Network Hard Drive Advice, Please

Bristolian

Bristolian

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Hi there folks, my first post on this forum ... and it's a plea for advice :thinking:

At home we have a small network with two desktop PCs and two laptops. The desktops (1xWin7, 1xVista) are hardwired to a 4-port router which also provides WiFi for the two laptops (both XP). Each of the computers has more than one internal hard drive with the non-OS one being mapped as a network drive with full read/write access enabled. To complete the set-up there is an Epson printer connected to the router via an Ethernet-to-USB print driver.

One of the desktops has an external hard drive (connected via USB) which is used as a central back-up/data store but it doesn't show up as a network resource. This means that accessing data on the drive (or writing to it) requires the host computer to be used as a go-between - not entirely convenient.

I've been considering buying a network hard drive to replace the USB one, but am being put off by the apparent slow transfer rates. For example, one of the items I was looking at has a specification of 4.4Mb/s for NAS transfer vs 480Mb/s for USB :thinking: Is this normal or am I missing something here - or maybe looking at the wrong drives?

Your opinions/experiences would be appreciated :help:
 
neil_g said:
4.4Mb/s for NAS? thats a wired or wireless figure?

remember 480Mb/s is for the interface, the controller/drive may not write at that speed at all.
Click to expand...

That is a wired figure. The unit I was looking at (Sumvision Net-box with 500GB WD drive) doesn't offer wireless.

I've not measured the transfer speed with my existing USB drive but it appears to be fast with 9MB NEF files being r=transfered in a couple of seconds.
 
For wired network storage I've been using the LaCie Networkspace, it isn't as quick as writing to a firewire drive, but it isn't *really* slow either.
 
well its going to depend on 3/4 things for the NAS..

1) the network speeds (wired or wireless) your router can handle
2) the network speeds (wired or wireless) your computer(s) can handle
3) assuming the NAS is wired, whether it's 100Mb/s or 1000Mb/s
4) if youre going to be using wireless what your signal is like

i mean i backup my lightroom over a 100Mb/s cabled link to my "server" and its not slow..
 
If you have an old PC lying around you could look at FreeNAS. I did a tutorial on how to set it up and use it a while ago.

Take a look at this link HERE and scroll down to tip 188-197 plus a few lower but they should be highlighted.

The thread is for Mac tips but this is the same for a PC. It is a very flexible way of adding storage.
 
My thanks to those that took the trouble to respond to my question. I've just ordered a LaCie Networkspace2 on 14-day approval - I have a tame hardware supplier - and will check it out before making a decision.
 
If your not keen on your LaCie after getting it, take a look at the Netgear ReadyNAS, awesome network storage device and has many other built in features too!
 
Thanks for the suggestion, Mike. I'll certainly bear it in mind :)
 
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