Choosing the right storage for your business NAS can mean the difference between getting by and moving ahead.
NAS-optimized HDDs: The right tool for the right job
When it comes to building a reliable NAS solution, the type of hard drive you choose to operate within the NAS makes a significant difference. Like the hammers, wrenches and drills in a toolbox, hard drives are designed with specific jobs in mind – whether it’s providing storage for a small business server, sprawling data center or everyday PC.
For example, you can build your own multi-enclosure NAS using low-cost desktop drives, only to find that your performance will degrade as your data demands and user access increase over time. You can also install the most expensive, mission-critical drives into your NAS box, yet your small business might never take advantage of the true performance due to bandwidth or application workloads. The large capacity and low power profile of an 8TB archive HDD might be enticing as well, but since the performance of this type of drive isn’t optimized for NAS systems, your users will be sorely disappointed in the timely access of data.
While great in certain applications, neither desktop drives nor archive HDDs are good long-term fits for NAS solutions. That’s where NAS-optimized hard disk drives (HDD) come in.
NAS-optimized HDDs are built to deliver the right performance, reliability and capacity for where your business is today and where it is tomorrow.
Performance
You might wonder what makes a NAS-optimized HDD perform better than a desktop drive. NAS applications for SMBs are most often used for backup, streaming and archival of data. Data storage must be nimble to handle a growing number of users accessing the NAS system simultaneously. While a desktop drive is designed to deliver excellent performance to one person at a time, NAS-optimized HDDs aren’t limited in this way. NAS-optimized drives like the Seagate® NAS HDD are engineered with enhanced workloads that simultaneously stream data to multiple sources, as well as deliver random data.
Reliability
Reliability is a critical factor for lowering total cost of ownership (TCO) and achieving a positive return on investment (ROI). When you build a NAS equipped with NAS-optimized drives, you experience a wide range of reliability benefits that help decrease outages and increase storage uptime.
For example, NAS-optimized HDDs by Seagate feature firmware to improve overall reliability by 30% over desktop HDDs. Extended error recovery controls ensure the drives remain active in a redundant array of independent disks (RAID) environment, avoiding downtime and boosting business productivity. The advanced power management, low operating temperatures and intelligent vibration tolerance of drives like the Seagate® Enterprise NAS HDD mean extended run times in 24x7, multi-drive applications, as well as product warranties up to five years.
Capacity
NAS-optimized drives deliver capacity points up to 6TB – 50% more storage than many desktop options. These high-capacity HDDs lower TCO by freeing up valuable storage space. Additionally, any extra storage capacity can be allocated toward data protection by implementing RAID.
Evaluating the costs
While NAS solutions can be a substantial investment for SMBs in the short-term, the costs associated with low productivity and lost data are long-term roadblocks to business growth. Read how this has proved true for Aspen 82, a small TV production company that has experienced the value of efficient, reliable data storage with NAS-optimized HDDs.
Choosing the right tool for the right job is important in any situation. Don’t compromise on your data storage. Select the right tools for your business needs, and discover the difference that NAS-optimized drives can make when building your NAS system.
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