Hello! First off, THANK YOU for the generous gift of your time and expertise to answer random IT questions from people like me. I'm sure you're busy, so I will try to be as brief as possible below:

I am a freelance Creative Director who works in a variety of locations, though primarily from home. My computer is an Apple M1 MAX. I do not collaborate on-site (physically) with anyone while at home. When I work with clients, files are typically posted to the cloud, through a variety of services – Usually determined by my clients existing systems and workflows. I am hoping to improve my productivity by creating a performant, desktop-like experience while in my office, while also having the ability to unplug and work on the go.

I currently use external USB 3.1 Gen 1 drives for active projects, assets. and backup (G-DRIVE ArmorATD type drives). My internet service is 1Gb, which I access through a Gen 1 Eero setup.

I am an amateur photographer needing a reliable storage device big enough to accommodate 250,000 photographs. I am moving from Drobo to a new sysytem. I am 77 years old and note very computer technically literate. I would appreciate your advice on what system to buy that I can easliy transfer my images to.

Buying TVS-h674-i5 (have TS-451+/8GB/4 x 4TB QTS RAID5). SW: run MQTT/Frigate/HomeAssistant and Plex/other media apps in containers. HW: ordered Coral G650-04686-01 (PCIe Gen 2 x1) for ReoLink TrackMix/MQTT/Frigate/HomeAssistant and SiliconDust Flex 4K (connect to LAN and Plex). Frigate only records audio/video/snapshots when there is movement in zones. Plan on 4 IronWolf ST4000VN006 4TB HDDs. Sounds like I should purchase 2 M.2 SSDs for a SSD RAID/1st storage pool. Do I need the QM2-4P-384A card for the Coral AI (Slot #1 ?) and what Seagate or WD M.2 capacity SSDs and HomeAssistant BlueTooth USB would you recommend (maybe UPS)? What would you recommend for the new NAS setup (QTS or QuTS hero), with at least System/media/NVR separated and RAID5? Okay with slow migration from old to new NAS. Trying to keep cost down, but want setup for years. Thanks

Hi there! Thank you so much for your videos im subscribed and been watching many videos for very long time. I´m on a budget but i have about 12TB of data spread out in many external harddrives. i would love to have all in one place and hopefully able to access it remotely. It would be mainly for storage since i came to the understang that would be the safer and budget friendly option. Basically i´m planning on getting and external ssd hardrive or use one of my fastest externall hdd ones for edit on and transfer those projects to and from the NAS. But i would love to have your reccomendation on this. Thank you!

I know from watching your Youtube channel that I can put two HDD's in a four bay NAS. But my question is about placement. Must one HDD be in position 1 and another be in position two? Or could I use positions 1 and 3 to allow for more air flow? Thanks for all your great work and videos!

Hi Ed,

I just purchased a ts464 but given I have a 16u rackmount cabinet I am considering a rackmount equivalent. Primary usage would be Photos, File backup and Plex (including transcoding to 1080p, native 4k playback and free to air stream via tv plex tuner - several streams to mobile, iPads, tv..)

I noticed Qnap has a ts-464eu rackmount unit which seems to be equivalent to ts464. I have not seen you review it yet for plex use etc.

Would the ts464eu be at least the equivalent of ts464? Anything I should be aware of in terms of advantages/disadvantages in use?

I have an existing Plex setup using a Lenovo M93p i7 to run Plex and 2 x Netgear RN104's.
I have 17TB of film and TV and I would like to refresh my wholes setup with a new NAS that will run Plex (no more external). Content is 720 and 1080.
I'm thinking about QNAP, but with so many models, which would be a good one for me?

Hey guys I am in the market for a PCIe M.2 NVME SSD card. The purpose will be to solely update firmware so I dont need something expensive or feature rich.
I have an old PC knocking about in which the motherboard has PCIe x1 and PCIe x16 slots.
Can you guys recommend an adapter card which supports both M.2 NVME and M.2 SSD drives that could work with that motherboard.

Thanks in advance and keep up the great work.

was wondering if should get either a 4 bay with 32TB storage, or maybe go for a 5 Bay with 40TB storage, plus what raid should use for best case senarios.

Hello , first off thank you for the very informative videos. I have 2 drobo 5D units with qty 5 cpacity 6TB drives in each unit. i currently have 14.7 TB of data , mostly movies for Plex server that i am running off of a mac mini that has the 2 drobos attached. i don't know which way to go. I am so confused. I want to re use the drives if possible but was thinking of buying 14TB drives if need be so i can use the NAS as a cloud service for my entire family giving them the opportunity to store back ups and pictures and such off theiur iphones instead of relying on icloud. what is the best recommnedation?