the second one offsite. There is a very real chance your NAS drives can still fail.
Before buying a nas first consider the available options on the market. I would suggest to choose for a synology nas instead of asustor
Care to tell us why?
I was configuring my new Mac online and by the time I was done it turned into a PC and the price reduced by 60%.😂 No hate my wife loves Macs and I think they’re sweet but I just love the hardware flexibility that comes with a PC.
😂
Thanks for review. Extremely valuable information.
Great Video Fascinating solution to my current dillema. New sub.
Awesome, thank you!
5:50 thanks for the video. Does the fan run 24/7? Thanks
There is always a very light whirring from the drives spinning etc, but only when it's put under stress, the fans really kick off. I don't keep it near my desk.
@@PatrickRambles Thanks, I've been considering a NAS for my Mac for sometime and you step by step gives me confidence I can actually set it up.
How could I make another backup onto an external drive from the NAS in order to put it into my safe at night or when we are away from home?
Great video Patrick. How much does it cost and where is the best place to buy it? I had a WD network drive that died on me and WD no longer supports it so I need a new one to back up my MAC. Thanks
Oops ! Forgot to add it to the description. It's there now :)
Will the Apple time capsule still work..I had one and I think I still have it for my 2009 iMac
could I ask what size Innocn screen that is? Looking for a vertical screen setup and this looks perfect. Thanks! Love the desk setup
This is really cool. Great video. Is there a way to use this as the main location of an iPhoto library? For me, that’s the biggest thing. I have like a 2 TB account, but for some time I’ve been having to move off files.
I'm sure there is a way to backup your photo library. These things are amazing, they can do so much!
Thank you for your videos keep up the good work.. I need to get one of these!!!
Thank you 😊
I’ll stick to iCloud since it’s easily configurable through windows PC.
Hi. Great vid.
Can you set up for as mac and a windows NAS as file types are different?
Thanks in advance.
Namaste x
Great video. I think this is my next evolution. I’ve got so many grey G-RAIDS and portable SSD’s.
With the storage, how fast is the access? Could I edit from it? Or is this just a cloud based Time Machine?
I've edited from it before. It won't be as fast as an SSD of course. Let me get back to you on the speed, I'll run a black
magic test when I get back to the office
Just to double check, can this NAS be accessed from ANYWHERE in the world??
A NAS "seems" like a good idea but it can absolutely leave you hanging. Home NAS boxes (even those with medium price tags) typically have crappy power supplies. I had a Netgear ReadyNAS NV+ and the PS died 3 times. Five years down the line, will you still be able to get a PS for your NAS? Probably not. Can you take the disks out and mount them on another NAS or even Linux server? Probably not. The only way to make NAS reliable is (a) buy at least two NAS boxes and keep one in the closet as backup (or at least a few power supplies), (b) setup a NAS server with software RAID. At least you'll be able to move the disks to another system. Home hardware RAID is a joke -- products reach end of life much faster than your hard drives will die. And if you are going to get home NAS, make sure to find an alternate way to mount the drives.
Thanks for sharing, I appreciate your insight. Personally I wouldn't be looking to hang onto a NAS for five years any more than I would a computer.
Wow that's amazing. I'd love for all my playlists to be automatically saved to my drive. Don't think I'll get to mirror the bays then, though ;p
Merci Patrick, très intéressante vidéo et j'aime beaucoup ce produit semble être une bonne solution. Bonne journée 😎 Louis de Montréal.🇨🇦
Merci Louis! Bon Dimanche!
NAS will fail as well, is more expensive and as you said, you need to keep your laptop connected 24/7 for backups.....but you can't with a NAS if you travel or go places. Get the SANDISK externals. 30 IT guy here.
I love my G-drive SSD but I would not recommend Sandisk at this time. Their drives are failing left and right.
@@PatrickRambles Very different experience here. NEVER a failure.
Hi, Patrick! Great video :) Question... Am I able to back up my data/TimeMachine when I am away from my home? like, if I go to the library and connect wifi from there, and I am finished with my work, can I back up my data while I am far away from the device?
Probably using a VPN. Some NAS support VPN service natively, once configured it’s like being on your LAN
I have absolutetly zero knowledge how to set up server. Is it easy to set up device for multiple devices and systems (mac, windows)?
thanks
hey, can you back up external hard drives? then can you restore them to a new external hard drive?
You can back up the drives or use redundancy which , in my opinion , is what makes a NAS system worth owning. Let’s say you have a 4 bay NAS, you’d use two drives for storage, and the other two as copies of the first two. If a drive fails, the redundancy drive is there with all the copies. You can then simply buy a new drive and copy all files back from the redundancy drive.
This is so helpful! I have been using Drobo but they are no longer making or servicing their products . I have about 5 TB of data and photos I need to back up.
Thanks Paul, I'm glad it was useful :)
Where is the link to the Asustor and how much is it?
Simple question do you buy the unit and then the drives separately ? What sort of cost are we talking about
Hi Steve! Yes NAS drives typically come empty. Some brands may have partnerships and offer combo deals but normally they are bought separately. The cost depends entirely on the types of drives you decide to install (brand, storage volume, etc). I installed HDDs but the die hard speeds freaks will choose SSDS, adding to the cost considerably. Asustor NAS drives are quite reasonably priced, compared to the competition. There's a link in the description if you want to check current prices. In terms of drives to add, I recommend Seagate as they are a well established brand. There are cheaper ones too but I don't like taking risks when it comes to my data.
is there a way to send specific photos to it? In other words, can I create a folder on there and send selected photos to the storage?
It blows my mind the hoops Mac users jump through to get their rig usable. Dont get me wrong I appreciate the positives Apple offers but damn there are so many down sides that I just can’t see myself ever getting one again. With my pc’s (win and Linux) I’m swimming in ports, RAM, storage upgrade ability. I’m not in the creative field though so there’s that.
If you use the nas for Time Machine backup, can yo use it for other backups too ? I mean, to backup a directory from a external disk
Absolutely. You can even decide how much space you want to allocate to your backups.
Would this be applicable to an iPad?
Can I back up both my Macs and my pc desktop on the same machine?
Also interested in this.
Thanks for the great tip!
Appreciate it , Joe!
If I can't connect this directly to a router could I use a powerline adapter in another room likeTP-Link AV2000 Powerline Adapter?
Any ethernet port that leads to your router, inclusion access points.
that good but I have 2 usb ext drive. One is formatted time machine, the other formatted for pc This is if my Macbook fails. This is incase I unable to replace the old one with a new macbook at the moment, or have to use a PC if a Mac us unavailable and Mac is 7yrs old. So how does this system work in this case
How much does it cost to set up a NAS with the same storage capacity?
Hey! Links to the products I used are in the description. You can check current prices.
@@PatrickRambles thanks 🙏
Hi there im currently backing up all of my data.
I have a hard drive for media, one for my files/photos and another that im backing up my mac with through time machine.
I have second hard drives for my media hard drive and files/photos hard drive that act as backups.
My question is whether time machine can mirror my media hard drive and files/photos to their counterparts and keep them synced?
Or would i need to purchase an external tool like carbon copy cloner?
I was unclear on whether you can back up/connect your phone he mostly mentioned Mac
If I'm understanding you correctly, I could load my Lightroom catalogue from the SSD it is on to a NAS and use it from there. Am I correct?
Yes. There will be a difference in speed though, depending on the SSDS you're used to.
what’s the cost ?
Links in description :)
I definitely love to get a NAS system but we are all WiFi. The fiber optic is install in the bedroom with Alienware router and mesh system. I definitely don’t want the system in the bedroom, wife would kill me since she’s a light sleeper.
Can the system be used to back up iPhone photos instead of using the iCloud? And is there a WiFi option?
So the main modem is in the bedroom?
@@PatrickRambles yeah unfortunately but that’s where they installed it
Hi Patrick! Love the videos! Why does everyone push external, physical media over cloud storage? I think a video about the strengths/weaknesses of cloud would be great!
I guess because cloud storage is too slow for a lot of things (like video editing) and people like to have their files on their own servers, rather than someone else’s. I advocate having your own with a cloud backup.
Is it possible to access the data on the NAS outside the LAN?
Yep, you can access it anywehere, as long as you are connected to the internet.
Uau, did not know something like this exists.
Mmm nice Patrick…
What led you to chose two 10TB? How big is your mac?
I use it to store my video files
iDrive. 100Gb a year for like $2.50. Backblaze: Unlimited storage.. $99 a year.
Those are great options. But they're all off-site. I like using a NAS for fast storage and the online options as backup.
I bnought a Synology NAS and I never got the damn thing to work correctly and I gave up - I still have the drives would you recommend just getting this NAS instead and slotting those seagate drives from my synoogy into it? I just need something that works and is easy. I'm an artist not a IT Tech.
Honestly, they all take a bit of fiddling. But it's largely a one-off. Did you try watching some setup videos?
Does anyone know if you have to pay a monthly fee or the like to access it via the cloud? I'm not speaking about backing the entire thing up to the cloud, just to access it in my house when i'm on the road or something...TIA
Nope. It's on your own connection, there's no cloud service involved, unless you buy it as extra backup.
@@PatrickRambles thanks for the quick response!
Why in 2023 are people still using spinning hard drives in the NAS equipment? I understand SSD's can slowly degrade over time, but the latest ones are much better with that and managing bad sectors. Having an always on, constantly spinning NAS drives is just asking for trouble in a couple of years. Q: Is it possible to use an adapter tray to install high quality (and blazingly fast) SSD drives in this Asus unit?
Absolutely. The reason is simple : cost.
is security threat?
Or! Or.. or you could just buy multiple external drives and manually backup yourself and keep your files off the cloud.
Or! Or....you could write all your notes in ink and feather and bundle them all up in a nice leather binder 😀🙄
What about my pc?
Your what ?
@@PatrickRambles That’s not nice! 😊
😜
❤
❤️ back atcha!
But these are the same old technology j7200 rpm HDs...pathetic. like for the video though
👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍