RAID 1 (Mirror) backup and media center

This all began from simply attempting to upgrade my backup storage solution. I’ve been using a USB Hard Drive for backup and reached the point where I needed more capacity. I bought a Seagate 8 TB USB drive. I have always had good luck with Seagate products in the past, but it was not to be this time and the drive failed immediately after performing my first backup. A real pain, since my data was now on the drive and I couldn’t just send it back.

That led me into looking at NAS devices. I quickly began to realize there are way more options than just simple backup. The list of things I know for sure I want to do is:

–Backup over my home ethernet network from multiple computers with at least RAID 1 mirroring initially and probably striping in the future.
-Store all my music (200 CDs with plenty of room to grow) digitally in either uncompressed or lossless format (preference is FLAC) and serve music over ethernet and WiFi.
-Store 50-100 movies and serve to home theatre receiver over HDMI.
-Replace HTPC if practical.

Possibilities I am giving serious consideration:

–Securely access files remotely over the internet.
–Record continuous security camera footage.
–Host my own webpage/site.

I don’t want to grossly overbuy, but I want to keep my options open to other capabilities and future-proofing to a reasonable degree. With that in mind, I am trying to determine is HDMI 2.0 and Thunderbolt are options I should invest in now when I don’t have any other devices that support these technologies, or if it would be smarter to plan to replace the NAS when my other devices catch up to those technologies.

Also, I’ve noticed that many of the latest QNAP devices are designated with an “e” suffix and, by QNAP’s own admission, these have certain features/ports removed to reduce cost from the previous generation devices. For example, the TS-453B seems to be a more fully-featured device than its replacement the TS-453Be.

You are looking at the right model. TS-453B was a great idea and it is still available to buy But many people found it to be too expensive because of the connectivity they would never use. Things like a direct ‘quick connect’ over USB and SD card slot were things for photo/video editors, not everyday consumers. So Qnap releases striped version TS-453Be at a lower price with removed unnecessary things. But inside it is still as performing as standard B series.

It still features HDMI port allowing you to connect it to your home theatre system or multi-channel audio amplifier. It is not HDMI2.0, but you can still stream standard 4K videos with it. Even if you decide to stream something more futuristic like 4K HDR videos, you can easily do it over the ethernet. You don’t need an HDMI port for that.

You start with only two drives in a mirror (RAID1) and later move to RAID5 once you more drives. You can stream your FALC files over the ethernet or WiFi or even internet. You can even select which files or folders can be securely shared with your friends remotely. Qnap will also give 4 free camera licenses with this model and mobile software allowing you to connect and control your cameras on the move.

To run your website, I would recommend getting at least 4GB RAM built in. And later once you get more visitors, SSD cache card could be also installed to improve the operations.

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