NAS question....very naive!

Posted by: Victorthesecond on 09 January 2019

Hi everyone. This may be a naive question, so my apologies in advance. I'm not a technical person, I'm afraid.

I have a Naim MuSo which I use principally for radio and Spotify. I also have a Ruark R2 which is in a different room and used as a "secondary" device for mealtime listening etc.

I have Asset UPnP installed on my laptop and use both the Ruark and MuSo to listen to playlists when we're entertaining.

I've explored a NAS in the past when I only had the MuSo, but found the whole thing to be potentially very expensive for the limited amount of music I listen to from my personal collection and, I have to say, it looked pretty tricky to set up as well as being restrictive in terms of the NAS that was suggested I needed to serve the MuSo - either Synology or QNap.

Now, I'm again thinking about a NAS, but more for back-up purposes as well as being a server for two PCs in the house - my wife and I run a small business from home and file sharing would be sometimes useful. Taking lots of photo and music files away from my laptop hard drive feels like a good thing to do as well. Being able to access files when away from home would occasionally be useful.

Given the perceived expense and complexity to set a NAS up for the MuSo, my current inclination is to install what looks to be a much simpler solution - something like  the WD MyCloud Home 4TB with RAID, which seems to integrate much more simply with the Ruark and acts as the server / back-up I'm looking for for the two PCs. I'm aware that this will not integrate with the MuSo....

My question is simple and naive......"If I install a NAS (I guess of any sort), I'm assuming that becomes the access point for files I want to use via my laptop? So, if for example, I want to open an Excel file that is stored on the NAS, and I have Excel installed on my laptop, I can open a file that is stored on the NAS"?

Is my understanding correct??

A follow up question.....I use KnowHow Cloud to automatically back up at the moment. I wonder if anyone might tell me if an external cloud back-up can work with a NAS?

Thank you SO much in advance of any replies.

Mike

Posted on: 09 January 2019 by Hmack

I can certainly answer one of your questions. 

You will be able to open an Excel file that is stored on a Synology NAS, (I've just done this) and I'm pretty sure the same answer will apply to a QNAP NAS.

The NAS can become the access point for files that you choose to store on the NAS - I am not sure exactly what you mean be 'files that you want to use via your laptop'. I assume you mean that you would choose to hold your documents (and not just backups of those documents) on the NAS rather than on your laptop, but I'm not entirely sure of why you would want to do this.

I'm afraid I can't help you with the external cloud bit, although I would be very surprised indeed if it isn't possible. There may even be an appropriate application bundled with Synology or QNAP. 

I run 2 Synology NASs. One for my music collection, and the other to host my photos and home videos and stream to my Smart TV. You could do this on a single NAS if you want and you don't have too many photos and videos. 

And of course as you have suggested, with a NAS and media server (minimServer or Asset) you will be able to stream music to your Muso as well. 

Posted on: 09 January 2019 by Guinnless

@victorthesecond

Don't use the WD My Cloud for serving music to the Muso. It can only run Plex Media Server and this doesn't work very well for music. 

Posted on: 09 January 2019 by Victorthesecond

Thanks guys, much appreciated! 

HMack  - re storing files on NAS instead of my laptop, I'm sort of assuming that one of the main attractions here is "all files in one place rather than on seperate drives / machines" and therefore accessing files from the NAS would be the right thing to do rather than store them locally and potentially have different versions......but now I'm going to contradict myself and assume that, if I amended a file stored on my laptop, the amended version would be backed up to the NAS  and the original file overwritten to the newer version anyway?!

I know you've mentioned Synology and QNap, but I don't think I can justify the cost of either of those. As mentioned, I'm not over- concerned about playing my personal collection to the MuSo via a NAS, so a less expensive / easier to install NAS looks a better option if it is only really to act as a a server / back up solution / streamer to the Ruark. Thus the reference to the MyCloud 4tb option....

Guinless - do you have any suggestions other than Qnap or Synology if I were to explore streaming via a NAS to the MuSo and didn't want to have the large spend of Synology or QNap?

Posted on: 09 January 2019 by Toe

I have a WD My Cloud NAS and it works fine streaming music files to my Superuniti. If your MuSo is DLNA/upnp compliant, which I assume it is, the WD will be o.k.

As far as I know, the WD still uses Twonky media server and despite what others may say, it does the job.

Why pay 3x the price for a Qnap or Synology?

Posted on: 09 January 2019 by AndyP19

This is something we all struggle with the price or value that you put on data. Or more importantly backing-up data.

We all spend thousands on hi-fi equipment, downloads and labour time ripping then agonise over a few hundred pounds on a back-up strategy.

I use both QNAP and Synology. For a main server then I’d go for QNAP and for back-up Synology is a good economic choice. The DS218J is about £150 and one WD Red 4tb is around £100. If you’re going to use RAID then you’ll need two WD Reds so that’s £350 all in.

A small price for peace of mind.

Posted on: 09 January 2019 by Victorthesecond

Thanks to all! I stream music to the MuSo via Asset UpNp (installed on my laptop), so I assume this means it (the MuSo) is "compliant". I guess I'd need a NAS version of Asset - is it that simple? (I ask only as I've not found anything simple about the MuSo which is a fabulous sound, but boy did it take some setting up!!)

It's all very complicated, especially to someone with limited technical knowledge like me!!

Posted on: 09 January 2019 by Matteo

We use 2 QNAP's in office; 1 with all the files (pst, doc, xls, ppt, etc. ) stored in and the other for back-up.

M.

Posted on: 09 January 2019 by trickydickie

If you use a QNAP you will be able to use Asset which you are already familiar with and know it works well.  The advantage will be that with the NAS being always on you won't need to fire up a computer to play music.  

The QNAP will also allow you to centralise your files which is another of your wishes.  It will do loads of other stuff as well well but much of this you won't require.

The WD My Cloud will make a capable and reliable file server but the UPNP options are more limited as it doesn't have the wider base of applications that QNAP or Synology have.  Unfortunately they come at a premium as you have found.

I would recommend that you pay a bit more and go for one that will support Asset, this way you won't end up buying cheap and buying twice.

Posted on: 09 January 2019 by Guinnless
trickydickie posted

The WD My Cloud will make a capable and reliable file server but the UPNP options are more limited as it doesn't have the wider base of applications that QNAP or Synology have.  Unfortunately they come at a premium as you have found.

Exactly. I use the MyCloud as a backup server and a QNAP/Asset to provide music.

Posted on: 10 January 2019 by Rich 1

Just a thought but a NAS of any sort should not be considered as a prime backup, more as a convenience. If you have any valuable information, photos, music, private or business documents then a 'proper' backup is required. This should be at a separate, secure location to guard against worst case scenario, ie total destruction, flooding etc. It need only be a high quality USB HDD or SSD with password protection as the data would be retrievable on any pc. External cloud is available on Qnap's. In theory you could do away with your existing cloud provider and use the NAS as your private cloud. Just ensure you have backups, remember that even cloud providers should not be considered as an excuse not to have your own backup. Back up and then back up again is a good motto. Rich 

Posted on: 10 January 2019 by Victorthesecond

Many thanks for all the replies. they're much appreciated. I think I remain confused as to the best course of action though, but I will take all into account!

Thank you