At present I current run (as primary source), MacMini (intel 2006) through a Rega DAC which I have really fallen in love with since I got it.

The MacMini only has an 80gb drive, so I have a 2.5" Western Digital MyBook constantly attached via USB which holds all of my songs stored as Apple Lossless.

One problem I sometimes get is that using the iPad Apple Remote it takes ages to find my "server" and is quite un-responsive to use. However, with my iphone 4 (not 4S) it is alot quicker to find and make song changes etc. However, I do feel some delay could be due to the USB HDD.

At present I have no back-up in place should I lose the hard drive, well other than my actual CD collection which I don't fancy re-ripping.

So I have started to look in the usual online retail stores at getting another Westen Digital USB drive, which is approx £65. However, I can get a 1TB Seagate NAS drive for £89. This got me thinking....

Are there benefits for me buying a NAS for a tiny bit more money? Will it make itunes faster to respond? I have a BT HomeHub 3 router if this makes any difference.... I could then just use my USB HDD as the backup if the NAS ever got damaged?

Also if I put all of my lossless on the NAS;

1. Will it be a pain to re-setup itunes, or a job that could be done in say 1 hour (putting a seperate time allowance in for the transfer of data from HDD to NAS).

2. Once on the NAS, if I ever got bored of the Rega/Mac combo, could I then just buy an ND5 XS and have it read all of my files on the NAS straight out of the box?

Would love to hear peoples thoughts as I really find the whole streaming thing confusing!