Most, but not all, NAS drives offer this kind of feature, so be sure to do your research before you pull the trigger if it's a must-have. But that's not an absolute guideline.We don't generally recommend NAS drives with just a single bay, unless they are to be used strictly for backing up data that will For most home users who aren't video-file hoarders, a two-bay NAS should be sufficient, provided that you buy big enough drives from the outset if you'll be mirroring them. The Synology DiskStation DS220j is an affordably priced, two-bay NAS device designed for use as a personal cloud solution. 700 Followers, 67 Following, 121 Posts - See Instagram photos and videos from @nas_be

More on redundancy in a moment.Some NAS drives are sold pre-populated with disks, oftentimes already formatted for use in a particular RAID configuration, while others come "diskless." The Synology DiskStation DS218j is an excellent entry-level two-bay NAS device that's supported by a bevy of management options and third-party apps. We wouldn't get a NAS without it. Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones ( /nɑːˈsɪər/; born September 14, 1973), better known mononymously as Nas ( /ˈnɑːz/), is an American rapper and actor. On the Western Digital side, the NAS-specific drives are the "WD Red," in capacities from 1TB to 10TB, with the "WD Red Pro" series meant for enterprise use.As we mentioned earlier, NAS units that have more than one drive are built to offer the option for redundancy, so in two- and four-drive configurations the extra disks can simply "mirror" the contents of the other drive. If you already own a bank of hard drives you intend to install, you'll want to look for such validation. You just connect the drive and tap the button, and everything on the external drive is safely copied to the NAS to a predesignated location.NAS drives, by definition, will come with an Ethernet port, possibly two for redundancy or channel-bonding (essentially, using two Ethernet connections to enhance speed) with very high-end business models. Supports 4K video transcoding and IFTTT automations. The "indie" NAS makers that aren't drive manufacturers, such as Synology and QNAP, are more likely to sell their NAS devices diskless, though they (or more accurately, their resellers) may also offer units pre-populated and configured with drives for shoppers' convenience.If a given NAS is offered in both pre-populated and diskless form, we suggest checking out the cost difference and making sure that the drives that are provided in the populated model work out to a good value. As a result, you can download files you need on the road, or stream a movie or music files resident on your home NAS to your laptop in a hotel across the country or the world, network bandwidth permitting. With this functionality, you can also access the NAS itself from any internet connection, not just via your local network.

But surprise, surprise: The NAS-device makers who are also manufacturers of hard drives (Seagate, Western Digital) favor pre-populated NAS drives for obvious reasons—they lock in a sale of their own hard drives when they sell a NAS. (Not an insidious motive, mind you, just good business.) Networked storage is the most versatile storage, but that's just one of the many benefits of buying a NAS device. The TerraMaster F2-221 is a dual-drive NAS that performs well and comes with some helpful features, but it's hampered by a difficult setup process and meager tech support. This might coincide with the hard drives they actually manufacture, or not. But if either disk fails, it's possible that all your data will be lost, so we don't recommend this approach. Since a NAS device is, at the simplest level, just a container for a … If you're using the NAS to back up your laptops overnight, that's pretty straightforward, as well. )A few models will also come with an HDMI port; this would let you use the NAS as a media server with a direct connection to your HDMI-equipped HDTV.In addition to the above sharing features, most NAS drives let you send web links to people to allow them to access remotely certain files or folders located on your NAS.