Upgrade path? Old Infrant Box and a new one!

[jay]

A little background first, we are a small engineering firm of about 12 people that run CAD files over the network. We have been using a Infrant Techologies ReadyNAS NV box starting from March 2006 with (3)300gig drives in Raid 1.

Now here is what I would like to do and would like your input and suggestions.

First off I need to add a second box as my backup server (Running Nasite) is full and getting way outdated.

This is the path I'm thinking of going. Let me know what you think.

1. Buy another NAS box (primary server), do I stay with the same type that I already have or a different style of box?

2. Change the orginal Infrant box to X-raid to expand the volume to 600gigs.

3. Update the firmware on the existing Infrant box? I dont recall doing that in the past so I'm sure its way out of date. Is this something that even should be attempted?

4. Really want to get Rsync between the 2 boxes.

5. Would I be better off getting 2 new boxes and letting the old one go?

Would love some rack mounted gear but cant justify the pricing at this point.

Thanks for the input

Jay

[chirpa]

Maybe look into the NVX or Pro, two of them if in your budget. Setup rsync between them, nice performance. And keep the NV around as a backup, maybe off-site.

[jay]

What would be the major advantage of the Pro vs what we have now, is it just a speed thing and the hardware is the same?

Being that its 4 times the price I just have to ask? If I went with the Pro I'm thinking we would be just getting for now and leave the old one as the backup I think, would that work?

Also looking at the Pro vs NVX is it mostly a difference with the number of drives?

I cant believe the number of options these people have, I dont recall this many from when we bought our first one in 2006!

[dbott67]

What would be the major advantage of the Pro vs what we have now, is it just a speed thing and the hardware is the same?

The Pro has a much more powerful CPU (Intel Pentium dual-core @ 1.83 GHz) vs. the old sparc-based CPU on the NV. It also has 6-bays vs. 4-bays. In a nutshell, the Pro can read & write at over 100 MB/s, while the NV is around 25-35 MB/s.

Also looking at the Pro vs NVX is it mostly a difference with the number of drives?

In addition to the drives, the Pro has a more powerful CPU than the NVX (1.83 GHz dual-core vs. 1.06 GHz Intel Tolapai SoC). I've got both a Pro and NVX and the Pro has significantly more horsepower and can deliver quite a bit more throughput. Have a look at this document to see the typical performance expectations: http://home.bott.ca/webserver/?p=363

I cant believe the number of options these people have, I dont recall this many from when we bought our first one in 2006!

I think it's primarily due to the fact that home users are starting to run into storage issues and are looking for a good way to safely store their digital media. The new Ultra line was designed using the Atom chipset and offers a 2-bay, 4-bay and 6-bay option without the business options of Active Directory, SNMP, ethernet teaming, rsync-over-SSH, 5-yr. warranty, etc.

[jay]

Perfect, thats just the input I was looking for.

Thank you very much.

Jay