NAS vs. External

[DrGlove]

Hi all,

New here and I'm in a dilemma of choice atm. I've just picked up a 1TB Sata2 hdd and am trying to figure out my best options for my data. I have about 1TB already full and bought this one to fill with my downloads and such.

Now, I'm trying to decide between an external enclosure (USB 2.0, 480Mbps), a dedicated NAS (say the D-Link DNS 323, 100Mbps with current router), or a NAS that supports both. It needs to be portable and I need to be able to access it without a router/internet connection without having to pop the NAS open and swap the HDD out to an enclosure/rig, but I share most of my data. The problem I face with the NAS' that double as an external is that I cannot use FAT32 because of the file limit, but will NTFS be too slow over a 100Mbps connection to get good transfer speeds of 12.5MB/s peak? The benefit of enclosure would be speed+portability, but harder to distribute (e.g. I am hosting a LAN coming up and need to distribute ~100gigs of games).

Perhaps I'm just thinking out loud but any input is appreciated!
DrGlove

 

[Celegorm]

I have that D-Link NAS, and it's wonderful. Not so good on 10/100 but put it on a gigabit network and you're set! Obviously you would need a gigabit router, but you do have a few options: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...me=1 x 10/100/1000M WAN; 4 x 10/100/1000M LAN and http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...er&name=1 x 10/100M WAN; 4 x 10/100/1000M LAN

I would go with a linksys router (Dlink seems to have problems with large file transfers) but that's personal preference.

 

[DrGlove]

Yes, in terms of speed I'm willing to stick with 100Mbps as opposed to 480Mbps until I can get a good gigabit router. How hard is it to access your data if you have no access to a router/switch or the internet? I think I will end up getting the DNS 323 as I've heard great things about it; just need to figure out the portability part next

Thanks for the reply celegorm!