TSGL: NAS Recommendations?

[Ethan Bell]

SimpleTech was purchased by FABRIK. You can see their line of Storage
products here: http://www.simpletech.com/products/storage/. I saw a 1.5TB
for around $500.00.

-Ethan

"A person pushed against their will is of the same opinion still."

-----Original Message-----
From: list-bounces at tsgserver.com [mailto:list-bounces at tsgserver.com] On
Behalf Of H Davis
Sent: Tuesday, February 26, 2008 4:15 PM
To: Tech Support Guy Mailing List
Subject: Re: TSGL: NAS Recommendations?

David,

I'm using a SimpleShare NAS 1.1, 500GB by SimpleTech. I've been using it 
about 6 months and it's worked flawlessly since I installed it. I went 
to check on the vendor's site and it looks like they've been acquired by 
someone else and aren't making any network drives any more (sigh). You 
might still find one around at some of the clearance type vendors. The 
model # was STI-NAS/500

It's quiet and you can set it to spin down (not power down) after a user 
specified time. This is an important feature because you really have to 
leave it on all the time or it's not useful. If it spins down it takes 
about 3-5 seconds to automatically spin up when you do anything that 
uses it, and a few things that don't use it (??).

It has 2 USB connectors on the back that can be used for a backup drive. 
I'm not using those for that purpose. If you use it as a network drive 
(it actually stores executables and documents that you call up for use 
on your computers) vs a back up drive (my use) then you might be 
interested in the ability to attach USB back up drives to it. This is a 
common feature of NAS drives.

It also has a print server allowing you to plug your USB printer into a 
USB connector on the back of the unit and print to it from any machine. 
I use this and it works fine. However, be aware that, as far as I can 
determine, no print servers support all the functions of the printer 
which is attached. In my case reporting of the ink status doesn't make 
it back to the computer. It seems that the information flows only one 
way, from the computer(s) to the printer. My requirements are minimal so 
it works for me. A print server is a less common feature of NAS drives.

They also have a feature called iShare which allows you to create a web 
page/site on the drive which you can access from anywhere through a 
personal net address routed through the SimpleTech servers, something 
like yourname.simpletech.com. This gives you access to anything on the 
drive from anywhere you have web access. I'm not using this either. It 
requires fixed addressing on your local network. This is also a less 
common feature of NAS drives and relies on the vendor providing the 
actual internet interface.

I bought mine from Newegg.com for $142. Although they don't have it any 
more, the reviews are still there at:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822100016

Amazon doesn't have it either but they had it and the reviews are still 
there at:
http://www.amazon.com/review/product/B000G18NRA/ref=dp_db_cm_cr_acr_txt?%5Fe
ncoding=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

There are plenty of mega-featured network drives out there but most cost 
more than this one. This was a pretty good deal for the money. Remember, 
speed isn't really a consideration because, unless you're using a 
gigabit network, the network will be much slower than the drive. Even a 
USB drive is 4 times faster (480Mb USB vs 100Mb Ethernet vs 56Mb wireless).

When you do get a NAS drive it makes life easier if you map drive 
letters on your computers to folders on the drive so you can refer to 
them easily on your computer rather than having to dig deeply into My 
Network Places all the time. Drives appear at the top levels of the 
folder tree and are easy to find. You can even rename the drive to give 
it a meaningful name.

For example, on my NAS drive I have a folder called Common that is 
mapped to drive Z: on each of my machines. We use this to pass stuff 
back and forth.

Also on the NAS drive I have folders for each machine that are used for 
backing up that machine. On each computer drive Y: is mapped to the 
corresponding folder on the NAS containing the back up for that machine. 
This way someone else's back up area doesn't appear on your machine and 
if you use an automated back up scheme it will be the same for each 
machine because each thinks it's backing up to Y: even though Y: is 
mapped to different NAS folders on each computer.

If you're interested I can send you a pdf of the instruction manual, 96 
pages. Seeing some details may be useful even if you aren't going to get 
this drive.

I've found the NAS easy to set up and immensely useful since I got it. I 
should have gotten one a long time ago.

HTH

H Davis

David Goldstein wrote:
> I'm starting to look for a network attached storage device for my home.  I
> have a desktop Windows XP machine and Mac G4 wired to my router and use a
> few laptops wirelessly.  I want all these machines to be able to access
this
> device.  I have seen many of these devices advertised but was curious what
> people on the list have to say on the matter.  Anyone care to make
> suggestions/recommendations?
>
> Thanks,
> Dave
> _______________________________________________
> Tech Support Guy Mailing List
> http://www.tsgserver.com/list/
>
>   

-- 
H Davis   hdavis1 at gmail.com


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