Gopher and Moles Be Gone!

Home desktops, a thing of the past - Netgear READYNAS NV+ RND4000

Over the holidays got the NETGEAR READYNAS NV+ 256MB SATA NAS-DS
Support page is here
Excellent Network Attached Storage, the next gen....comes with the SUN SPARC OS in a box that you can literally hold in the palm of your hand.
Very versatile, You can toast your bread too...just about.
Great feature functions.
Got this working and now my old desktop is turned off - don't need it anymore
This is the energy efficient, simplistic approach
Here's why - read on

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I got the base unit (diskless system), without the hard drives. The reviews on Amazon indicated that the OOTB Hitachi drives conk out easily.

Here are the steps you need to execute to get this device up and running, quite simple.

I got the diskless system from pcnation. Great price!
Connected power and ethernet cable and plugged in two 2TB Samsung HD204UI drives

SAMSUNG HD204UI - Excellent drives, don't heat up as much as other makes.

The drives were recognized it right away.
Next, I placed the install CD into my PC - and installed the Netgear software RAIDar onto my PC.
Started RAIDar from my PC, it searched and found the NAS right away.
Did a browse and I could see two folders MEDIA and BACKUP that were already created.
I hit SETUP on RAIDar (that I just installed) and started configuring using the wizard.
I enabled some of the media defaults that were turned off - the wizard was super easy.
My PS3 can now see this NAS - and the PC can be turned off, unless I need to load new data or setup the NAS.
Here comes the part I enjoyed the most...taking all the data off from these numerous backup drives collected over the  last few years (maintenance nightmare - since I had manual backups for every drive) and moved them all onto the NAS. Hmm...love it already.


Now, I can play video, audio and pictures from my PS3, that directly connects into the NAS (without the PC)..
The Raid Redundancy is automatic...
Excellent health monitoring features, will trigger alerts, can be sent to your email address.
(It even pointed out that one of my 2 TB hard-drives is liable to fail based on past activity, see details below).

Checked the firmware - I am at 4.1.6, no issues yet.
Quite easy to setup
Give it a try....these steps are exactly what you need to doNETGEAR ReadyNAS NV+ 4-Bay 0TB (Diskless)
I got the diskless system from pcnation. Pretty decent price.
Connected power and ethernet and plugged in two 2TB drives
Recognized it right away.
Next, I placed the CD into my PC - and installed the Netgear software RAIDar onto my PC.
Started RAIDar from my PC, it found the NAS right away.
Did a browse and I could see two folders MEDIA and BACKUP
I hit SETUP on RAIDar (that I just installed) and started configuring using the wizard.
I enabled some of the media defaults that were turned off - the wizard was super easy.
My PS3 can now see this NAS - and the PC can be turned off, unless I need to load new data or setup the nAS
I can play video, audio and pictures from my PS3, that directly connects into the NAS (without the PC)
I love it already!
hMMM...I am not sure if the RAID REDUNDANCY is working
Under VOLUMENS, RAID SETTINGS, I hit RESYNC VOLUME and
after a day or two - I got a message back about FULL REDUNDNACY
Checked the firmware - I am at 4.1.6
No issues yet.
Quite easy to setup
Give it a try....these steps are exactly what you need to doNETGEAR ReadyNAS NV+ 4-Bay 0TB (Diskless)
My first two bays have Samsung 2TB drives
The other 2 bays have Western Digital and Hitachi
THe Samsungs seem to run a lot cooler than the others.
____________________________________
Some further thoughts
Also - The manual is just terrible - perhaps I have not downloaded the correct one - but the one I have has barely any details.
- The backup jobs configuration does not seem to recognize any of my networked drives
How can I create automatic backups if none of my networked computers are recognized?
- Make sure you have an external backup of your data - even though you have RAID protection.
i.e for a 2TB data, have 2TB in raid + an external 2 TB USB
Only because the reviews have been scary
- Purchase the diskless system, easy to setup- and you don't deal with crappy Hitachi drives

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Update 6/20/2011
Two issues
- Cannot seem to get new folders to show up on my PS3
Sometimes takes weeks to pop up, sometimes seconds.
Bizarre
- The email notification of alerts, have had a hard time setting up
 
Bay1, Bay2 have Samsung 2TB drives
Bay2, Bay 3 have Western Digital and Hitachi
The Western Digital was heating up abnormally, so returned that to Amazon
Western Digital 2 TB Caviar Green SATA Intellipower 64 MB Cache Bulk/OEM Desktop Hard Drive WD20EARS  Make sure you don't get this one.
The Netgear alert pointed out some abnormal behavior in this particular drive and I decided it was safer to return it and get something better.
Got the Seagate ST32000542AS to replace the WD - which had some decent reviews.
Again, the Samsungs seem to run a lot cooler than the others.
BTW - I am paranoid, I still have external backups of the critical stuff.

Excellent feature functions, lots of patches you can download and install, to enable certain features
Once you have this setup - get the LOGITECH SQUEEZEBOX RADIO too
And start streaming your music onto this radio
And lots more features - Bittorrent, ReadyNAS Photos, backups, media streaming services, FTP, SSH, AFP, NFS, CIFS/SMB



EDITED March 28, 2012 -
 Create your own WebServer
http://www.readynas.com/?p=135
Required for running your media files using ROKSBOX or
http://roksbox.com/home/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=128&Itemid=54

Add Plex Media Server for ROKU
Details here http://www.readynas.com/?p=5523
http://www.readynas.com/?cat=63


Here are the differences between the NetGear Duo and the NV+. If you intend to use the ReadyNAS as a dedicated server (or in conjunction with a Windows 2000/2003 server network) then you should consider the NV+.

Performance:

Both NAS devices use the same processor and can support up to 1 GB of RAM. Overall, read/write performance is about the same.

Drive Capacity:

The Duo supports 2 drives in a mirror (or now in Flex-RAID with the latest beta firmware). Keep in mind that switching the Duo to RAID 0 will allow you to utilize both drives for storage, but you will lose the redundancy of RAID.

The fact that the NV+ supports 4 drives gives it the added flexibility for different levels Flex-RAID (RAID 0, 1 and 5) plus support for a "hot spare". The default X-RAID configuration will give you lots of room to add more storage later on.

DHCP Server & Print Server:

The NV+ has both of these services built-in, so if you are planning on using the ReadyNAS as a central, dedicated server these are nice features to have for automatically configuring the client computers, as well as sharing USB printers & scanners.

The Duo does not have these features.

Snapshots:

The NV+ supports "snapshots" of your data. In the event that you delete or modify a file/folder on the ReadyNAS, you can go to one of the snapshots and recover the file from a previous snapshot.

The Duo does not support this.

AD support:

If you plan on having a Windows 2000/2003 Server on your network, then the NV+ can be integrated quite nicely into the Active Directory.

The Duo does not support AD.

WINS Server:

The NV+ has a built-in WINS server that can be enabled to provide internal name resolution (which makes it easy to find devices using "Network Neighbourhood").

SNMP:

A protocol used by geeks to check/log the status of devices without having to get out of their chair. A program can be set to "read" the status of different things (temperature, fan speed, capacity, running services, etc.) and log them to a file and/or e-mail/page the sysadmin when things go awry. Quite useful on large networks with hundreds or thousands of devices.

The Duo does not support this.

Network UPS:

A single compatible uninterruptable power supply can be shared between multiple devices and the NAS can send out a broadcast signal to automatically power down other devices plugged into the same UPS. The other devices must be capable of running a program like WinNUT in order to shut themselves down.

More details here:

http://www.readynas.com/forum/viewtopic ... 080#p89080

The Duo does not support this (only locally attached UPS).

Warranty:

NV+: 5 years
Duo: 3 years

Other Features and Services:

The other services (things like Bittorrent, ReadyNAS Photos, backups, media streaming services, FTP, SSH, AFP, NFS, CIFS/SMB, rsync) are offered on all models of the ReadyNAS.

My Recommendation:

If you plan on utilizing the NAS as dedicated server, then you should get the NV+. The added features and flexibility will come in handy as your network and storage needs grow. The NV+ can be the central point of your network, and be used to share both file and print services quite easily.

If you only plan on using the NAS for backups and/or additional storage, then the Duo would suffice (for today's needs, anyhow). My concern is that you may find that you quickly out-grow the Duo as you come to realize the full capabilities of the ReadyNAS.

Downloads

The following software images are available for download.
http://www.readynas.com/?cat=41/



Hosting WORDPRESS http://www.readynas.com/?p=213
Hosting your home page http://www.readynas.com/?p=135

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