An extended family member is looking for a NAS solution. I run a completely DIY solution since I’m a knowledgeable Linux user. They’re not. I’m trying to figure out what’s available and what to recommend. Here’s what I have so far:
- TrueNAS SCALE (Debian based, UI)
- OpenMediaVault (Debian based, UI)
- Synology (??, UI)
- QNAP (??, UI)
I think that the proprietary solutions like Synology and QNAP are less desirable due to unknown longevity of the companies and their willingness to support their products with software updates. Am I wrong?
I have no idea what’s better between TrueNAS and OMV. I know Debian so I’m confident I can force either to listen via terminal if I have to.
What do you use? Which one of the list do you prefer? Any other Linux-based additions to the list?
I think a Synology is best if they lack technical skills. The GUI is nice and integrations are easy enough to manage. Longevity-wise, I’ve have the 918+ since 2018 and it’s still going strong. Plus there are packages for things like Tailscale (easy to use VPN) you could setup for a them. That way you reduce their attack surface of exposing services externally.
I’ll second synology for ease of use. Source your drives secondhand if you can.
I’ve had a 218+ since 2017. The only reason I might upgrade is to have space for more drives. Im way more of a data hoarder than I used to be
If they’re not technical and you don’t feel like playing family help desk, you can’t go wrong with either synology or qnap. The downside with them is the hardware is just barely powerful enough for a NAS. If they start to get into self-hosting at all – pihole, home-assistant, minecraft servers, jellyfin, etc – they’ll quickly run into limitations.
If they’re somewhat technical but not a Linux guru, I’d add Unraid (slackware based, but 100% UI-driven) to the list. I’ve been running it for years and it’s been great. It makes running docker/VM a breeze on top of the hardware-agnostic setup of mixed drives that makes upgrading slowly over time painless.
I have a DS418play which is several generations behind and it runs a dozen Docker containers, including all of my media automation, just fine. I even host a Minecraft server for my nephews!
QNAP at least used to make pretty powerful NASs. I had one with an older Xeon in it that I bought in like 2015 that at the time crushed Plex streaming. Not sure if they still do, I also moved to Unraid and will never look back, it’s exactly what I need and none of what I don’t (literally, raid. Don’t care about IOPs).
Actually ran Unraid on the Xeon QNAP for a year or so before building my own box.
Synology rules
Even as someone with tech experience using it for the last couple years as I learned what I even wanted to do with my NAS, it was awesome
Even my less tech literate wife was able to do stuff with it, just s little bit of “here’s how to access the server” and boom, the GUI is that intuitive
Using docker on it is also really easy if you do eventually want to step up your game.
And fully supported by Synology, too! They are pretty good at embracing the community while still keeping security as a priority.
Honestly if they are not that technical, I’d with the nearly fool proof solutions of QNAP and Synology and alike. It is very easy to maintain. I think e.g. Synology still provides updates for their 2012-2013 generation devices, hardware limitations apply whatsoever.
Surely you get less Hardware/Dollar but the software is near fool proof. I recommended such devices to two of my half technical friends and granted mutual space for encrypted off-site Backups and it just works flawlessly. If they would have me setup any self made raspberry pi like solution and anything goes wrong with their data I’d rather not stand in their line of sight.
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Open sourcing code definitely doesn’t cost nothing. Assuming your code is 100% in house and wholly owned by you then at best you just dump it onto github. But it rarely ever is. Qnap and synlology probably have a lot of proprietary code directly from Intel that they can’t share. Now they have to comb through every line of code that could be using Intel’s code, and then do something about it. Either delete it and release really broken code, or try to make something work which now 100% costs someone’s valuable time
Offering my experience as an example: I’m a software moron (fine at building a pc, crap at using it) and TrueNas Scale was simple to install and then access on mobile, tablet and via windows PC, at least as simple network attached storage.
When I tried to use it to just jellyfin I hit a brick wall, completely unable to understand how to use the shared datasets.
But as NAS it’s simple with a bookmark to manage.
I’m pretty technical… but I love my Synology.
It just works. Obvious choice for those that aren’t techy.
I bought a used Synology before knowing more about NAS alternatives. I hated every minute with it… Because it was a bit older, security updates could stop anytime. And using the proprietary OS felt even more unsave. Who knows what backdoors are build in there? I sold it after I found out that there is no way to install a custom OS or any alternative to the proprietary version.
Edit: found a picture of it:
I would suggest TrueNAS, but use Core not Scale if the hardware supports it.
I thought the difference was bsd/cages vs Debian/containers?
When does the hardware not support core but does support scale?
I don’t know what hardware they end up running. I’m not trying to imply BSD has poor hardware support, you should check these things when you plan a build or buy.
ixSystems sells pre-built machines running TrueNAS. They’re a little pricier than building on from scratch of course, but they have ECC ram and have everything set up out of the box. Funds also support the development of TrueNAS. I got one earlier this year and I love it. Fussing around in the web UI requires some technical know-how, but if you get it set up for them, I expect it to run like a dream.
I use FreeNAS/TrueNAS core, and I’ve been using it for almost a decade now.
The UI definitely has a sharp learning curve (it’s not at ALL noobie friendly) but once you figure it out it’s a lovely system. It’s FreeBSD based and not Linux based, but to me that’s largely an upside since I’ve liked it a lot more.
Thanks for all the suggestions and experiences!
Anything other than QNAP.
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:
Fewer Letters More Letters NAS Network-Attached Storage Plex Brand of media server package VPN Virtual Private Network
3 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 8 acronyms.
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