In order to answer the many demands of the modern day IT department, Synology offers a wide variety of configurations. The Synology design team offers several Disk Station (DS) models as an out of the box, turnkey solution to your storage needs including the option to adjust each model in order to further fine tune your Synology NAS Disk Station. The following will illustrate five different categories that will help you when configuring your Synology device.
- Drive Bays
In order to balance power consumption with storage needs Synology offers NAS devices that can have a single drive bay (DS115 Series) or as many as twelve bays (DS2415, DS3615xs series). Simply stated, the more drive bays a device has the more power the device will use in order to support the drives in the array. Each storage requirement has its own set of components necessary to fulfill a need and Synology offers a myriad of possibilities to answer each configuration need.
- NAS Capacity
Synology NAS devices support a wide array of drive sizes. There are times when storage may not be of paramount importance but speed is. Using multiple small drives across a RAID array can have a marked increase in access speeds as compared to a single drive. Conversely, larger capacity drives in a smaller NAS device can save on power as well as the possibility of failure. It is up to you as to which is best for your particular needs.
- USB Access
It goes without saying that passing data through the network may at times be much slower than a direct connect USB device. In times where it is necessary to use a USB device Synology offers both USB 2.0, and USB 3.0. Although USB 2.0 is no longer widely used, Synology offers this model (DS216se) for those who are budget conscious and need an economical solution to their storage needs. All of the high end DS series NAS devices offer a USB 3.0 solution which includes multiple USB ports.
- Fan Capacity
This in and of itself may seem a small item and not something that really needs to be addressed, but the fan component can make or break a NAS device especially the larger models.
The single most destructive component to a hard drive is heat. Heat can ruin a hard drive in a matter of hours to the point where the hard drive can become physically damaged and the data unrecoverable. The correct fan size, speed, and proximity are of paramount importance to the health and life of a hard drive. In the larger models such as the DS1815x and the DS2015xs there are always two fans 120mm x 120mm to give maximum cooling protection for a multi bayed device. In the midsize devices such as the DS215+ a 92mm x 92mm single fan is sufficient for keeping one or two drives cool.
No matter what Disk Station configuration, Synology offers the proper fan size and RPMs in order to maintain a cool and quiet operating environment.
- Virtualization
It is now common practice when implementing high end devices to employ a virtualization solution. This process can be in the form of VMWare and their VSphere technology or the Microsoft Hyper-V solution. In any case a completely configurable high end NAS device can solve many a virtualization challenge. Memory, (up to 36 GB) and storage (up to 288 TB using the DS 1215 Expansion Component) and network bandwidth capacity (4 10 GB ports) brings the possibility that all virtualization compositions can be easily addressed by the Synology family of NAS devices.
DTI Data has a time tested insight into Synology Disk Station Recovery. Although the Disk station series is reliable and cost effective there are times when even the stoutest of devices will fail. DTI Data offers a technical staff as well as its modern clean room facility for just those times when your NAS device fails.
