DSM-G600, DNS-3xx and NSA-220 Hack Forum

I went from the CH3SNAS (which is identical to DLinks DNS-323) to the DLink DNS-325. It's got a much faster CPU and 4 times the RAM, and I'm all around happy with its performance.
It runs funplug just as well, so there was no learning curve for a new environment
It's not very expensive either.
Then again, it only has room for 2 drives, and there's only  a single USB port, which is the major disadvantage for me (I have funplug running from a USB drive).

There are of course other options, like Synology stations or NASes by QNAP, but  they're all more expensive.

I suggest to get a raspberry pi or similair for more complex software. Keep the dns323 and similar devices only as simple network storage.

beto6971 wrote:

Thanks KyleK. That sounds like a good suggestion.

I checked amazon, and found that Synology DS212j is just about 35 USD more expensive than DNS-325, but has two USBs (DNS-325 handles up to 6TB, though). Would that be a good option too? Is it possible to hack that NAS as well, to the same level you guys have done it with DNSs?

Interestingly, DNS-323 is still possible to get (new) for US$ 350!!! Almost twice as the newer DNS-325!

The Synology is certainly "hackable", from what I have seen on their forum:
http://forum.synology.com/enu/

I was thinking about getting a backup NAS just in case my DNS-323 ever went out (which does everything I need, I have custom stuff on it, but not all the media stuff), and I considered Synology.

In the end what I did is take my old machine, put Linux on it, make it a "NAS", and built up a new hot machine for my use.  Now I have a "NAS" that can transfer data at out 100 MB/s on my 1 Gb/s network.  I get about 14 MB/s on my DNS-323, but of course it uses less power and all.  But in the end I got my dream machine, which it 100% silent, and still powerful (AMD A10).

Now the new "NAS" is the does everything the DNS-323 did, and once a night all the changes are synced to the DNS-323, so if I ever lose the "NAS" I could just rename the DNS-323's host name and switch over (all my personal data comes from the NAS).  Except for the 20 minutes or so it needs to sync, the drives on the DNS-32 are spinned down and it basically does almost nothing, it should last a long time that way.

Last edited by chriso (2013-01-17 10:44:27)

unmesh wrote:

You could also try the intriguingly named NSA320 or NSA325 from Zyxel that are priced around the same as the DLink DNS-320 and DNS-325 but have beefier CPUs, more RAM, better performance (as per smallnetbuilder.com) and also run ffp.

In reading the reviews, the biggest disadvantage I could see was that the Zyxels require you to mount the drives on rails before inserting them into the chassis and the biggest advantage beyond performance was that they support Wake-on-LAN.

Interesting options. I didn't know Zyxel made NAS's, I know they make some excellent modems.
Their NAS seem comparatively better hardware-wise that the others. NSA320 has 3 USB ports, and in NSA325 one of them is USB 3.0!!!.
However, not very good reviewed by users in Amazon. You can see a lot of complaints for the bigger model NSA325, which is the High performance one. Still something to keep an eye on....

Komano wrote:

I was actually looking at building a NAS.

Was Looking at this as the main board

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a … 6813131881

Wouldn't that be a bit overkilling for a NAS? I do understand you could do a lot more sophisticated stuff but at what cost...?  You still need to buy a processor, PC case, memory, etc. You would be actually building a server. IMHO it wouldn't be as power efficient as "tweaking" an already built NAS.

I understand the reasoning behind, though    and it is tempting. Then again, you start thinking beyond the simple NAS.

Last edited by beto6971 (2013-01-21 21:54:25)

Dammit. Now I'm really thinking about replacing my DNS-325 with the Zyxel NSA325. It's so cheap!

If hacking the NAS is in your plans, then build a linux box and be done with it.  Part of the concept of a NAS is to have a low cost (both from purchase & operating aspects) appliance that sits in a corner, and stores your data.

I bought my DNS-323 back when they first came out (2006) and after exploring it with the help of this forum and fun_plug, it's has been sitting on a shelf alongside my router & switches, backing up my data - I'm not going to replace it unless it fails or upgrade to something bigger/better/faster until such point as it no longer meets my needs - it doesn't even have fun_plug installed anymore.

NSA325 also supports WOL

I actually went from the CH3SNAS to the DNS-325, and yeah,  switching was a bit of a hassle: I had a 3rd hard disk that I first copied the content of one of the CH3SNAS disks to, popped that in, copied the stuff from the 2nd drive to the first, and popped that in. (I'm not running in RAID mode).

It took a while, but eventually it was done.