Is my data redundant?

[Enquiries]

Hi there,

I'm new in the NAS world, so it's probably a pretty basic question I have ^.^

So, I got a Sinology DS220J with 2 X 4 TB seagate ironwolf Drives and got it setup. I chose SHR, then created 1 pool, then 1 volume and "assigned" my 2 drives to the volume. (not that I completely understand what all of that means btw)

Everything looks fine, but I'm not clear whether my data are redundant (aka stored on both drives) or not. One very important use case for me is to make sure I don't lose my data. So, my questions are:

Are my data backed up on both drive? Is it safe already? And how can I double check that?

Hope that makes sense and feel free to ask more details if needed.

Guys, great ressources you are providing. It has been extremely useful already and given the depth of NAS technology, I feel it will keep on being useful. Big thanks!

[TribalHound]

In layman's terms a storage pool is like a pie, and they can vary in size.
A volume is a portion of that pie.
You can cut the pie into variable sized slices, or you might be hungry and eat the whole pie in one large portion. If you invite lots of people for dinner (multiple users) you’re going to need more pies.

Since your NAS has 2 x 4TB drives the total usable space as a single pool with no redundancy is 8TB.
If you created a RAID1 arrangement you would only have 4TB of usable space. RAID1 is where your NAS automatically clones all your data to both discs. Then, if a single disc fails you follow the NAS instructions, swap the failed disc for an empty one (same size or larger) and let the NAS take care of re-cloning all your data.

Raid is NOT a backup, it’s just insurance against dying discs & all discs die eventually.
All discs inside the NAS are managed by the NAS so if the NAS fails, is stolen or destroyed, you have no backup. So decide what data is crucial and either back it up to a cloud storage or get a WD my passport (or similar) and back it up via usb or to another hdd inside your PC.

If you’re using both discs without RAID, you can’t create it without reformatting, so you’ll need to move your data off first.

Within your system you’ll have Disc management where you can configure RAID, storage pools and volumes.

[TribalHound]

Hi there,

I'm new in the NAS world, so it's probably a pretty basic question I have ^.^

This great overview explains a little about SHR & Raid + how they differ.
What is Synology Hybrid RAID (SHR)? - Synology Knowledge Center

Of course with a 2 disc NAS and both disks the same size, SHR is in essence the same as Raid1 - so you have redundancy.
Just try and keep your discs the same size until you move up to a 4 (or more) bay NAS in later years.