I recently made a video on modding my Synology DS918+ to 5GbE and it works great using a QNAP 5GbE USB adapter for $79 but when I eventually outgrow my current NAS I'll probably go with a higher end QNAP, but for now 5GbE is fast enough for me video editing and storage needs.
I don’t even have a computer 😢. But it’s still great 👍 to watch. So when I’m ready to buy. I will know what to buy 😊. Education in Tech is always great 👍.
As a Synology owner, let me suggest a slightly different workflow that might work better for some people. Synology (don't know about Qnap) has a program called "Drive". This lets you sync directories from your local computer to the Synology box as quickly as you write them. This way you edit on your local machine on super fast NVME disks and your project is instantly synced the moment you write anything to disk. You then backup that NAS dir to the cloud or whereever. You can sync between other computers too. On windows, it gets better because there is a feature called On Demand sync which will, as the disk gets fuller, unload files that haven't been used in a long time (you can pin directories to never be unloaded) so you see their filenames, but they don't take up space on the disk. If you need them, they are transparently copied from the NAS back to your drive. This means on a small local super fast NVME disk you can have access to as much larger amount of content on your NAS without you having to manage everything. This means in the vast majority of cases a 1 gig link and cheap platter drives are just fine and you get all the benefits of local NVME editing.
Appreciate this comment, as it might be exactly what I'm looking for. I've got nVME internal, and I'm considering a 6-bay, with two, 3-drive volumes (one as mass storage with SHR1, the other as a backup for my actual computer and the other volume, also SHR1) Would that be a workable use case? Or is there a better way altogether?
@@JustinDoesTriathlon I have a 6 drive Synology (1618+) and made one 6 drive RAID6 Storage Pool. On top of that, I made two logical volumes. This accomplishes the same thing as what you want to do, but imho is much more flexible and gives 2 drive redundancy to all data. You also don't need to allocate all data into the volumes and can grow each independently based on your needs. If you eventually swap in new, bigger drives you can also add space as you see fit and grow each volume as needed. The only downside I can think of is each time you swap in a new drive you have to rebuild the entire storage pool, but that's a small penalty for the flexibility and RAID6 redundancy.
@@machinethinking Wow, that's really fantastic, thanks for your help. I feel decently knowledgeable about building computers, but nas/server volumes are very new to me. Appreciate the input (and your videos, coincidentally! Have watched them all in the past) I'll give that a strong look over, seems like it could be great.
Hi. Thank you for sharing. This sounds really interesting and like something that can save me some bucks as I have a team of 5 and each PC has fast nvme drives to work off and then archive on slower HDDs. Can you please point me to a resource where I can find out how to set this up and how it works in more depth? Thank you!
I built my own custom server for a few reasons. Redundancy on EVERYTHING, infinitely expandable, and its faster and cheaper than most off the shelf options. Its a complicated experience, for those without a networking background, but still possible.
I personally build a UnRaid setup and it has been awesome. Even using old tech the system is faster and easier to add things like 10gbe, ssd caching etc. Of course it'll cost more if you're looking to save space but since I was putting this into my storage room in my basement I didn't mind. I love the Qnap but $1500 for just an enclosure is wild.
Thanks for putting another review with clear description of use case, acceptance criteria, expertise limits, etc. I personally was not considering all SSDs in my next RAID box; but, you got me wondering about TRIM support and accurate SSD status. SSDs rarely die; but, when they do, it can get really ugly. Storage is where I tend to setup and forget. Then a lot of years go by and suddenly realize I got end of life issues on my oldest components. I think I would put a sticker on my all SSD RAID box saying "Replace drives around 7/15/2024 (+4 years from use)" as a reminder.
Hey Gerald, I exhanged the stock fans in my Synology to Noctua fans. Very easy mod to do, and it runs much quieter (and probably cooler, although unconfirmed) now.
Max would you recommend a thunderbay 4 with thunderbolt 3 for fast read and write speeds over synology? I don’t want to spend OVER $800; this is without any hard drives.
How do you compare to Synology's new 1618xs+? It seems like they had an answer to these issues and it's the same price with upgraded CPU, RAM and built in 10GB / NVME cache. I only ask because I need to upgrade my Synology solution and I'm used to their amazing UI.
@@StreetsOfVancouverChannel What is funny, man? I was being serious. Full Spectrum allows you to see two extra wavelengths that the human eye cannot see... infrared and UV. Cameras block these frequencies by default with the hot mirror filter.
Synology DS1618+ is by far the best solution I've used. My suggestion is that if you edit heavy footage from the NAS max out the NAS RAM and if you can add a NVMe then max that out too in order to have the fastest buffer. Now I'm planning to get a larger NAS to handle Plex from a different box just to keep things separate. Also way more apps within the Synology ecosystem.
I like your philosophy of only keeping the finished videos. Archival storage is such a beast and it's only getting worse with higher resolutions and multiple cameras. I have to convince myself to jettison the old footage once the final result is achieved.
Thank you for the video. I am definitely interested in a custom solution. Now that I have completed my storage cleanup, I am interested in upgrading my current setup and would be interested in seeing how a custom setup compares to the Synology and QNAP. Great job once again.
@@jamesj4998 You wouldn't say that if you knew what was planned... although, we aren't evolving at the moment we are de-volving due to the majority of the population not having a positive mind-pattern.
Something I read on the internet: SSD RAID makes more sense if you're using similar spec drives of different models from different manufacturers. If you buy a bunch of drives from the same manufacturer and retailer, they're quite likely to die around the same time, unlike a HDD, which has a much more random lifespan.
I would substitute all third parties with "dirty danglers." Friends, family, children, postal workers, best buy employees, babysitters, let your imagination soar...
Gerald - I wonder if the thing to do would be to go back to the 672, swap the dual Thunderbolt for the 10 Gb/s Ethernet. Then an interesting experiment would be to add (2) NVMe drives in a RAID 1 as the front-end cache to the storage. That might allow you to saturate the network since the NVMe's would be faster than SATA SSD's and the RAID 1 algorithm is even simpler than the RAID 10. Just some thoughts. Thanks for the video!
I've been using (rather deploying) QNAPs in various studios. Ranging from small 5-bay models up to a few 16-bay models. I can say I am really satisfied with them! One of the nice things - you can put double the amount of 2.5" drives into them! This means if you have a 6-bay model you can put 12 drives into them. QNAP provides a special "craddle" for the 3.5" bay that has some form of raid. This means you can make your QNAP a RAID0 because the craddle is basically a RAID1.
@@levraichris3321 Haha, somehow I still am! One of them is QNAP QDA-A2AR, maybe they have other models as well, but this one I know of that definitely works :)
I have a QNAP TS-932X with 10 GB SPF+ connection. I have 4 4 TB Iron Wolf drives set-up in a RAID-5 array, and 2 256 MB SSD drives set up as a read cache. I edit 5.9K directly off of the NAS.
I set this up at the beginning of the year. DS1618, three 6TB spinners (for now), maxed out the ram, put in an SFP+ PCIe card (Mellanox connect-x2 in the NAS and the 2 computers) , and ran fiber to the PCs. Edit 6k video off it without issue in Davinci Resolve. Using a ramdisk on the DS1618, got 1.08GB/sec file transfer. I didn't go with the QNAP because I read about the security / malware issues they've had scared me away.
Gerald, your reviews are incredible. Thank you for putting this together. As always your thoroughness is astounding. Hands down, the best channel on TH-cam.
Loved this review!!! QNAP also makes add in cards to add both 10gbe and M.2 cache drives on the same card. So you could probably swap out the dual thunderbolt for a dual M.2. Also on a side note these cards can be used in a PC as an Add in card. So 10gbe & an M.2 on the same card.
We have a QNAP 1282 T3 and it's a vast improvement over an earlier unit - why? Processor i7 v. i3. The I7 make a huge difference. Boot times, transfers and so on. Quiet as well. We configured completely differently with two 2TB M.2 NVME drives and 4 12TB hard drives in raid 1 pairs. for backup. It's been flawless, but I know what you mean about interface. It's not very easy or intuitive. But how often do you need to look at it, not very.... Great video.
I started with Synology diskstations but this year I upgraded to a RS1619xs+ with four 4TB Samsung Evos in RAID F1 and then a RS2818RP+ with over 100tb for bulk storage. You definitely would have to keep these in a server closet with sound dampening and ventilation but this setup is rock solid if you prefer performance and reliability over noise levels (about 60 dba eek). NVME caching on the 1619xs+ actually had a performance penalty but it’s plenty fast enough without it. For the Synology disk stations you can swap the 40mm fans for quieter noctua fans.
I think NAS can never compare with local file system due to the remote file system and local is different. What I do is install several 12TB mirrored drives (redundancy) with ZFS.
Also synology has an auto ingest mode. right when you plugin a USB / ESATA drive you can have it pull the data and place it chronologically in the synology system.
"I'm not really interested in storing all that nerd talk perpetually" haha. As always, even a few years later, excellent content from Gerald Undone. Thanks for all that you do. TJ
Thank you so much for this video. Because of these videos, I was able to buy a Synology NAS (my first ever NAS) 920+. I am in the initial phase of my YouTubing career and 920+ has been incredible, especially DSM 7. With Synology Photos, I could organize with photos like Google Photos. I am using my NAS with MBP M1 Pro 2021 and the experience has been mind-blowing. with 7GBPS speeds in the new Mac, it has been a hell of an experince.
I'd never thought about just getting rid of all the non used files. My issue is I don't publish 99% of what I film so it's often not edited into something nice. Maybe I should spend more time doing that so I can delete the old stuff.
I don’t even have a computer 😢. But it’s still great 👍 to watch. So when I’m ready to buy. I will know what to buy 😊. Education in Tech is always great 👍.
You should be able to saturate that dual 10gbe connection with a RAID 0 cached NVME on the 6 bay QNAP. I'm guessing you went with straight SSD's for the reduced noise, otherwise, a RAID 0 two NVME solution will give you superior performance over a 6 SSD SATA RAID 0.
Solid video. This is why I just keep 50TB in my system rather than using a NAS. I get all the speed I need, it's accessible to other computers, and I can still have external & cloud backups for a fraction of the total cost.
Right time,through video,nice segmented video titles.Was thinking to purchase a NAS system,watched a bunch of distracted videos,but you nailed it Gerald. Salute from London,ON.
If you are going for a custom build with the ryzen platform. Then an asus or asrock motherboard will let you boot the computer without a graphics card installed. Freeing up 1 of the expansion slot. For 10gb I also recommend netgear XS505M switch. Finally an LSI sas card (the 9211 8i for pcie 2.0 x8 link. or the 9207-8i for pcie 3.0 x4). Will support +8 SATA 3 drives (and the pci-e uplink give full bandwidth for anything up to 7 of those 8 drives working simultaneously).
I went with a QNAP unit. With any of those pre-fab storage solutions (QNAP or Synology), I would recommend ONLY using the drives that are fully compatible with the specific storage unit. I believe this is a more expensive route, but less headache in terms of troubleshooting & maintaining.
Get yourself a tiny little Noctua fan to replace the one on the 10Gb NIC. They even come with a low-noise adapter which will lower the maximum RPM of the fan and keep the noise down. The NF-A4x10 FLX is a tiny fan that should fit. If you don't want to cut and solder the 3 pin DC fan plug to that 2 pin VGA fan plug, get something like a Kolink fan adapter on Amazon and it's all plug and play! I would feel MUCH more comfortable knowing that there was active cooling on a component that was intended to have it!
How cone after so many years on YT Just now I found the best reviewer!? 🤷♂️ Last week I picked up a new DS920+ and I love it despite still having 1gb port.
Missing out on a lot of good stuff on both those boxes by just using them as file storage, for that a custom setup will come in significantly cheaper and with significantly higher spec. I personally use the Synology kit and once you bump the RAM and start adding a few virtual machines, automated remote encrypted backups, surveillance station etc it really shines.
Hey Gerald, just to be on the safe side with the unplugged fan on the network card, maybe put a 40mm Noctua fan on top the heatsink? They're only like 20 bucks and SUPER quiet.
This was incredibly dense and concise. I watched it the whole way through and all information was pertinent but clearly explained. Excellent video. Thank you for this.
Storage is an expensive but interesting topic. I do try to save my video projects and it does add up fast... I recently picked up a QNAP TR-004 and filled it with 10TB drives. I'm happy with it so far for my use case. Using it in RAID 10 with the software configuration option instead of dip switches on the unit to select RAID level. I'm getting around 200mb/s writes which isn't great, but I'm using it for backup rather than trying to edit off of it. I might convert it to RAID 5 eventually to get more storage. At least until it makes sense to change out the drives. It sounds like you will benefit from a custom solution, but saturating a pair of 10 gbit ethernet ports would be a (fun) challenge to build a compact storage focused system around. I wonder if there are speed limitations related to the network gear rather than the NAS to consider as well.
@@MiaogisTeas 2.5 gigabytes a second over the two connections that do 10 gigabit. I haven't watched this video in 3 years so no idea what specific SSDs he was using but if they were SATA they will be limited to that interface and it's not 2.5 gigabytes/sec, more like a maximum of 500 MB/sec but with my older SATA SSDs it's a bit slower. You also don't get 1:1 transfer speeds in RAID situations.
Hey. Amazing video! This is kind of exactly what I was planning to build for editing from 2 or 3 PCs. Awesome to see a great video about it. What about using regular HDs in the NAS, though? Too slow? Does anybody know if regular HDs and 1GBit network would be enough to edit from (mainly 1080p footage/video though)?
Looking into getting myself a NAS. This is very helpful. Actually the most helpful I've watched! Why have I not stumbled upon your channel before? No idea. But I've already subscribed! Thanks for this 👌
It's not every day you hear someone say that Synology is the cheaper solution. To be fair, this is like comparing a $750 camera from one vendor with a $1.5k camera from another. For the amount that QNAP costs you could get the Synology FileStation FS1018 with support for 12 SSD drives and expand with with a dual 10 GbE NIC. Anyway, I have a QNAP box, my brother uses Synology... both are good. The most important part is understanding your need and matching it to the correct hardware.
As an infrequent amateur my needs aren't intense, but I have definitely found my Synology 918+ to be sufficiently fast for light timeline work in Resolve. Also, I just discovered Backblaze B2 and am over the moon! Great video. It was good to have my own experience confirmed
@@TheBecke1983 Considering I have my "old" rig all DDR3 AMD but i'm sure it's 4.7gig CPU and 3400K memory will do just find hosting Me a NAS, I just need the SSD's :)
Thanks for doing your videos in my own bespoke order. I literally bought a Synology RS2418 and a QNAP TS-1635 in the last 2 days! The QNAP is replacing the LOUD Synology (which is a rack unit, granted). Would be easier if you made the videos right *before* instead of right after my purchases though :-) The good news is I can play back a clip in Final Cut with four 4K camera angles and the angle viewer AND the main clip visible and it just rocks along at 10G.
Wow...I made it to the four minute mark before getting a bit glassy eyed. That is not bad for a landlord. Great video! tHanks for all the info. I have a super Triple Drive backup system - but this is next level stuff!
Please do a continuation to this video. I was in a similar situation with storage and simply upgraded to 13tb but a long term solution is needed for me.
Great video Gerald. I’ve been a QNAP user for 10+ years now. They have got better and better for multipurpose video editing. Tech support is also fantastic. Now I have 6 of the buggers. Haha. Keep up the good work. Pete.
I would like to see how a custom build that achieves your goals and compares to these NAS boxes. I have recently been considering building a NAS so I'm glad to see these videos. Thanks Gerald.
If your looking for flat storage check out the TS-932PX. 25(2x2.5 + 2x10)GBe Networking and 2 storage tiers (5+4) running raid 6(if you can live without a cache drive) for about 600 bucks + drives is actually an amazing deal. If you dont need media features theres no reason to get any different model atm. Also: Use a resistor to bring down the fan RPM instead of outright unplugging it. Alsoalso: Dont waste capacity by going raid10. Raid6 should "almost" saturate those network ports, with the number of drives in use.
Awesome video, Gerald! I would love to see a video of a regular day of filming and editing workflow, as well as the time it takes you. Thank you for the knowledge here my friend!
How about reliability??? Do these have filesystems with block-level checksums, or anything to detect bitrot? Do these even support ECC RAM? Those are at least my first 2 requirements for a NAS.
Careful with those Aquantia cards. Everywhere Ive worked they tend to fail from load and heat when frequently in use. The Intel’s are ROCK solid. x550 cards. Well worth it.
I've been using the Synology Diskstation for 5 years now and have accumulated 5 of them across 3 sites for redundancy and sheer lunacy. In fact I've had the 1618+ for year plus now and am really happy with it. I picked up a QNAP TS-251+ today and was pleasantly surprised to see your video comparing the two companies offerings. My reason for buying the TS-251+ is to offload some operations off my 1618+ so that I can get back to editing off of it. I may make a video explaining all of that but it will probably be 3 hours long and not as entertaining as I hope. Will probably be some high level nerd stuff. Thanks for your video.
Great review - always wondered if anyone else had edited over a network. I only use the NAS for backups these days, and edit a working copy off of local drives. I've found a few network hiccups that led to corrupted premiere pro project files and a tonne of re-work. There was no advantage to editing via network. (exporting to network has some advantages) Thanks for putting the time into this.
Gerald, a question/suggestion I have for a nerdy explanations video. Why do same focal length lenses measure different physical body lengths. This happens on both the same sensor size and more prominently when you switch sensor sizes. I have never found a good video that explains what happens to the light once it enters the lens until it gets to the sensor. One specific part in that is how a smaller aperture still results in the same image size on the sensor.
Good job on the review. Network anything is hard to review and talk about so its hard to find good information about differences and uses. I ended up with going with Synology DS918+ with 2 10T Drives at the start for budget reasons. Synology allows you to add drives in over time and I have since added another drive with no problems.
Awesome review. Very professional and well delivered. And entertaining, too. You've given everyone enough info to know whether or not this tech will work for them and their use case.
I swapped out the fans on my Synology unit for high quality Silent Wings 4 fans from BeQuiet. Much quieter. Something to consider if you are in the market for a NAS and near-silent operation is important to you.
Thank you for the insight. My current solution is to keep the files on my iPad (I edit on it) until finished editing, then upload to an external drive. Hdd may not be optimal for editing, but I just use them for storage 😂 keep up the good work Gerald I enjoy your videos 💚💙💜
Not sure why Synology sent you the DiskStation; the FS1018 is designed for SSDs first and is significantly quieter since it doesn't have to deal with hard drive heat.
Definitely would be fun to see what kind of crazy custom setup you could rig up. Check out all of the used enterprise server hardware on Ebay... Massive supply combined with very little demand. I bought an HP proliant rack server with dual 8 core xeons, 128gb ram, 8x2.5" drive bays, 3x dual sfp+ 20g cards, and redundant power supplies for $300! Overkill for storage? Sure, but I set it up to automatically transcode all of our offloaded camera footage to a better mezzanine codec as well as small, web-friendly versions that we often use. I'm sure you could think of some more creative ways to put cheap compute horsepower to good use!
This level of nerddom is fantastic.
Benj Haisch Exactly. Most of what he said went over my head. Was still pleasing to watch, guy knows his stuff.
I recently made a video on modding my Synology DS918+ to 5GbE and it works great using a QNAP 5GbE USB adapter for $79 but when I eventually outgrow my current NAS I'll probably go with a higher end QNAP, but for now 5GbE is fast enough for me video editing and storage needs.
I don’t even have a computer 😢. But it’s still great 👍 to watch. So when I’m ready to buy. I will know what to buy 😊. Education in Tech is always great 👍.
As a Synology owner, let me suggest a slightly different workflow that might work better for some people. Synology (don't know about Qnap) has a program called "Drive". This lets you sync directories from your local computer to the Synology box as quickly as you write them. This way you edit on your local machine on super fast NVME disks and your project is instantly synced the moment you write anything to disk. You then backup that NAS dir to the cloud or whereever. You can sync between other computers too. On windows, it gets better because there is a feature called On Demand sync which will, as the disk gets fuller, unload files that haven't been used in a long time (you can pin directories to never be unloaded) so you see their filenames, but they don't take up space on the disk. If you need them, they are transparently copied from the NAS back to your drive. This means on a small local super fast NVME disk you can have access to as much larger amount of content on your NAS without you having to manage everything. This means in the vast majority of cases a 1 gig link and cheap platter drives are just fine and you get all the benefits of local NVME editing.
Appreciate this comment, as it might be exactly what I'm looking for. I've got nVME internal, and I'm considering a 6-bay, with two, 3-drive volumes (one as mass storage with SHR1, the other as a backup for my actual computer and the other volume, also SHR1) Would that be a workable use case? Or is there a better way altogether?
@@JustinDoesTriathlon I have a 6 drive Synology (1618+) and made one 6 drive RAID6 Storage Pool. On top of that, I made two logical volumes. This accomplishes the same thing as what you want to do, but imho is much more flexible and gives 2 drive redundancy to all data. You also don't need to allocate all data into the volumes and can grow each independently based on your needs. If you eventually swap in new, bigger drives you can also add space as you see fit and grow each volume as needed. The only downside I can think of is each time you swap in a new drive you have to rebuild the entire storage pool, but that's a small penalty for the flexibility and RAID6 redundancy.
@@machinethinking Wow, that's really fantastic, thanks for your help. I feel decently knowledgeable about building computers, but nas/server volumes are very new to me. Appreciate the input (and your videos, coincidentally! Have watched them all in the past) I'll give that a strong look over, seems like it could be great.
Hi. Thank you for sharing. This sounds really interesting and like something that can save me some bucks as I have a team of 5 and each PC has fast nvme drives to work off and then archive on slower HDDs.
Can you please point me to a resource where I can find out how to set this up and how it works in more depth?
Thank you!
Solid tip
Would love to see you make a custom solution, especially after getting burned by NAS's custom power supplies that tend to fail.
Check yt for zfs raids. Tutorials allows total nobs to make it.
I built my own custom server for a few reasons. Redundancy on EVERYTHING, infinitely expandable, and its faster and cheaper than most off the shelf options. Its a complicated experience, for those without a networking background, but still possible.
@@joejamesphoto Any walkthroughs/tutorials you'd recommend on how to do this?
I personally build a UnRaid setup and it has been awesome. Even using old tech the system is faster and easier to add things like 10gbe, ssd caching etc. Of course it'll cost more if you're looking to save space but since I was putting this into my storage room in my basement I didn't mind.
I love the Qnap but $1500 for just an enclosure is wild.
As an agency owner and video editor… I love what you’re talking about and wish I knew what you are saying 😂
Thanks for putting another review with clear description of use case, acceptance criteria, expertise limits, etc.
I personally was not considering all SSDs in my next RAID box; but, you got me wondering about TRIM support and accurate SSD status. SSDs rarely die; but, when they do, it can get really ugly. Storage is where I tend to setup and forget. Then a lot of years go by and suddenly realize I got end of life issues on my oldest components. I think I would put a sticker on my all SSD RAID box saying "Replace drives around 7/15/2024 (+4 years from use)" as a reminder.
Hey Gerald, I exhanged the stock fans in my Synology to Noctua fans. Very easy mod to do, and it runs much quieter (and probably cooler, although unconfirmed) now.
Qnap crew 👏👌👍 . Thanks for making this vid! Always wanted to but never did so glad you made it instead and it’s fantastic!
A nerd bromance good to see.
Max would you recommend a thunderbay 4 with thunderbolt 3 for fast read and write speeds over synology? I don’t want to spend OVER $800; this is without any hard drives.
@@Sapientiaa If you don't need it to be connected to the web or multiple computers then yes.
Qnap all the way bros! 💪🏼
How do you compare to Synology's new 1618xs+? It seems like they had an answer to these issues and it's the same price with upgraded CPU, RAM and built in 10GB / NVME cache.
I only ask because I need to upgrade my Synology solution and I'm used to their amazing UI.
"Give me about 15 minutes..." SO excited to hear that line again!😃😍
Wonder who was able to cut his hair as well as go hang gliding, within that 15 minute window? Aircuts 'R' us?
"What's up everybody, I'm Gerald Undone and converting your camera to full spectrum is how you bust ghosts."
hhahahahahahaha!!!!
@@StreetsOfVancouverChannel What is funny, man? I was being serious. Full Spectrum allows you to see two extra wavelengths that the human eye cannot see... infrared and UV. Cameras block these frequencies by default with the hot mirror filter.
Gerald: I don't keep files forever...
Here I am staring at my 7TB HDDs full of unedited files
I feel you. 8TB NAS and another 14TB in archive drives.
i think i have +2000 old movie rips that come in a 700mb taking a big chunk of my server and i just can't let'em go
I have a Synology setup on my UniFi equipped network. I simply cannot give up that Synology UI. It’s just so good.
Synology DS1618+ is by far the best solution I've used. My suggestion is that if you edit heavy footage from the NAS max out the NAS RAM and if you can add a NVMe then max that out too in order to have the fastest buffer. Now I'm planning to get a larger NAS to handle Plex from a different box just to keep things separate. Also way more apps within the Synology ecosystem.
I like your philosophy of only keeping the finished videos. Archival storage is such a beast and it's only getting worse with higher resolutions and multiple cameras. I have to convince myself to jettison the old footage once the final result is achieved.
Thank you for the video. I am definitely interested in a custom solution. Now that I have completed my storage cleanup, I am interested in upgrading my current setup and would be interested in seeing how a custom setup compares to the Synology and QNAP. Great job once again.
I've been using an old Qnap for 5 yrs now and still receiving constant updates on them, definitely sticking with Qnap!
I’m Gerald Undone: and 2019 tried to warn us, but we didn’t listen
2020 is warning you for what is coming. It will get worse and worse up until probably 2033... then we either evolve or become complete slaves.
@@jamesj4998 You wouldn't say that if you knew what was planned... although, we aren't evolving at the moment we are de-volving due to the majority of the population not having a positive mind-pattern.
Something I read on the internet: SSD RAID makes more sense if you're using similar spec drives of different models from different manufacturers. If you buy a bunch of drives from the same manufacturer and retailer, they're quite likely to die around the same time, unlike a HDD, which has a much more random lifespan.
18:13 Yes please! That sounds interesting!
yes pls
I want to figure out how to say "dirty danglers" more often.
Just drop trau towards any full length mirror
Say that instead of your name.
I would substitute all third parties with "dirty danglers." Friends, family, children, postal workers, best buy employees, babysitters, let your imagination soar...
Watch a couple seasons of Letterkenny and you'll be top sniping Sallys with your dirty danglers in no time.
Gerald - I wonder if the thing to do would be to go back to the 672, swap the dual Thunderbolt for the 10 Gb/s Ethernet. Then an interesting experiment would be to add (2) NVMe drives in a RAID 1 as the front-end cache to the storage. That might allow you to saturate the network since the NVMe's would be faster than SATA SSD's and the RAID 1 algorithm is even simpler than the RAID 10. Just some thoughts. Thanks for the video!
How I enjoy, "give me about 15 min" great info Gerald.
loved that "back to the future" style intro. Time dilation really makes a video pop. hahahaha
I've been using (rather deploying) QNAPs in various studios. Ranging from small 5-bay models up to a few 16-bay models.
I can say I am really satisfied with them!
One of the nice things - you can put double the amount of 2.5" drives into them! This means if you have a 6-bay model you can put 12 drives into them.
QNAP provides a special "craddle" for the 3.5" bay that has some form of raid. This means you can make your QNAP a RAID0 because the craddle is basically a RAID1.
Hey ! if you are still alive 3years later, can you point me out that accessory ? I can't find them ! Thanks !
@@levraichris3321 Haha, somehow I still am! One of them is QNAP QDA-A2AR, maybe they have other models as well, but this one I know of that definitely works :)
Did he just use “dirty danglers” and “orifice” in the same sentence 😂
I'm guessing he stores other videos on those boxes.
I have a QNAP TS-932X with 10 GB SPF+ connection. I have 4 4 TB Iron Wolf drives set-up in a RAID-5 array, and 2 256 MB SSD drives set up as a read cache. I edit 5.9K directly off of the NAS.
I set this up at the beginning of the year. DS1618, three 6TB spinners (for now), maxed out the ram, put in an SFP+ PCIe card (Mellanox connect-x2 in the NAS and the 2 computers) , and ran fiber to the PCs. Edit 6k video off it without issue in Davinci Resolve. Using a ramdisk on the DS1618, got 1.08GB/sec file transfer. I didn't go with the QNAP because I read about the security / malware issues they've had scared me away.
Gerald, your reviews are incredible. Thank you for putting this together. As always your thoroughness is astounding. Hands down, the best channel on TH-cam.
Loved this review!!! QNAP also makes add in cards to add both 10gbe and M.2 cache drives on the same card. So you could probably swap out the dual thunderbolt for a dual M.2. Also on a side note these cards can be used in a PC as an Add in card. So 10gbe & an M.2 on the same card.
Right in time when I'm thinking to finally throw in a NAS! 👍 As usual, huuuge thumbs up for the job done!
We have a QNAP 1282 T3 and it's a vast improvement over an earlier unit - why? Processor i7 v. i3. The I7 make a huge difference. Boot times, transfers and so on. Quiet as well. We configured completely differently with two 2TB M.2 NVME drives and 4 12TB hard drives in raid 1 pairs. for backup. It's been flawless, but I know what you mean about interface. It's not very easy or intuitive. But how often do you need to look at it, not very.... Great video.
"Micromachines, just like the real thing, only smaller."🤣 Great review. Wow. not sure how I missed this one. I am still no better off in deciding. LOL
I started with Synology diskstations but this year I upgraded to a RS1619xs+ with four 4TB Samsung Evos in RAID F1 and then a RS2818RP+ with over 100tb for bulk storage. You definitely would have to keep these in a server closet with sound dampening and ventilation but this setup is rock solid if you prefer performance and reliability over noise levels (about 60 dba eek). NVME caching on the 1619xs+ actually had a performance penalty but it’s plenty fast enough without it. For the Synology disk stations you can swap the 40mm fans for quieter noctua fans.
I think NAS can never compare with local file system due to the remote file system and local is different. What I do is install several 12TB mirrored drives (redundancy) with ZFS.
Even though I don't understand 3/4 of the technical details you talk about sometimes, you still make it interesting 😊👍🏻
Also synology has an auto ingest mode. right when you plugin a USB / ESATA drive you can have it pull the data and place it chronologically in the synology system.
"I'm not really interested in storing all that nerd talk perpetually" haha. As always, even a few years later, excellent content from Gerald Undone. Thanks for all that you do. TJ
Thank you so much for this video. Because of these videos, I was able to buy a Synology NAS (my first ever NAS) 920+. I am in the initial phase of my YouTubing career and 920+ has been incredible, especially DSM 7. With Synology Photos, I could organize with photos like Google Photos. I am using my NAS with MBP M1 Pro 2021 and the experience has been mind-blowing. with 7GBPS speeds in the new Mac, it has been a hell of an experince.
Sold on the QNAP 672XT. The level of thoroughness on this has my interest peaked as something to add as part of a setup for backing up.
I'd never thought about just getting rid of all the non used files. My issue is I don't publish 99% of what I film so it's often not edited into something nice. Maybe I should spend more time doing that so I can delete the old stuff.
I don’t even have a computer 😢. But it’s still great 👍 to watch. So when I’m ready to buy. I will know what to buy 😊. Education in Tech is always great 👍.
You should be able to saturate that dual 10gbe connection with a RAID 0 cached NVME on the 6 bay QNAP. I'm guessing you went with straight SSD's for the reduced noise, otherwise, a RAID 0 two NVME solution will give you superior performance over a 6 SSD SATA RAID 0.
The quality of this content is unparalleled in this field, well done!
QNAP has a feature that makes them the winner. Hybrid drives. QNAP can be a Thunderbolt 3 direct connected drive and a network drive at the same time.
I'm Gerald Undone and I've finally finished this video! ;)
Solid video. This is why I just keep 50TB in my system rather than using a NAS. I get all the speed I need, it's accessible to other computers, and I can still have external & cloud backups for a fraction of the total cost.
Right time,through video,nice segmented video titles.Was thinking to purchase a NAS system,watched a bunch of distracted videos,but you nailed it Gerald. Salute from London,ON.
my 2tb MX500 failed in month... Good luck!
If you are going for a custom build with the ryzen platform. Then an asus or asrock motherboard will let you boot the computer without a graphics card installed. Freeing up 1 of the expansion slot. For 10gb I also recommend netgear XS505M switch. Finally an LSI sas card (the 9211 8i for pcie 2.0 x8 link. or the 9207-8i for pcie 3.0 x4). Will support +8 SATA 3 drives (and the pci-e uplink give full bandwidth for anything up to 7 of those 8 drives working simultaneously).
I went with a QNAP unit. With any of those pre-fab storage solutions (QNAP or Synology), I would recommend ONLY using the drives that are fully compatible with the specific storage unit.
I believe this is a more expensive route, but less headache in terms of troubleshooting & maintaining.
Get yourself a tiny little Noctua fan to replace the one on the 10Gb NIC. They even come with a low-noise adapter which will lower the maximum RPM of the fan and keep the noise down. The NF-A4x10 FLX is a tiny fan that should fit.
If you don't want to cut and solder the 3 pin DC fan plug to that 2 pin VGA fan plug, get something like a Kolink fan adapter on Amazon and it's all plug and play!
I would feel MUCH more comfortable knowing that there was active cooling on a component that was intended to have it!
How cone after so many years on YT Just now I found the best reviewer!? 🤷♂️ Last week I picked up a new DS920+ and I love it despite still having 1gb port.
If it ain't broke then why fix it? Looks like either of these will work fine for someone needing 10Gbe. Good review and thank you.
Missing out on a lot of good stuff on both those boxes by just using them as file storage, for that a custom setup will come in significantly cheaper and with significantly higher spec. I personally use the Synology kit and once you bump the RAM and start adding a few virtual machines, automated remote encrypted backups, surveillance station etc it really shines.
Hey Gerald, just to be on the safe side with the unplugged fan on the network card, maybe put a 40mm Noctua fan on top the heatsink? They're only like 20 bucks and SUPER quiet.
This was incredibly dense and concise. I watched it the whole way through and all information was pertinent but clearly explained. Excellent video. Thank you for this.
GU, how are you this effortlessly smart? Seriously, how? My brain simultaneously hurts and feels better listening to your wisdom.
Storage is an expensive but interesting topic. I do try to save my video projects and it does add up fast... I recently picked up a QNAP TR-004 and filled it with 10TB drives. I'm happy with it so far for my use case. Using it in RAID 10 with the software configuration option instead of dip switches on the unit to select RAID level. I'm getting around 200mb/s writes which isn't great, but I'm using it for backup rather than trying to edit off of it. I might convert it to RAID 5 eventually to get more storage. At least until it makes sense to change out the drives. It sounds like you will benefit from a custom solution, but saturating a pair of 10 gbit ethernet ports would be a (fun) challenge to build a compact storage focused system around. I wonder if there are speed limitations related to the network gear rather than the NAS to consider as well.
He's using SSDs. Just two will saturate a single controller or 10gb port.
@@MiaogisTeas 2.5 gigabytes a second over the two connections that do 10 gigabit. I haven't watched this video in 3 years so no idea what specific SSDs he was using but if they were SATA they will be limited to that interface and it's not 2.5 gigabytes/sec, more like a maximum of 500 MB/sec but with my older SATA SSDs it's a bit slower. You also don't get 1:1 transfer speeds in RAID situations.
Freakin' freekishly fast and efficient breakdown of these devices. Nice job guy.
Almost went this route but have a setup now with a internal SAS card and windows storage spaces. 8x 2tb drives 12.7tb internal
Hey. Amazing video! This is kind of exactly what I was planning to build for editing from 2 or 3 PCs. Awesome to see a great video about it. What about using regular HDs in the NAS, though? Too slow? Does anybody know if regular HDs and 1GBit network would be enough to edit from (mainly 1080p footage/video though)?
Looking into getting myself a NAS. This is very helpful. Actually the most helpful I've watched! Why have I not stumbled upon your channel before? No idea. But I've already subscribed! Thanks for this 👌
It's not every day you hear someone say that Synology is the cheaper solution. To be fair, this is like comparing a $750 camera from one vendor with a $1.5k camera from another. For the amount that QNAP costs you could get the Synology FileStation FS1018 with support for 12 SSD drives and expand with with a dual 10 GbE NIC. Anyway, I have a QNAP box, my brother uses Synology... both are good. The most important part is understanding your need and matching it to the correct hardware.
As an infrequent amateur my needs aren't intense, but I have definitely found my Synology 918+ to be sufficiently fast for light timeline work in Resolve.
Also, I just discovered Backblaze B2 and am over the moon!
Great video. It was good to have my own experience confirmed
I've been looking to build my own NAS for my house. looking at the prices of all this def makes me want to do it DIY over paying that price. EAK!
yeah I made a bit of an overkill NAS for 500 dollar excluding drives u can prob make one for just 300
@@TheBecke1983 Considering I have my "old" rig all DDR3 AMD but i'm sure it's 4.7gig CPU and 3400K memory will do just find hosting Me a NAS, I just need the SSD's :)
@@TheKidsDaaaaad I was thinking the same thing.
The cost benefit of using an older custom build is enormous.
Thanks for doing your videos in my own bespoke order. I literally bought a Synology RS2418 and a QNAP TS-1635 in the last 2 days! The QNAP is replacing the LOUD Synology (which is a rack unit, granted). Would be easier if you made the videos right *before* instead of right after my purchases though :-)
The good news is I can play back a clip in Final Cut with four 4K camera angles and the angle viewer AND the main clip visible and it just rocks along at 10G.
Wow...I made it to the four minute mark before getting a bit glassy eyed. That is not bad for a landlord.
Great video! tHanks for all the info. I have a super Triple Drive backup system - but this is next level stuff!
hey Gerald, can we get an update on this topic for 2021? maybe there is a budget solution, faster, efficient etc currently? thank you!
Please do a continuation to this video. I was in a similar situation with storage and simply upgraded to 13tb but a long term solution is needed for me.
Good timing. I was just looking for this.
Am I the only one who spent the majority of this video watching the reflection of Gerald's hands, from his monitor, in the glass of the QNAP?
You voice and breakdown made me subscribe. Your in-depth knowledge for a beginner made me hit the bell.
Well done, sir! I've been looking at the QNAPs with envy, but I think I'll stick with my Synology for now.
Great video Gerald. I’ve been a QNAP user for 10+ years now. They have got better and better for multipurpose video editing. Tech support is also fantastic. Now I have 6 of the buggers. Haha. Keep up the good work. Pete.
Love it, I have pulled fans before, I have even rewired two fans from parallel to serial so they run slower and quieter. Great review, thanks.
I was looking for cloud services and decided on B2 as well since I am on linux. I like the pay what you use and the pricing is very fair.
I would like to see how a custom build that achieves your goals and compares to these NAS boxes. I have recently been considering building a NAS so I'm glad to see these videos. Thanks Gerald.
If your looking for flat storage check out the TS-932PX. 25(2x2.5 + 2x10)GBe Networking and 2 storage tiers (5+4) running raid 6(if you can live without a cache drive)
for about 600 bucks + drives is actually an amazing deal. If you dont need media features theres no reason to get any different model atm.
Also: Use a resistor to bring down the fan RPM instead of outright unplugging it.
Alsoalso: Dont waste capacity by going raid10. Raid6 should "almost" saturate those network ports, with the number of drives in use.
Oh boy almost 150,000 subscribers congratulations well deserved now... let's get undone!!!
Awesome video, Gerald! I would love to see a video of a regular day of filming and editing workflow, as well as the time it takes you. Thank you for the knowledge here my friend!
How about reliability??? Do these have filesystems with block-level checksums, or anything to detect bitrot? Do these even support ECC RAM? Those are at least my first 2 requirements for a NAS.
Careful with those Aquantia cards. Everywhere Ive worked they tend to fail from load and heat when frequently in use. The Intel’s are ROCK solid. x550 cards. Well worth it.
I've been using the Synology Diskstation for 5 years now and have accumulated 5 of them across 3 sites for redundancy and sheer lunacy. In fact I've had the 1618+ for year plus now and am really happy with it. I picked up a QNAP TS-251+ today and was pleasantly surprised to see your video comparing the two companies offerings. My reason for buying the TS-251+ is to offload some operations off my 1618+ so that I can get back to editing off of it. I may make a video explaining all of that but it will probably be 3 hours long and not as entertaining as I hope. Will probably be some high level nerd stuff. Thanks for your video.
Crystal Clear Explanation Build one at End Of The Year . Awesome
Great review - always wondered if anyone else had edited over a network. I only use the NAS for backups these days, and edit a working copy off of local drives. I've found a few network hiccups that led to corrupted premiere pro project files and a tonne of re-work. There was no advantage to editing via network. (exporting to network has some advantages)
Thanks for putting the time into this.
Disabling SMB should help with saturating the 10G connection.
I've been waiting for this exact video and I'm so glad that YOU made it.
Gerald, a question/suggestion I have for a nerdy explanations video. Why do same focal length lenses measure different physical body lengths. This happens on both the same sensor size and more prominently when you switch sensor sizes. I have never found a good video that explains what happens to the light once it enters the lens until it gets to the sensor. One specific part in that is how a smaller aperture still results in the same image size on the sensor.
Good job on the review. Network anything is hard to review and talk about so its hard to find good information about differences and uses.
I ended up with going with Synology DS918+ with 2 10T Drives at the start for budget reasons. Synology allows you to add drives in over time and I have since added another drive with no problems.
Awesome review. Very professional and well delivered. And entertaining, too.
You've given everyone enough info to know whether or not this tech will work for them and their use case.
I swapped out the fans on my Synology unit for high quality Silent Wings 4 fans from BeQuiet. Much quieter. Something to consider if you are in the market for a NAS and near-silent operation is important to you.
Thank you for the insight. My current solution is to keep the files on my iPad (I edit on it) until finished editing, then upload to an external drive. Hdd may not be optimal for editing, but I just use them for storage 😂 keep up the good work Gerald I enjoy your videos 💚💙💜
Gerald’s videos are the only one in youtube that i have to slow down to watch
Not sure why Synology sent you the DiskStation; the FS1018 is designed for SSDs first and is significantly quieter since it doesn't have to deal with hard drive heat.
Definitely would be fun to see what kind of crazy custom setup you could rig up. Check out all of the used enterprise server hardware on Ebay... Massive supply combined with very little demand. I bought an HP proliant rack server with dual 8 core xeons, 128gb ram, 8x2.5" drive bays, 3x dual sfp+ 20g cards, and redundant power supplies for $300! Overkill for storage? Sure, but I set it up to automatically transcode all of our offloaded camera footage to a better mezzanine codec as well as small, web-friendly versions that we often use.
I'm sure you could think of some more creative ways to put cheap compute horsepower to good use!
I'm curious if you ever tried to connect over TB3 instead of 10G Ethernet. In theory it should have allowed for faster read/write speeds.
Important add fast dual M2's to enable SSD Cache acceleration.
QNAP has a larger ecosystem with software to do anything you need.
The definitive guide on NAS is here!
wow what a great reviewer this guy is. so thorough. Great Job Gerald.
Hey what do you know. Dropping the speed down a bit helps. Thanks for the tip.
I've been using the Synology DS418play, and I couldn't be happier (disks not SSD), but throughput has been great.