Hardware > Servers, Network Hardware

Network Attached Storage

By Lasa Information Systems Team

In this article we’ll look at what network attached storage is, what it can do for your network, the pros and cons, and what to look out for when buying a network attached storage device.

If you’re running a file server network or a simple peer to peer network and your organisation needs extra storage space that is affordable and readily accessible from multiple locations, then a Network Attached Storage (NAS) device could be the ideal solution.  With disk-hungry media such as music, photos and video eating into precious hard disk space, £120 will put a 160GB NAS device on your network and, enable you to share files, share your USB printers and back-up data securely.

What is an NAS device?

NAS devices are in effect mini-servers that provide services such as file and printer sharing and data storage, over a computer network.  NAS devices commonly run either Windows 2003 Storage Server or a Linux kernel.

Of course, you could do all this with out a NAS device – by setting up shared folders and printers on a PC attached to the network – but this would mean having the PC always on and running up your electricity bill. 

Why NAS?

NAS devices are not only lower on power consumption, they also don’t need their own monitors, keyboards or a mouse to control them.  All you need to do is plug the NAS device into the Ethernet port of your wireless router, hub or switch and configure it using the web browser on your computer.

NAS devices are also incredibly convenient as you can manage the device from anywhere on the network for sharing, and most importantly backing-up your organisation’s precious data.

Using NAS for data storage and back-up

Consider this: if your organisation runs a peer to peer network, the chances are your data back-up routine is ad hoc, usually involving a labour intensive trek around each machine that needs to be backed-up, with your back-up device of choice.  Adding a NAS device to a peer to peer network will allow everyone to regularly save their files to one location.  You can do this by configuring the Windows back-up utility, or using the managed back-up software that ships with many NAS devices.  We don’t suggest that a NAS device should be your only backup device, but for convenience and security it’s certainly a step in the right direction.

For those running a fileserver network, NAS devices offer a quick and convenient way of cheaply adding extra storage space to the network.

Additionally, most NAS devices are able to share data across different operating systems – a useful feature if you have different machines running Windows, Linux and Mac on the same network.

Disadvantages

One of the downsides to NAS devices is that many of them are limited to data transfer speeds of 100Mb/sec - the speed of your Ethernet cable – painfully slow if you’re transferring large amounts of data, say over 2GB.  This can lead to bottlenecks on your network, slowing it down for all your users.

Operating systems

On the more technical side, most NAS devices are pre-formatted to FAT32 as this is the only file system that Windows, Linux and Apple Mac can all read and write to.  However, FAT32 doesn’t support file sizes of over 4GB, common for those working with music, video and graphics files.  Many vendors now provide NAS devices formatted to the EXT3 file system and other Linux flavours which do support file sizes of over 4GB.  However, Mac users beware that OS X does not support the EXT3 file format, so be sure to check the box for compatibility with your operating system.

If speed and large file sizes are critical, we suggest that rather than void the manufacturer’s warranty by reformatting your NAS device to another file system, an external USB2 or firewire hard disk could be a better option for quickly transferring and safely storing large files.  See the Knowledgebase article on backing up your data for more on this.

Summary

NAS devices are now very affordable and widely supported.  For just £120 you can buy what is effectively a mini-server with a 160GB of storage and add it to your network, not bad for £1.33 per GB.  NAS devices are particularly ideal for those with peer to peer networks as they provide a convenient way of sharing files and backing-up precious data at a low cost. 

Do bear in mind that although NAS devices are not designed with the same degree of robustness found in an enterprise level fileserver, NAS devices are certainly an affordable and convenient start for those developing a data back-up strategy.