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Am I thinking my NAS solution correctly - Enquiries - 10-11-2022
I mostly want to centralize about 4tb of family videos and photos and make them available to other family members plus have a time machine backup location for my MacBook Air. In the future I want to install an outdoor surveillance camera.
Right now I’m thinking of buying a Synology 920+ 4 bay system. I would add three 4 TB drives using Synology raid. Then I would get one surveillance hard drive for the 4th bay in raid zero for the camera. If there is any important video captured I could copy it over to the Synology raid.
Does this sound like a workable solution? This would be my first NAS and I’m trying to not make any mistakes before I buy.
RE: Am I thinking my NAS solution correctly - TribalHound - 10-11-2022
You're nearly there, but definitely on the right track.
That 4 BAY Nas will take 4 disks. Any RAID is 2 or more:
RAID 0 (2 discs) - a definite NO is a NAS unless you like roulette with your data and you've put it all on Green
RAID 1 (2 discs) - like putting your roulette on black and red - pretty safe, but there's still that green
RAID 5 (3 discs) - same coverage as RAID 1, only you gain more space and spread yourself across 3 discs
If you're not needing to backup your camera, other than occasional clips - you could go for a RAID5 with 3x4TB for all your system and data and TimeMachine, then use one of the Ethernet ports to create a new virtual network for your camera(s) and recordings that would save to a solitary disk in bay 4. No cover against drive failure, but you can copy what you want to keep to your main 3 drives that way.
The 920+ has some great specs for a new NAS user, and buys you some future proofing as well. With the 922+ soon to be replaced with the 923+ (rumors so far) there could be some sizable discounts on the 920+
If you go Raid1 I'd suggest 2x 8TB drives, go RAID 5 and make that 3 x 6TB drives + whatever you need for how many cameras you want and recording resolution.
That should buy you a few years trouble free.
Give Robbie a shout if you can't find a referral link for the kit you choose as he has links for most things NAS and you might save a bit towards an extra camera (which incidentally he's reviewed a few on youtube that might help you decide on those too).
Hope this helps.