Synology 216j NAS to replace WD My Cloud!
Posted by: DNO on 19 April 2016
So, a year ago now I jumped headfirst into the streaming world with a preloved unitilite. This was a reasonable investment and to keep the costs down I bought a WD My Cloud 2T NAS – ‘it’ll be fine’ I told myself. Well, to cut a long story short, it and bl**dy Twonky are now gone. Yes, many of you can say ‘I told you so…’ at this point.
Anyway, many people on here endorse Synology and QNAP so I’ve crawled overthe specs, prices and reviews all weekend and before I click the ‘Buy’ button I hope someone may find a dull moment at work to comment on my choice.
Again, I still have to manage the costs so I’ve provisionally settled on a Synology 216j (why so many 216 versions?) and a 2TB WD Red HDD - I believe I can install just 1 HDD and add another later.
The 216j seems to be a good compromise on cost and specification:
CPU speed – 1Ghz
Memory – 512
USB3 port
Read – 112
Write - 97
…and it has hibernation (which was one redeeming feature of the WD)
£75 ish for the HDD, and £140 ish for the 216j.
My music is CDs ripped to FLAC, with a few higher quality Qobuz FLAC downloads in the mix. I also stream to another Sony box in the kitchen. The family like having playlists to choose from so hopefully the DSM 6 software is OK with that. I mention playlists because it may have been one of the things that screwed with Twonky’s head as I was often getting duplicate tracks listed. I use bubble more than the Naim app (I just prefer it) for the unitilite. I just use the remote for a quick hit. The Sony has its own Songpal app. I have to use WiFi for the present time which I know has its limitations but it's OK most of the time.
Any comments will be appreciated.
Hi NDO,
I have been running an older version 212j for the last few years and it's been spot on. Synologys user interface put some of the large high preference storage area networks i look after in my day job to shame. It's not very often i get impressed with technology but these things are the real deal for the price.
Agreed - good functionality and a community here with experience to help. The native Media Station works fine; installing Java and MimimServer also works fine...you're covered from the software side. For other family members, you can also use the native DS Audio (and Video) apps to stream or download your media to things like iPads. I don't have much experience with playlists, but the naim app ability to build on the fly lists using "queue next" and "queue last" works great (and if you try Tidal, it is seamless to build a list from items on your local collection and from your subscription service, which is neat but not a must-have...).
You can definitely start with a single disc and add later; when adding you can add as a second volume (increased total storage) or as a new RAID (increased redundancy but, obligatory reminder, not a substitute for a separate backup). The Disk Station software takes you through this; the online tutorials and how-to instructions are very good (and forum traffic is helpful for things that seem awkward).
I think they have so many units (6 iirc) in the DSx16 range to cover the price / performance spectrum. There is a recent YouTube review that runs through features and specs, pointing out the trade offs. Generally speaking, though, all are good units and you will likely be happy and almost certainly will fret over these things once you've made your purchase.
Best wishes.
Regards alan
Welcome to your Synology ..........
Why so many ? Some users need a lot of CPU & RAM for business & security applications & others with HD 4K video, your DS216j is the budget line but well suitable for music replay.
Yes you can add another WD Red later, but you need to think about that. Most peeps run 2x HDD in RAID-1, this gives you a mirror image copy & security for when one HDD fails. It does not replace the MUST DO need for a separate back up onto another HDD or SSD to support a complete NAS failure. Have a look at the various RAID or no RAID options ...... www search.
Hibernation is OK, but you will probably find the Synology is a light sleeper. I have mine pretty well tuned for sleep, but it still wakes 4 to 6 times a day when not used. You will need to systematically go through everything in the OS to be sure of what has been installed & running & you may not need. I have a list of all this & can e-mail to you if/when you are ready.
You will need to install - a simple one button touch on "Install" - to set up a few of the included Packages, Look in your Synology webpage - http://192.168.1.201:5000/index.cgi - Package Cente
- Media Server (DLNA/UPnP) is for streaming to your Naim & Sony, it does its job well, is simple to use, but is not liked by forum'ites who transcode FLAC to WAV. They choose to get a 3rd party media server called Minimserver, it needs to be installed with Java & while its not difficult its not a simple one button touch.
- Hyper Back Up will be needed to back up your albums on a separate HDD or SDD - I use WD My Passport & thats aprx £70 for 2TB
- You might need Audio Station for play lists, or do as I do & have play lists set up on the Naim app, or compile & store your own in the NAS. I personally don't use Audio Station.
Look in your Package Center > Installed & see what (if any) Synology might have pre-installed. If you have some you don't need they can be "uninstalled", a one button touch switches them off & moves them back to the package store.
Thank you all. Looks like I'm on the right lines with the 216j, I'll just see how much more the plain 216 (no 'j') is before I buy the 216j...
Mike-B; I will certainly be interested in your list of many things to check Re. Hibernation. And I will study your hints when I set it up. I have read some of your comments before about Minimserver/FLAC/WAV but it sounds like Media Server will be streets ahead of the Twonky I've been used to anyway!
DNO posted:I will certainly be interested in your list of many things to check Re. Hibernation. And I will study your hints when I set it up.
I will need your e-mail address when yr ready - can you read .pdf OK
Good advice as usual Mike-B. Not wanting to hijack the thread but you mention Hyper backup. Can you explain this a bit moe as I also use a Synology NAS and it may also help the OP. Details on the Synology website are vague to say the least. I want manage my music back ups correctly.
Hyper Backup is the new back up facility that came with DSM-6. It was integral before, now its separate & it can be made very specific for complex auto backups in & out of the NAS. Personally I have not looked into it other than use it as I only back up into an unattached (stored elsewhere) WD Passport & do this as & when after I've loaded new albums.
Does this replace a simple drag and drop to an external storage as and when new music is added. Does it make the process easier?
Is there a Private Message facility Mike? I can't find one...
Ok I've found a section on hyper back up on the Synology website so will do some reading. Sorry DNO for hijacking your thread! I'll get my coat...
No worries PIXIES, it's all relevant to me. Any questions about this NAS and OS welcome!
DNO posted:Is there a Private Message facility Mike? I can't find one...
No, I will temporarily post my e-mail address on my profile page, e-mail me yours & I will send my hibernation stuff on .pdf
Done it Mike
pixies posted:Does this replace a simple drag and drop to an external storage as and when new music is added. Does it make the process easier?
Drag and drop from within the Synology File Manager works. If you do it from your pc or mac, however, the files move from the nas to the pc/mac and then to the external storage. This slows down the backup significantly most times.
And of course drag and drop copies EVERYTHING; a proper backup utility will do incremental backups and go much faster as unchanged files are skipped.
The Hyperbackup utility is a simple interface with options to specify source directories, target drive/directory, and schedule. If you specify "unscheduled", you can choose "backup now" whenever you want. It is an incremental process, so only copies what has changed. You can have as many tasks as you like - eg to backup everything here on Sundays, backup music there on Mondays, backup photos elsewhere on Fridays. It's not much more complicated than that to set up, and it can work using different protocols depending on what is available at the target (so it's fine copying to a local USB drive as well as to another NAS on your local network or even a cloud service). Even lazy folk like me have no excuses any more...
With a proper backup strategy in place for your personal content, there is much less reason to implement a raid solution at home; your second bay may be better used to add another volume. If your drive fails, you'll need to reinstall the system on your new one then bring your content back over, rather than having it automatically mirror without interruption. I've done both (on different systems) and neither is particularly hard (as long as you have your content backed up!). But you can cross that bridge when you choose...or when you are forced to in the (distant) future.
Regards alan
Thanks Alan. All very useful and I intend to check out Hyper backup.
I have 2 nas's, one with 2x 3TB WD red drives in JBOD, and one with 2x 3TB WD drives in raid. I really don't know which is "better." I only "need" a little less than 2 tb of storage at this point. But each gets backed up to a usb 3.0 external drive.
I have a 215j and prior to that had a 212j. The 215j is setup with 2x3TB drives as RAID 1 and I'm running MinimServer which is great. Overall I really like the Synology units, it's great streaming to my SuperUniti and I can access it anywhere. One piece of advice - speaking from experience - make sure you buy NAS or Enterprise drives rather than Desktop. I set up my 212j with desktop drives and one started to fail after about 2 years and it appeared as though the Synology unit was failing. Hence the reason I now have a 215j fitted with 2 NAS drives. I also have a weekly backup to a local USB Drive and to Amazon Glacier.
I now have a 116J upgraded from a WD MyCloud. So, moved from a 1200MHz dual-core to a 800MHz single core with same amount of Ram. Things are moving at least twice as fast and I very much appreciate the stability of this service.
Now WD is like a distant bad dream I used to have..
I have a 212J which in a lot of respects works quite satisfactorily. However, the ARM based memory. The version does not at all work happily with Java and updates are a pain if not impossible. These are needed for Minimserver I think, but am not sure as I have tried various bits and pieces on the NAS. Secondly, I cannot get any of the backup services on the Synology to work satisfactorily with my hardware, a combination of PC and Apple Mac. I have a stab at them now and again then get lost in the search for the NAS, or need for shared folders, or the stupid thing looking for another server instead of clients. I find it all far from intuitive.
Of course I have worked my way round all of this and have copied music and other files to the NAS and can access it quite easily over the network, but this has primarily been done from the client side using their copy facilities. Yesterday, I played with Hyperbackup and gave in when again it wanted a shared folder. It is not that I cannot create a shared folder, but I don't want to have to do that for everything. It may be a system administrator's idea of great fun but not mine.
Realistically, I only use it for backup as I find the administration aspect tedious. To be honest, I have no intention of copying hundreds of CDs to a NAS as my current equipment would not merit the hassle. I can access all I need from iTunes or Spotify and was never planning on using the NAS purely for music. Now, if my wife was to spring for a 272 and a 300 DR then things might change.
The 212J, being 4 years old, IS rather under-powered by today's standards. If you want to use a nas as a music server, I'd probably upgrade. But as an external storage device for backups, it's probably fine. I'd backup FROM the computers TO the nas using programs running on the computers. For OS X I have really liked Carbon Copy Cloner.