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Beginner NAS advice needed


Aze

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Hi all,

I'm wanting to get a NAS to put all my movies onto and be able to access from all displays in the house.  What is a good (not top of the line) brand/model to look at? Also what do you need to stream/view the movies on tv/projector/ipad? Is something like a chrome cast or similar required? Something that has a few slots so it can be expanded later would be good. Is $300 a realistic budget to get started? Does a better quality NAS get you better PQ/SQ, or is it quicker or easier to use?

Thanks, Aze

Edited by Aze
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Synology is a good brand. It has an app for iPhone, iPad etc called DS Video which you can use to stream to your devices using Chromecast or Apple TV etc. It also has an Apple TV app. Not sure about Android.

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Synology makes great NAS. Their user interface is easy to use. But $300 isn't going to get you much.

 

You need to work out how much disc space you want (then double or treble it). Do you need data protection/redundancy? (RAID). This is where data is distributed across multiple disc drives so that if one fails you still have all your data.

 

What media do you want on there? I started with just my music and music concerts, then favourite movies and TV Series, then more favs, then why not whack everything on there? I no longer need a DVD, CD or Blu-ray player. Once you have instant access to everything you don't use discs.

 

I started with a 4 drive/bay NAS. Then added a 2 bay expansion, then started upgrading discs to larger sizes. Eventually ended up with a 12 bay NAS. It's expensive upgrading. Both drives and NAS.

 

If you have lots of optical media it will take many (hundreds) of hours to convert all to files so you also want to back it up. (I never want to do all my collection again!). So for every GB of NAS storage you need a GB of backup... (more $)

 

You can always start with a smaller NAS and add drives as needed. But whatever NAS you buy you'll realise "you should've bought a bigger NAS"

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Thanks, I will read up on Synolgy. I'm not looking at getting rid of physical media, just allowing access on all screens without going to get the disc and firing up the blu ray etc. If $300 isn't enough, what amount would you suggest. I have 700 movies across dvd and BR and laserdisc, how much space is a typical movie with each format?

This will help me decide on how much drive space to aim for.  Obviously growing my collection is a constant problem :) 

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7 hours ago, Aze said:

 I have 700 movies across dvd and BR and laserdisc, how much space is a typical movie with each format?

This will help me decide on how much drive space to aim for.  Obviously growing my collection is a constant problem :) 

That does depend on the format whether you don't compress and what method you use Aze , if you want no loss you can store as an ISO or as a mkv which is popular . I use dvdfab to compress bd;s strip out subtitles and do the main movie only . I also compress movies to save space depending on the title ; some of my m2ts bds are 26gb uncompressed; lesser titles are 1/2 that but still retain a lossless soundtrack . A dvd can be 6 or 7 gb but use an efficient codec like mp4 and maybe 2 or 3gb is easily gettable .Laserdisc isn't high resolution either and a lot are only 2ch bitstream so even less should be fine :)

I have an enterprise NAS I was lucky to get but another to check out as well as Synology is Qnap which has been around awhile https://www.qnap.com/en-au/

 

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Aze,  how handy are you on computers.  You can custom make a great NAS running UnRaid on a HPE Microserver platform.

 

Infinitely more flexible/expandable than the OEM variants.  But requires build and config effort.

 

All my content 10TB streams via SMB through PLEX across my network.

 

If you are going to use Plex best to convert to H264 using handbrake.

 

Edited by zmacka
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All good advice here.  Synology all the way.  If budget an issue, start off with a 2 bay drive.  Down the track you will get the hang of it and will want more of just about everything - space, flexibility, performance etc.  I started off with a 2 bay and now have a 2+5 bay expansion running raid 5.  As for Hard drives, look no further than WD Red's for home use.  Best bang for buck.  The higher end Synology's allow you to upgrade your memory modules, so worth considering if you're going to be running a lot of NAS apps on the NAS

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2 hours ago, zmacka said:

Aze,  how handy are you on computers.  You can custom make a great NAS running UnRaid on a HPE Microserver platform.

 

Infinitely more flexible/expandable than the OEM variants.  But requires build and config effort.

 

All my content 10TB streams via SMB through PLEX across my network.

 

If you are going to use Plex best to convert to H264 using handbrake.

 

Ummm....I know how to turn one on and navigate around :P We have Mac's if that makes it different? Whatever I end up doing needs to be fairly easy or else I would give up and continue fetching a disc each time I want to watch something! Is it a good time to ask what PLEX is and H264?!?

 

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6 hours ago, cwt said:

That does depend on the format whether you don't compress and what method you use Aze , if you want no loss you can store as an ISO or as a mkv which is popular . I use dvdfab to compress bd;s strip out subtitles and do the main movie only . I also compress movies to save space depending on the title ; some of my m2ts bds are 26gb uncompressed; lesser titles are 1/2 that but still retain a lossless soundtrack . A dvd can be 6 or 7 gb but use an efficient codec like mp4 and maybe 2 or 3gb is easily gettable .Laserdisc isn't high resolution either and a lot are only 2ch bitstream so even less should be fine :)

I have an enterprise NAS I was lucky to get but another to check out as well as Synology is Qnap which has been around awhile https://www.qnap.com/en-au/

 

I would want to keep it uncompressed, but happy to remove trailers and subtitles etc. Does Synology use a particular file format or you can choose?

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2 hours ago, katattack74 said:

All good advice here.  Synology all the way.  If budget an issue, start off with a 2 bay drive.  Down the track you will get the hang of it and will want more of just about everything - space, flexibility, performance etc.  I started off with a 2 bay and now have a 2+5 bay expansion running raid 5.  As for Hard drives, look no further than WD Red's for home use.  Best bang for buck.  The higher end Synology's allow you to upgrade your memory modules, so worth considering if you're going to be running a lot of NAS apps on the NAS

I would be happy to start with 2 bay and go from there. Is there a drive size limit with Synology? Also can you daisy-chain expansion bays or is it limited to the one expansion? Thanks for the tip on WD Reds. What sort of apps are available for NAS? I figured it was just a storage and stream thing.

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5 minutes ago, Aze said:

I would be happy to start with 2 bay and go from there. Is there a drive size limit with Synology? Also can you daisy-chain expansion bays or is it limited to the one expansion? Thanks for the tip on WD Reds. What sort of apps are available for NAS? I figured it was just a storage and stream thing.

I dont believe so, just remember that with a 2 drive, you're limited to Raid 0, 1 or SHR.  Best to set it to SHR as the first instance, when building the raid.  Go with the largest capacity you can afford.  You can buy a 5 bay drive as an add on later but its not cheap as the unit is about $500+ plus additional hard drives.  As most people stream services for video, music etc, the days of ripping music and blurays are numbered and time consuming.  Forget about installing Plex *ON* the Nas itself as performance will be an issue.  Most NAS units have low powered cpus, which doesnt have enough grunt to transcode across multiple streams.  

 

I run a plex server on my laptop (which is on 24/7) and just keep my files on the NAS as storage. 

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48 minutes ago, Aze said:

Ummm....I know how to turn one on and navigate around :P We have Mac's if that makes it different? Whatever I end up doing needs to be fairly easy or else I would give up and continue fetching a disc each time I want to watch something! Is it a good time to ask what PLEX is and H264?!?

 

PLEX is a media server and player,  fetches all clip-art and tiles/summaries around media content it sees on the NAS.  This is the front end I see on all my media capable devices.

 

H264 is a compression standard,  the best for compatibility for streaming.

 

 

Plex.jpg

Edited by zmacka
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46 minutes ago, katattack74 said:

I dont believe so, just remember that with a 2 drive, you're limited to Raid 0, 1 or SHR.  Best to set it to SHR as the first instance, when building the raid.  Go with the largest capacity you can afford.  You can buy a 5 bay drive as an add on later but its not cheap as the unit is about $500+ plus additional hard drives.  As most people stream services for video, music etc, the days of ripping music and blurays are numbered and time consuming.  Forget about installing Plex *ON* the Nas itself as performance will be an issue.  Most NAS units have low powered cpus, which doesnt have enough grunt to transcode across multiple streams.  

 

I run a plex server on my laptop (which is on 24/7) and just keep my files on the NAS as storage. 

just curious, what is the benefit of storing all your media on the NAS but using the laptop as the server for plex? I understand that the NAS may not have the processing power to transcode media files that need transcoding, which is why you use the laptop as a server. Why not just store all your media on a normal external hard drive? Wondering what the benefit of using the NAS is in your case?

thanks

 

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22 minutes ago, swervyn said:

just curious, what is the benefit of storing all your media on the NAS but using the laptop as the server for plex? I understand that the NAS may not have the processing power to transcode media files that need transcoding, which is why you use the laptop as a server. Why not just store all your media on a normal external hard drive? Wondering what the benefit of using the NAS is in your case?

thanks

 

I just thought a NAS is what you do? I don't know anything about PLEX etc, I just thought a NAS was to store all your movies so you can watch them on different displays without getting the disc out.

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A external hard disc can't be accessed by many users at the same time.

NAS can included mirroring of data (if a disc dies you haven't lost everything)

A NAS can hold many times more data than an external drive.

Never have to swap external drives to find something (it all on one NAS)

 

 

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Its not just the data redundancy that you need (NAS) a Media Server buffers/transcodes fetches clip art so your media is available in a graphical as outlined above.

 

You can nominate a computer to act as the Plex web server,  I have used my NAS in the past,  but if you have heavy transcoding overhead it will struggle most likely in a relative sense against an i5 CPU's upwards.

 

Executing a file on a remote (NAS) drive is a very basic functionality.  After all Plex is free..

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2 hours ago, swervyn said:

just curious, what is the benefit of storing all your media on the NAS but using the laptop as the server for plex? I understand that the NAS may not have the processing power to transcode media files that need transcoding, which is why you use the laptop as a server. Why not just store all your media on a normal external hard drive? Wondering what the benefit of using the NAS is in your case?

thanks

2 hours ago, HomerJ1503560906 said:

A external hard disc can't be accessed by many users at the same time.

NAS can included mirroring of data (if a disc dies you haven't lost everything)

A NAS can hold many times more data than an external drive.

Never have to swap external drives to find something (it all on one NAS)

 

 

Homer explained it well :)  I dont use my NAS specifically for just media sharing.  It also stores my home security camera recordings :)

 

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6 hours ago, Aze said:

I would want to keep it uncompressed, but happy to remove trailers and subtitles etc. Does Synology use a particular file format or you can choose?

You can choose ; an ISO is everything that's on the disc including menus and all subtitles . A mkv can be trimmed of subtitles and secondary audio files ie dolby digital when a dd truehd track exists . I don't use plex or another server on a pc but a separate media player that covers a plethora of different file types from the old avi ;mpeg to bd type h264 ;mp4 and mkv downloads ; everything but the latest h265 UHD files ; a new box is around the corner ;zappiti can put a media player in every room but its not cheap  :aww:

 

This enables me to run the system without having the pc on but of course plex is free and its not hard to setup your pc to share the files ..

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6 hours ago, katattack74 said:

 Most NAS units have low powered cpus, which doesnt have enough grunt to transcode across multiple streams.  

 

I run a plex server on my laptop (which is on 24/7) and just keep my files on the NAS as storage. 

That's the limitation with low powered CPU NAS. Whilst Synology is good, their range don't consist higher end CPU. Having a laptop on 24 by 7 just to serve the functionalities of  NAS. That defeats the purpose of having a NAS in first place.

 

Either OP has to learn how to build NAS such as unraid/freeNAS or purchase a multi bay NAS with an i3 and above spec CPU. Both will cost more than 300 bucks. Stay away from cheap NAS if you want steaming capability whilst using Plex. Info here.

 

Yes Plex will allow you to stream from a networked share to just about any devices in your network across different resolution screen. Limited to CPU, and bandwidth. Hell, you can even stream across the internet to another part of the world provided you have a fast uplink!

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6 hours ago, HomerJ1503560906 said:

A external hard disc can't be accessed by many users at the same time.

NAS can included mirroring of data (if a disc dies you haven't lost everything)

A NAS can hold many times more data than an external drive.

Never have to swap external drives to find something (it all on one NAS)

 

 

This is what I dont get

 

I have my movies on an external hard drive (4tb)

I already use plex

Just now as a test I have a movie playing on the tv via the plex app on 4k BD player (cat 6 cable)

I also have a different movie playing on the server (pc)

I also have a different movie playing on an android tablet (wifi)

One movie is transcoding AC3 audio to AAC, the video is direct stream

The second movie is transcoding video and the audio is direct stream

The third movie is transcoding video to H264 and audio DCA to AC3, all playing at the same time

So it is quite possible to access for different users

An external hard drive can be mirrored to another external hard drive

You can plug as many hard drives in as you have usb ports or get a usb hub

Plex stores all data and is accessible from any folder you nominate as your library folder, also accessible remotely

 

So what can a NAS do for me that a pc based Plex server cant do? Especially if a NAS cannot transcode files that are not in its preferred native format?

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6 minutes ago, swervyn said:

I am also using the free version of Plex btw apart from having to pay about $6 for the android app which was limited to 30 second playback time before buying

6 bucks to unlock 30s playback limit? Are you sure? Plex client on Android?

Quote:

The Plex Media Server is free to use and includes the Plex Web App. ... These include Amazon Fire TV, Android TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, Plex Media Player, Roku, Smart TVs, TiVo, and game consoles (PlayStation and Xbox). Our mobile apps (Android, iOS, Windows, Windows Phone) can be used for free, but have limitations

 

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5 minutes ago, Sirmorebeer said:

6 bucks to unlock 30s playback limit? Are you sure? Plex client on Android?

Quote:

The Plex Media Server is free to use and includes the Plex Web App. ... These include Amazon Fire TV, Android TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, Plex Media Player, Roku, Smart TVs, TiVo, and game consoles (PlayStation and Xbox). Our mobile apps (Android, iOS, Windows, Windows Phone) can be used for free, but have limitations

 

yep, on android tablet, server is on pc,  4k bd player has Plex preloaded

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1 hour ago, swervyn said:

yep, on android tablet, server is on pc,  4k bd player has Plex preloaded

Plex is definitely free, no limits in playback. Server is free but anfroid client is not but one time activation.  Full membership - Plex pass unlocks all features like trailers, artists bio, access to other platform clients. More info here.

Edited by Sirmorebeer
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12 hours ago, Sirmorebeer said:

That's the limitation with low powered CPU NAS. Whilst Synology is good, their range don't consist higher end CPU. Having a laptop on 24 by 7 just to serve the functionalities of  NAS. That defeats the purpose of having a NAS in first place.

 

Either OP has to learn how to build NAS such as unraid/freeNAS or purchase a multi bay NAS with an i3 and above spec CPU. Both will cost more than 300 bucks. Stay away from cheap NAS if you want steaming capability whilst using Plex. Info here.

 

Yes Plex will allow you to stream from a networked share to just about any devices in your network across different resolution screen. Limited to CPU, and bandwidth. Hell, you can even stream across the internet to another part of the world provided you have a fast uplink!

So on reading some more on the plex info you linked you can broadly say that a $300 nas will require a laptop to provide the processing power to transcode, and a more expensive nas will be able to do it as a stand alone unit? I can't imagine wanting to stream more than two different movies at once, what sort of cpu speed and number of cores would you recommend to have a stand alone nas?

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