Do I have to use raid on these NAS devices

[Maiyr]

Hi all,

So there are quite a few of these NAS boxes out there and they always seem to tout raid as the main feature. I mean the Synology, QNAP, Western Digital MyCloud, etc.. devices.... Can these be configured without raid? Meaning lets say in the instance of a 2 disk version. Could I just assign a share to each disk and have the two disks operate independently of one another? Like a simple multi disk file server? Such that if I pulled the disk out of the NAS I could stick it into a PC and read the contents?

Thanks,

Maiyr

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Yes, you can operate them in JBOD mode. (Just a Bunch Of Disks.)

No, you can't pull the disks out and stick them in a PC. Probably.

Because most of those NAS units use Linux and one or another variety of linux file systems, which Windows PCs can't read. You might be able to stick them in a PC running Linux though.

 

[Maiyr]

thanks Dave. I really want to get one of those things because the small form factor and low cost is something I would be hard pressed to replicate if I built my own. But I don't want to use raid and I would like to be able to pull and read the discs in another PC w/o having to boot up linux. Cry, I'll keep looking.

Thanks again,

Maiyr

 

[dave_the_nerd]

thanks Dave. I really want to get one of those things because the small form factor and low cost is something I would be hard pressed to replicate if I built my own. But I don't want to use raid and I would like to be able to pull and read the discs in another PC w/o having to boot up linux. Cry, I'll keep looking.

Thanks again,

Maiyr

Well, if all you're looking for is file storage, a PC running Windows will do the job with normal file sharing, etc. An SFF PC like a used NUC can run a couple external hard drives, no sweat.

Alternatively, (more expensively) you could get a microserver type machine, possibly with Windows Server Essentials.