I have been searching and learning a bunch but there doesn’t really seem to be any good methods that I can find.
You would think more companies would be putting out DAS considering the capabilities of USB3.2 and Thunderbolt. I have been looking for a quality DAS but almost all of them don’t have built in hardware RAID. I don’t really trust software RAID. Mostly rebuilding if the software crashes or my hardware crashes. Even if I was ok going with soft RAID, almost every model has a huge flaw.
It feels like getting a NAS is the only real way to go and basically just using it as an ethernet DAS for my server. It just seems like a waste of a processor. Should I just build a DAS with 4 Bay Rack? Then I have to find a place to mount a PSU and tidy up one of those PCIe to 4 Sata boards and PCIe to USB board as well as a couple fans.
Is there a good cheap enclosure to just install 4 HDD, a couple boards and a PSU? Am I missing some other easy option? It just feels like the market now is to buy a NAS and use it as a DAS.
Most people here are the exact opposite of you and don’t trust hardware RAID especially cheap implementations in a USB based DAS box. Software RAID is far more flexible and makes your setup independent of the hardware RAID cad dying.
A NAS is great when you have multiple simulataneous users. What kind of computer do you have? Do you have a desktop computer in an ordinary case? How many drives can it hold internally? If you’ve run out of space just buy a bigger case and move the motherboard etc to the new case and put the drives in the same case as the rest of your computer.
Yeah I definitely get that. All the DAS I see with hardware raid look like shit. I mostly don’t trust software raid being run on a separate machine. I have read stories of losing all the data even after shutdown properly and attaching the DAS after moving or something.
I am using a mac mini, it would be much easier if I was just using a full desktop computer, very easy build.