General NAS question

[phillyman36]

As far as NAS devices go if I am not doing any transcoding does the cpu and memory in a NAS really matter as far as streaming? All I do is watch movies (blu ray) on a media player/HTPC. I have 4 tvs so at the most only 2 maybe 3 movies will play at the same time. What is the least amount on memory the NAS should have? I have FIOS cable with a Gigabyte switch. As far as streaming does it matter if the cpu is Arm/celeron etc etc?
As far as no stuttering goes via wired network.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Streaming w/o transcoding? Any CPU should work, yes.

I'd want 2GB of RAM minimum in something I'm using as a file server. Some low end units ship with less, and that's probably ok for light use.

Your internet connection doesn't really matter, if all the traffic is over your LAN.

 

[abekl]

I looked into performance carefully when I was buying a NAS. I didn't think I'd be transcoding, but now that I do, it's made the world of varied sources open up. So, I'd buy a system with a little horsepower. Stay away from Atom units and get one based on the Celeron. An excellent 4 bay unit can be had for 500. I like Asustor. Look at these for starters.
https://www.asustor.com/product?p_id=33&lan=en
https://www.asustor.com/product?p_id=39&lan=en

P.S. If you're running more that one session, you'll need more memory. You should buy the unit with the standard memory installed, and then buy a new memory module to install and max out the mem. On the Asustor units the max is 8 GB.

 

[phillyman36]

Thanks, looking for a 6 to 8 bay NAS. I have a ds 1812 but looking to get another. Most of the time I read forum threads saying most people want something stronger than an Atom. From what I see the cpus are either Atom, Intel Celeron/i3-i7, or a Annapurna Labs Alpine cpu inside. I'm sure I wont need any transcoding as I use a Dune media player and a Intel NUC(Openelec). Based on the responses it seems for what I need the cpu wont matter. Just need to make sure the NAS has at least 2GB of ram