Reddit reviews Synology Disk Station DS216play - NAS Server - 0 GB, Black (DS216PLAY)

Synology will provide the best apps, qnap second best. If you can swing it, the ds216play will provide much better performance and 4K transcode.

http://www.amazon.com/Synology-Station-Diskless-Attached-DS216play/dp/B015JQAWW0/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1453874135&sr=8-2&keywords=synology+ds216

https://www.synology.com/en-us/products/compare/DS216play/DS215j

I want to clarify in case you were looking in the wrong place that a NAS is not a "prebuilt" as much as it's a purpose-built appliance. Something like the Synology DS216play. It's more like akin to an external HDD enclosure with a network card and a bit of software.

We have that functionality. Our video files are stored on a Synology DiskStation. We use the Android app, but you would want the iPhone/iPad version, to cast the videos to a Chromecast plugged into the TV. All of the artwork and info is by the server automatically and displayed on your phone/tablet in the app.

The Synology DiskStation has a bunch of additional functionality, but the most relevant to this discussion is the Download Station which can be used to manually or automatically download video files using FTP, HTTP, BitTorrent, NZB, etc.

If you're planning to have a Roku connected to the TV, you can also add the DS Video channel to your Roku and access the server directly from there.

You can do very similar things by using your own server to run Kodi or other software packages. I've been there and done that, and it's a complete pain in the rear compared to the Synology. If you want something for you to tinker around with, go for the roll-your-own solution. If you want something that's going to just work every time your wife wants to watch a show or movie, then get the Synology.

Just saw your post on /r/homeserver - sorry I've confused you. You will probably find what you need over there. If all you want us some always-on network storage, the device you linked on Amazon will probably do the trick.

If you want more options, something like this will give you a bit more flexibility - https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B015JQAWW0/ref=mp_s_a_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1483343638&sr=8-2&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=2+bay+nas&dpPl=1&dpID=31GaiS0ZjFL&ref=plSrch

Bear in mind you will need to buy 2 disks to put in it.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B015JQAWW0/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Powerful dual-core CPU, 32-bit with H.265 (HEVC), MPEG-4 Part 2, MPEG-2, VC-1, Maximum resolution: 4K (3840 x 2160), Maximum FPS: 30

Am I misunderstanding that?

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OK am not in the USA... http://www.amazon.ca/Synology-Station-Diskless-Attached-DS216play/dp/B015JQAWW0/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1453874135&sr=8-2&keywords=synology+ds216

Hope you don't mind the dark humored names but these are 5 of the drives connected (C & D are partitioned of course). There's a few more that I either use docks or as networked drives and I'm afraid to even look through them. There may be some organization, i.e. Videos>Movies, Videos>ShadowPlay, etc but... everything is scattered in all the drives except C:. I want it to be 'one for pics/videos', 'one for games', one for programs/setups & related files and so on.

I have been looking at this Synology NAS system but I'm not sure if an extra 16TB is what I'm going for. Maybe more like 40TB. Hard drives are a bit expensive right now and it seems they've raised in price last time I checked. 8TB WD Red for $300 but I'd prefer getting an 8TB WD Gold for $455. I don't have that kind of money.

Let me tell you about this fun story... I had a setup similar to yours, spent 100s of hours ripping all of my music, and all of my DVDs. Eventually the drive failed, and lost everything.

I now have a 4 drive Synology NAS that stores everything. (music, video, backups, etc)

It supports DLNA, iTunes Music Sharing, and a number of other services. It's cheaper than a Mac Mini, and gives more storage options.

I'd go with the "play" versions, as they support 4k streaming:
2 bay - http://smile.amazon.com/dp/B015JQAWW0
4 bay - http://smile.amazon.com/dp/B00LO3KW7S (I have an older version of this)

If you're just worried about music, it might be worth considering iTunes Match. It's pretty handy, but limits to 100,000 songs and 256kbps AAC.

Yeah you can go that route as well, just wanted to give you an option which can be automated relatively easily.

I use my Synology to host all my content (6-7TB worth), and run Sickrage on the NAS itself. Synology has free applications which allow me to manage the download manager (torrents) and file browsing, and even their own version of PleX that you can install on iOS/Android/Samsung Smart TVs/Roku.

It also uses very minimal power on idle, and can handle hardware transcoding for files that won't play back natively. For example, I'm at work now, and can access the UI for the NAS from here, manage all my downloads, move files around, even watch my content through my web browser.

The DS216Play is $271 on Amazon, just need to add hard drives: http://www.amazon.com/Synology-Station-Diskless-Attached-DS216play/dp/B015JQAWW0/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1458740967&sr=8-2&keywords=ds214play

I'm using the older DS214Play with Western Digital RED NAS hard drives.

https://www.amazon.com/Synology-Network-Attached-Storage-DS216play/dp/B015JQAWW0

or even this - https://www.amazon.com/Synology-DS216J-NAS-DiskStation-DS216j/dp/B01BNPT1EG

If you won't mind me asking, what's wrong with this? It's $150 less than the one you linked to... in my mind it shouldn't take a very powerful system to provide dumb RAID1 and some configuration options. I'll be limited by the gbe connection so performance shouldn't be critical.



When I build a NAS for myself it'll definitely build something higher end and will likely get something with 10gbe in mind, ssd caching and RAID10, etc.... I just don't see a good reason for that in this case.

Look into synology... You will probably have to buy the drives separately though. AND It isn't the cheapest solution, but I think its a good, but cheaper than it could be, solution.