2-Bay vs 4-Bay NAS Drives - Which Should You Buy?

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Choosing Between Buying a 2-Bay or 4 Bay NAS nascompares.com/2021/07/26/sh...
For many users who decided to make the switch from subscription-based Cloud services and to their own private NAS server, it can be tricky to understand exactly what they need in terms of storage and power. Network-attached storage NAS has evolved rapidly over the years and now there is a tremendous range of solutions that vary in size and ability to choose from, often resulting in the most expensive servers not always being the most capable. One of the first hurdles that many users encounter when choosing their first NAS drive is choosing between a 2-bay NAS and 4-Bay. With the majority of NAS brands out there offering most standard solutions and across different hard drive scales, choosing between these different sized NAS is not as straightforward as one might think. So today I’m going to talk to you about the differences between each, which one is the best value, their advantages and hopefully help you decide which one best suits your storage needs. Let’s start.
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Пікірлер: 32

@MickeelPramono 2 жыл бұрын

very in-depth explanation. Thanks!

@volatilesky 2 жыл бұрын

Great explanation, been looking into these things ever since having... Issues with my laptop. For my own uses, I'm going to start with the two bay for now personal use. If my future plans turn out I'll definitely have to do a 4 bay, but at that point it's not a total loss - I can still user the 2 bay as a personal backup, use the 4 bay as a business write off, and there would still need the option to expand using both. For me either of pretty much solely going to see use as data backup.

@kevinintheusa8984 Жыл бұрын

I bought a 2-bay thinking it would be enough for my Plex content. In less than a year, I had digitized about 25% of my DVD collection when I filled up 18tb (2 x 18 tb drives). I then went out and got a 4-bay and 4 18 tb drives to add to it. Now, 2 years later both are full and I am building a NAS with 18 drives to add to them for the future. My wife has now started a KZfaq channel and is asking about storage.

@AndrewKarczewski Жыл бұрын

Jesus

@moushe786 Жыл бұрын

Moses

@OutofDarkness_jik 10 ай бұрын

Died 4 U@@AndrewKarczewski

@topgazza 2 жыл бұрын

I use my 2 bay Synology DS720 for Plex. I store my photos on it and that’s about it. So a two bay with two 4tb drives in is fine. Had it a year and I am up to 1 tb used so plenty to go. Upgrade when the time comes will be in drive size not extra bays I back up to external drives with them being directly attached to the NAS. I back up Apples Time Machine to a size restricted volume in the pool. That’s because Time Machine will fill up all available space if given free reign. So I’m happy with my Raid 1 2 bay. It does the job for me

@TopHatCat1989 2 жыл бұрын

As someone who uses a 4TB drive in his PC for media storage over the last year and have used approximately 2/3 of it, I'd probably go for the 4-bay option and start with a pair of 4TB drives and then add more drives with more capacity as needed over time. As drives fail I can replace them with bigger drives over time.

@DavidM2002 2 жыл бұрын

That's exactly what I did with my QNAP. But, the downside is that, assuming you start with a Raid 1, you will have to convert to Raid 5 when adding that 3rd drive. And that can be very time consuming. When I bought my Synology, I just put 3 drives in to start and skipped the aggravation. But, 4 bay is definitely the smartest move for many even if they don't think so in the beginning. Finally, you need to compare the cost per HD bay; importantly, a 4 bay NAS is not twice the price of a 2 bay. It's typically closer to 1/3 more. All the more reason to go for the 4 bay.

@Ckwon117 Жыл бұрын

I didn't even think about this, 4 bay but with just 2 drives, smalish. I dont want to overthink it but there are a lot of ways to grow a NAS efficiently

@Bakin Жыл бұрын

I am a home user and only need a total of 4 TB of storage, which is unlikely to increase in the future. If there was a need to increase my storage I could simply swap out for larger NAS drives. As a result, a two-bay NAS unit (Synology 220+), running in a Raid 1 configuration easily meets my needs. To increase reliability, I installed a second two-bay NAS unit, again operated in Raid 1 configuration and synced to the first NAS unit as a backup unit. I backup the NAS units to the Cloud to provide off-site secure storage. I believe this approach provides increased the reliability over a single four-bay NAS unit at a slightly higher cost. Any thoughts?

@tofu_golem 2 жыл бұрын

The 4-bay versions tend to have more RAM and advanced options like M.2 slots for cache drives. Comment added before watching the whole video (sorry). My apologies if this observation is already made.

@jonathanwessner3456 2 жыл бұрын

My work has a 4 bay, but it is older and limited to 4tb drives. I'd like to get one that has more storage. as we back our server up to one of the drives

@chrishalle1982 Жыл бұрын

I use my nas as audio station. I have a 1 bay nas and do a backup with hyper backup to an external drive. so where is the problem to just buy a bigger hard drive, change it and import the backup??????

@dataecstasy 2 жыл бұрын

can you pls tell me how to connect Synology ds920+ to the internet if the router access is unavailable?

@nascompares 2 жыл бұрын

Cheers s for watching and your question. I'd recommend using the free advice section over on NASCOMPARES. As it allows me to help people in a more first come first serve basis, plus then you can provide more information on your question/issue. It's here - nascompares.com/contact-us/

@gabrielbatistuta3859 2 жыл бұрын

This is an awesome video, lots of details in it like, how many watts they may consume in comparison between each other. According to all you've explained in this video, you really kinda convinced me to buy 4 Bay NAS. However, I'm still thinking about it, about, how am I going to use it. I'm a newbie software developer and, I kinda think that the this will be very useful especially when I need to reach my data outside of my flat. But, will I be still needing 4 Bay? Also another question I have, QNAPs have HDMI input, but I've heard that Synology has a lot better software support. Is there a super duper reason which may make me prioritize NAS with HDMI input? My budget is anyway limited. But hey, I'm thinking about either buying 4 Bay Synology (currently 570 € in Germany), or, 2 Bay QNAP (currently 280 € in Germany), or, Canon G6050 printer (currently 300 € in Germany). Very difficult to decide. I may buy a printer and a 2 Bay NAS instead of 4 Bay... Any ideas? :) Thanks in advance.

@gabrielbatistuta3859 2 жыл бұрын

I do understand though before any of you write anything, obviously, the bigger HD I put on, the more costly it will be, just like you explained in your video. So, again, just like you said, a 8TB x2 will be a lot more expensive than 4TB x4. but yeah. still, difficult to decide....

@Beyondesp 2 жыл бұрын

I started with a 2 bay synlogy then went to a 4bay and now expanded the 4 bay with a 5bay expansion setup ..

@michaelbyrne8238 2 жыл бұрын

I want to do the same thing. Is the process to take the two drives from 2bay, put them into the 4bay with raid 1 (if raid 1 before), then add an extra drive and convert to raid 5?

@Beyondesp 2 жыл бұрын

@@michaelbyrne8238 synology software had/has a setting in the main menu of the nas to help transfer data over. Once set it was just take the drives out and move them over to the 4 bay drive. Now i filled out the 4 bay and added the expansion bay. With a total of 8 drives now.

@Monkwrestler 2 жыл бұрын

The lower cost of smaller drives could also be due to SMR (Shingle Magnetic Recording) on the non "pro" drives this shouldn't really be an issue for most consumer users but for high usage users this is where the pain comes in.

@GTFour 2 жыл бұрын

I think this has spun on it's head now, Seagate EXOS Enterprise 16 and 18TB are currently the cheapest drive per GB. Time for a do over!

@c.s.christopher5801 2 жыл бұрын

Those drives are not compatible with these devices (at least not on the official compatibility list). EXOS 16TB is compatible with, say, DS1821+, but that's a different price tier.

@NoneDareChallengeMe 2 жыл бұрын

And here I am looking to move from a 4 bay to a 5 bay lol.

@FC-eo9tn Жыл бұрын

..............WHEN will we see a Follower to the DS920+??????

@jeffbergstrom Жыл бұрын

I keep seeing lately that RAID-5 is worthless and should never be used. Pretty much RAID-1 or RAID-10 or better. Any opinion? Because I do not think that four-bay can do RAID-10.