Storage options abound in the SMB-based NAS market

By James E. Gaskin, Network World
October 24, 2005 12:02 AM ET

The market for network-attached storage devices aimed at small or midsize businesses suddenly offers some real choices with a range of features. No longer are these devices just "boxes of disks" with little differentiation. Companies can choose units for size, data redundancy, innovative back-up options, a do-it-all network unit or a combination of these features.

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We recently tested four devices - Anthology Solutions' Yellow Machine (the all-in-one unit), Infrant Technologies ReadyNAS 600, Iomega's 200d with REV drive and Netgear's Storage Central SC101. Newcomer Infrant delivered a great product that performs well and provides a complete management utility, and wins a Clear Choice Award.

Infrant ReadyNAS 600

Infrant has a low public profile, but its ReadyNAS 600 box greatly impressed us. Offering several RAID options, the ReadyNAS forgoes the sleek and polished look of Buffalo Technologies' TeraStation for a businesslike squat black box with a fan grill above the hard drive LEDs.

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The ReadyNAS acts like an older-model NAS and works quite well when just plugged into the wall and connected to the network. The default settings give everyone access under standard Windows networking rules (\\ReadyNAS\ Backup and \Media are preconfigured). The four 232G-byte drives in our test unit were arranged as RAID-5, which left about 650G bytes of free space (subtracting the RAID overhead and space set aside for folder Snapshots).

During the installation, the device downloaded a firmware update, installed it automatically and returned to the same browser screen administration page. This was the smoothest upgrade of the devices we tested. The system even sent us an e-mail stating that the newly upgraded box needed a reboot.

Security settings will cover small, medium and large network customers. For small groups, share-level security, with or without passwords, is recommended. Midsize groups can use individual user passwords per share, or group accounts. If you have a Windows domain controller or Active Directory, the ReadyNAS relies on those services for user authentication.

How we did it

We added each unit to our lab network with a Xincom XC-DPG602 Dual Wan Router connected to Comcast Cable Internet with a failover link to Yahoo SBC DSL, and a Linksys EtherFast Auto-Sensing 24-port managed wiring hub, installed according to instructions, and populated the disks with files. Clients tested for connectivity include Windows XP Pro (SP2) running on an Intel P4 3.2MHz, 1GB RAM, mirrored 80GB hard disks, Windows 2000 (SP4) (Pentium III 700 MHz, 256MB RAM, 10GB hard disk HP Omnibook 500 Laptop), and Xandros Business Desktop Linux (Pentium III, 1GHz, 512MB RAM, 9GB SCSI disk). On the Yellow Machine, we configured the router for basic connectivity and tested the firewall setting followed by the most secure proxy server setting.

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The management utility, FrontView, offers a setup Wizard and advanced configuration settings. The utility is a standard left-menu, tabbed-page-on-the-right layout, but at least Infrant didn't get cutesy with graphics. Pages have clear markings, and its clean presentation didn't attract attention to itself and distract us.

Genie Backup Manager Version 5.0 shipped with our test unit, but Version 6.0 now ships. It worked quickly and reliably.

A journaling file system (the embedded Linux-based operating system distribution isn't revealed) includes disk-write cache by default. The Gigabit Ethernet port supports Jumbo Frames, which is handy if other devices also support this protocol. You can optimize performance for Apple OS X clients, but that will lock out Windows clients. Because Apple-only shops don't have many cost-effective NAS options, the ReadyNAS may make some inroads there.

Click to see: Infrant's ReadyNAS 600

E-mail alerts can be sent to up to three addresses, with system events such as disk failure, quota violation, low disk space and even improper shutdown. ReadyNAS includes step-by-step instructions on how to perform a file-system check in the e-mail sent after an improper shutdown.

Logs (system status and health) contained a nice balance of useful information without overload. One click e-mails a log page, and the system sends an exact HTML copy in the e-mail. The administrative browser utility also shows green, yellow and red lights in the bottom status line for the volume, individual disks, fan, power, temperatures and status of any attached UPS devices, giving users a quick glance of the system status.

To replace hard drives, you have to take the case apart, and drives are not hot-swappable. RAID 0, 1 and 5 are supported, and you can vary the file system access list by network share. Common Internet File System /Server Message Block for Windows starts by default, AppleTalk File Protocol, Network File System Version 2 and 3, HTTP, Secure-HTTP and anonymous FTP can be included. Also supported is Rsync, a back-up protocol used by Linux and Unix. Streaming from the media shared folder supports networked DVD and media players, with options such as showing a slide show or setting the pixel rate (480i/480p, 720p or 1080i) for the targeted display.

The ReadyNAS has a solid block of features with a complete and no-nonsense management utility. But the device also is fun for streaming music and watching the various disk LEDs dance along as the stored music files unwind across the striped disk array.