Discover reviews on "the best hdd for nas" based on Reddit discussions and experiences.
Last updated: June 10, 2025 at 05:41 PM
Summary of Reddit Comments on the Best HDD for NAS
Recommended Refurbished Drives
- Consider refurbished drives for a budget-friendly option, such as a 7200 12TB HDD for $80 that has been working fine: "I grabbed a 7200 12TB HDD for $80usd and so far it's working fine."
- Refurbished drives from serverpartdeals.com were also highly recommended due to good prices and reliability: "Get them from serverpartdeals.com, I have purchased several dozen Seagate manufacturer re-certified drives from serverpartdeals.com over the past few years and have not had an issue to date."
NAS vs. DAS
- Synology and TerraMaster were popular choices for NAS setups: "Synology single bay 8TB" and "TerraMaster four bay."
- Consider a Direct Attached Storage (DAS) setup with options like QNAP TR-002 or TR-004: "Connect the DAS directly to your PC for improved access speed."
RAID and Backup Recommendations
- RAID 1 for data protection was highly advised: "Do yourself a favor and set up that NAS with two drives in RAID 1 from the get-go."
- Emphasized the importance of backups: "You would do better by getting a Mac Mini to run Plex and something like a QNAP TR-002 or TR-004 for storage."
- Consider data duplication and storage expansion needs: "Buy the largest drive size that has the best dollar per terabyte, the sweet spot is in 14-18TB drives."
Recommended NAS Systems
- ASUSTOR AS5402T NAS was suggested for optimized storage management: "Get an AS5402T NAS and set up the NVMe volume in RAID 5 for the system volume."
- Casa OS was mentioned as a simple and cost-effective option: "Casa OS will be the simplest and cheapest out-of-box for file storage with easy configuration for various applications like Tailscale."
HDD Brands
- Toshiba N300, HGST, Seagate Exos, WD Red, and Seagate IronWolf were recommended HDD brands for NAS: "The N300 by Toshiba and HGST are usually the most reliable brands."
Avoid SSDs for Media Storage
- Mechanical hard drives were deemed more cost-efficient for media storage compared to SSDs: "Spinners are the way to go for media, low activity, near cold storage files."
Operating Systems for NAS
- OpenMediaVault (OMV) was suggested for its stability and user-friendly management interface.
- Alpine with containers for a lightweight and efficient NAS setup was recommended by a user running Alpine servers commercially.
This comprehensive summary encompasses various recommendations from Reddit comments on the best HDDs for NAS setups, including specific products, storage strategies, backup solutions, and NAS operating systems.
