NAS Price Comparison

2-bay (€200-400): Basic home backup, media streaming, 1-2 users. Supports RAID 1 mirroring. 4-bay (€300-800): Small office, multiple users, better RAID options (5/6/10). 6-8 bay (€500-1500): Professional use, high capacity, advanced RAID. 12+ bay (€1000+): Enterprise applications, maximum performance and redundancy.

RAID 1: 50 percent usable capacity, 1-drive failure tolerance, simple setup. RAID 5: 75-90 percent capacity, 1-drive failure, good for 3-6 drives. RAID 6: 66-85 percent capacity, 2-drive failure tolerance, best for 4+ drives. RAID 10: 50 percent capacity, high performance, multiple drive failures. SHR (Synology) or FlexRAID: Flexible capacity management with drive mixing.

NAS drives (WD Red/Pro, Seagate IronWolf/Pro, Toshiba N300): 24/7 operation rated, vibration resistance, RAID optimization, error recovery controls, 3-5 year warranty. Consumer drives: 8-16 hours/day rating, may cause RAID issues, shorter warranty. NAS drives cost 20-50 percent more but provide better reliability in multi-drive environments.

RAM: File serving: 2-4GB. Plex transcoding: 8GB+. VMs/Docker: 16GB+. Each concurrent user needs ~1GB. CPU: ARM for basic tasks, Intel/AMD x86 for transcoding, VMs, and intensive applications. Plex 4K transcoding requires Intel Quick Sync or dedicated GPU. Check manufacturer compatibility before upgrading.

Gigabit Ethernet (1 Gbps): Standard for most home use, supports 4K streaming, adequate for 5-10 users. 2.5/5 Gigabit: Better for high-bandwidth applications and multiple simultaneous users. 10 Gigabit: Professional use, multiple 4K streams, large file transfers. WiFi 6 can handle multiple simultaneous 4K streams from NAS.

Synology DSM: Most user-friendly, extensive app ecosystem, excellent mobile apps, regular updates. QNAP QTS: Feature-rich, good for power users, strong virtualization support. TrueNAS: Open-source, ZFS filesystem, enterprise-grade features, steeper learning curve. Asustor ADM: Good balance of features and ease-of-use, Docker support.