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External Storage USB or NAS?

H

heiber

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 19, 2014
5
0
I have more than 1 TB of data so no matter what option I go with, I will need external storage. I also have some Windows laptops. Would be nice to have access to photos at the very least and maybe music. Here is what I understand

USB - cheaper, but directly attached so files can be shared and viewed, but not necessary directly edited by Windows laptops. I typically leave the computer on 24x7 so access should not be a problem from the other machines

NAS - more expensive. Slower performance? But files can easily be read and written to by all computers.

Also would look at a time machine backup for the internal system drive. Where can this be written to? I don't want to have to buy more devices than I need (for example would rather buy a 4 TB external drive than 2 2TB external drives if necessary). Backing up the data to time machine is not as important to me because I already back it up to the cloud via Crashplan. Still, if I have the space can I backup everything to the same external drive? Should I create 2 partitions?

Thanks for the help.
 
I used to own a WHS, but now I'm replacing it with a Mac mini server with DAS. NAS has the convenience of being cross compatible with windows/Mac but it's soooo slow even with Gigabit.
 
I had a NAS for a little while. It was cool because I could access the same files from my PS3 and mac and iPhone and iPad. It was too much bother to set up and keep going. So I decommissioned it and went to exertnal hard drives. I just picked up a 2012 mini so I am going to turn my 2008 into a server for everything.
 
If you keep your photos on a USB drive connected to your computer, and use Time Machine for automatic backups to a NAS, would you be able to share (view) the backed up photos from the NAS?
 
hi. Im using WD My Cloud 3TB NAS end connected WD Elements 4TB so i have 7TB NAS Server . Have DLNA stream i can watch video,pictures, lising music on my smart tv or car. NAS using 4 computer, smart tv, iPhone end on my car. Good write end read speed at home, city or drive. Also my macbook pro 13, mac mini do automaticall backup. Also try write 180GB 3D Video Macbook pro to NAS about 1h 25min. I happy its really good NAS.
 
I have a WD Passport 2TB drive which is in split into three partitions (TimeMachine,Backup & Music) This is all backups of my Mac Mini and works well. I use Carbon Cloner every other day to back up to the drive.

If you need more space I would go for a NAS, also better for future upgradability.

Not sure where you are but in the UK HP were doing cash backs on HP N54L Micro servers (£89)
I use that as a NAS. I currently have one with 4x4TB WD Red drives for Plex as media server. It can also be setup as a TimeMachine backup aswell, running on WHS2011.
Also Synology is a good option but more expensive.
 
Last edited:
I'm a big fan of synology's NAS offerings. I have an older DS211j and a new DS214+. They not only serve files, but also run services like my surveillance system, time machine, and PBX.
 
brentmore said:
I'm a big fan of synology's NAS offerings. I have an older DS211j and a new DS214+. They not only serve files, but also run services like my surveillance system, time machine, and PBX.
Click to expand...

But not very well, unless you are just doing the basics or easily amused, one quickly outgrow them.... and there is no scalability.
 
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