Which NAS we Should go for?

My Cloud OS 3 Personal & Network Attached Storage My Cloud
1

Dears

Good day

our company have 50 workstation, we would like to implement automatic backup system for all workstations’ hard disks to be performed monthly.

our staff are occupying only 30 - 40 GB of their hard disks

Our requirement is to get a WD device to act as NAS with a backup client could be deployed through domain GPO for the workstations to schedule the backup tasks like (daily, weekly or monthly).

SO which device i should go for

2

For a business environment you should be looking at the more expensive NAS drives, especially those which have multiple RAID drives for redundancy. The single bay My Cloud’s (which this subforum is primarily supports) is designed more for the home user or the single home office user.

WD has a series of models more geared for the business user, they include:
My Cloud EX4 series
My Cloud EX2 series
My Cloud EX2100 series
My Cloud EX4100 series
My Cloud DL2100 series
My Cloud DL4100 series
My Cloud Pro Series PR2100
My Cloud Pro Series PR4100

To implement automate backup of computers one may want to invest in a quality, dedicated backup program designed for business or corporate environments. The Smartware software included with some My Cloud drives is not really designed for a business environment or to have business class features, its geared more for a home user.

One also needs to consider backing up what ever NAS device they are using. Proper disaster recovery plans account for multiple backup methods, paths and locations to provide redundancy. This often involves having a secondary backup drive located offsite to backup the main NAS.

3

Bennor

Thanks for your reply,
Yes i agree with you that single bay is mostly designed for home and small business users and a secondary Drive (Disaster Recovery) is indeed required for emergency cases & it’s better to be a cloud based also.

But, regarding the backing up software, I found that WD has released “Acronis True Image WD Edition”
Do you see that it will help in my scenario and won’t require additional dedicated backup software since it will be free of cost while using with WD drives, Correct?.

_Ref: Software and Firmware Downloads | WD Support

4

It is not clear if that software, intended for use with a different WD product (the My Book external USB hard drive) will work with the WD My Cloud device. Per the following link it states: “You need at least one WD hard drive attached in your system to be able to install and run the product.” The My Cloud is technically not attached “in” one’s system, rather its attached to the local network.

http://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?p=119

For the My Cloud the WD Smartware program is what normally ships for free with the My Cloud and is used to backup a Windows computer to the My Cloud. One can read the Smartware User Manual at the following link: http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/wdsmartware/um.asp

It should be noted that many if not all free backup software programs are only free for home, non business use. For a business environment its worth spending the money for a proper business or enterprise level backup system. Especially for backing up 50 computers. Many more full featured backup programs will feature a management interface that allows one to monitor and configure each computer’s backup process from one single seat/workstation’s management interface.

The downside to any business class or enterprise level backup program is cost. But if the data is important than its worth the money to have a solid well planned backup/disaster recovery program in place, and that often costs money.