Question Any advantage in using NAS from a backup point of view?

[tablespoon]

Hello, I try to decide if I should buy a NAS for home office use. One user but multi-platform, multi-OS environment. From a backup point of view, is there any advantage in spending money on the NAS? I know that by using RAID 1 and 5, we could have redundancy so if one drive fails, the data is still there. However, we can also buy two external drives to have such backup. In the case of NAS, if there is a hardware failure with it, all the drives inside could fail at the same time while if we backup using two drives, the chance of them failing at the same time is probably lower. So, we spend more money to buy a NAS and NAS drives when we can just have the same level of protection using two separate, even faster external drives?

I also read that it is recommended to have two NAS so one could backup the other. That means cost of two NAS enclosures plus double the number of hard drives.

 

[Tech Junky]

My approach is using raid 10 which is faster but also mirror and stripe.

A NAS off the shelf is easy but, it's also a pain in the long term. There are some with security issues where someone can remote wipe them or if it fails it might be using proprietary software and you can't just move the drives to a new system.

For the same price you can get a PC and load the drives into it and set it up yourself using Linux or there's several Nas specific os options as well.

 

[tablespoon]

In the case of Raid 10, we will need 4 drives but in the case of Raid 5, only three are needed.

By some with security issues, do you mean those from company Q?

 

[Tech Junky]

What's another drive for a bit more peace of mind? And double the speed.

Qnap is one of the higher profile issues but, others have underlying issues as well. The issues stem from using open source old kernels and not applying patches to close the backdoors. Also, being "closed source" at the same time to keep them user friendly. All it takes is a bad cider to leave out or inject something in the firmware package to make it vulnerable.

I'm running WD Red drives and get 400MB/s out of them using Linux with mdadm and no special raid card or anything fancy. Just add samba to share them on the lan.

 

[OlyAR15]

I use a NAS primarily for being able to share my data among my various computers. I do back up my computers' data to it, but then I also back up the NAS onto a separate external drive. If backup is all you plan on doing with a NAS, then you are probably better off just using an external drive. However, I do appreciate the convenience of a NAS. Also, if it fails, then you do not lose your data since you can transfer the drives to a new NAS.

 

[VirtualLarry]

If you are backing up a single PC, a NAS may be overkill, but for a LAN with multiple PCs, laptops, etc., and using something like Macrium Reflect, you can have them all back up to the NAS daily, weekly, whatever, without any real fuss or hassle. (Though, do take the time to regularly check that the image files are getting made properly, there's a log in Macrium Reflect.)

 

[tablespoon]

If you are backing up a single PC, a NAS may be overkill, but for a LAN with multiple PCs, laptops, etc., and using something like Macrium Reflect, you can have them all back up to the NAS daily, weekly, whatever, without any real fuss or hassle. (Though, do take the time to regularly check that the image files are getting made properly, there's a log in Macrium Reflect.)

In the past, I used Mac , Windows and Linux systems as main computers. Windows PC is my main work computer right now. Sometimes I use a small Linux computer for development. When I don't use it, I just turn it off. I also use an iPad and iPhone which store lots of photos and videos. Currently I just backup the PC using an external drive. Trying to decide what to do with iOS devices. Occasionally I may need to access files from my old Mac. In this case, is it worth to spend the money on NAS?

Over the past 30 years, I have many drives taken out from old computers. Some files are backup of files. Others include backup of backup of backup. Kind of messy. They are just stored in a box. I read that NAS can remove duplicated files and folders using a "consolidate" feature. How good is that feature? Does it work well all the time?

 

[Tech Junky]

@tablespoon

Any sort of network storage will deduplicate things since it will alert you to an existing file if you try to copy it to the same folder.

I think there might be a program out there that can scan drives for duplicate files but, I haven't used one personally. Consolidation would be a good idea and condense things from a variety of sources.

Either a NAS or the diy approach gets you easy access to files from multiple devices and os. It's still something to put some thought and planning into though because it's not cheap either way if you change your mind later.

 

[HappyCracker]

The way I have things setup:

• Primary NAS
  • TrueNAS Scale running on an old desktop
  • ~18TiB usable from old enterprise 3.2TB SAS flash drives
• Secondary NAS
  • TrueNAS Scale running in a VM on ESX
  • 6TiB of capacity in the pool

I replicate everything from my primary system (~5TiB at present) to my secondary nightly. Each side uses local snapshots to provide additional checkpoints. The highly critical data is copied onto an external drive periodically.

I let RAID/ZFS handle local resilience of the blocks, snapshots handle the file system, and a separate system handle complete failure of the source data. After that, the external drive gets me back the irreplaceable items.

NAS makes sharing files and running media servers against those files easy. It also allows for good replication mechanisms to be applied to the data. Think of it as a storage-oriented operating system, versus Windows which is general purpose, application focused (gross oversimplification, I understand). Whether that NAS is homebuilt with Linux, Windows, or a product like TrueNAS or Unraid, or even Synology is immaterial. What I do could be achieved with a Linux box and some work, but the NAS-focused systems have already done the legwork for a simpler instantiation.

 

[tablespoon]

I am reconsidering a NAS, an external backup drive or a Mac Mini with an external drive. From a backup point of view, is the main point for choosing a NAS is that it makes the backup task easier since once the schedule is set up, it does everything automatically while using an external drive or a Mac Mini, we could get lazy and not backup as often as we should?

 

[manly]

I am reconsidering a NAS, an external backup drive or a Mac Mini with an external drive. From a backup point of view, is the main point for choosing a NAS is that it makes the backup task easier since once the schedule is set up, it does everything automatically while using an external drive or a Mac Mini, we could get lazy and not backup as often as we should?

NAS storage isn't really "backup" but the storage pool could be used to backup your "devices." You can also automate backing up to direct storage or a Mac mini, so that isn't the difference. If your backup plan relies on you not being lazy, then it's not a very good system.

A NAS is a purpose-built tool, and typically requires little ongoing administration. The UX is usually easy enough that you don't need to be an expert to manage. Lower power consumption is a plus, but that won't be any different from a USB hard drive or Mac mini. RAID-1 is fine, and will protect you from a single disk failure. If your data is valuable, this is a main advantage of a basic NAS over a standard USB hard drive.

As OlyAR15 said, you don't need a second NAS to backup the primary one. Most NAS will support connecting a (cheap) USB drive, which can be used as a backup target (the NAS will have a software tool to automate this).

 

[Tech Junky]

Or get the nas and backup to backblaze for $7/mo.

 

[tablespoon]

I don't upload work related files to any cloud storage.

 

[Tech Junky]

I don't upload work related files to any cloud storage.

Then exclude that folder and do a local backup. Work related stuff is probably backed up automatically anyway with file sync.