We understand that this is one of the most vital questions to costumers looking for a QNAP server. We believe it doesn't have to be that way and we can help any user (even without IT knowledge) to be assured they have made the best possible choice in terms of investment!

Category: To help with this process, we have divided all NAS servers into 9 categories. Select one:

• VALUE and VALUE PLUS > Oriented for Personal Use, small offices, file sharing, Backups and Replicas
• BUSINESS START, BUSINESS MEDIA and BUSINESS PLUS > Oriented for Micro and SME with ERP, CRM, HRM, VPN access and Private Cloud
• BUSINESS MEDIA and MEDIA PLUS > Oriented for Photography, Video, Music, Hardware Transcoding (Plex and Roon Media Servers)
• MEDIA (DAS) > Oriented for media professionals that only need access to a raid storage device without further apps
• DATACENTER and DATACENTER PLUS > Addressing top enterprise customers and rack format requirements.

IMPORTANT NOTES:

• PLUS categories are higher in equipment than non-PLUS categories, but are equivalent in functionality.
• It´s possible that equipment in one category can perform features that we recommend for another category, however it´s not the most appropriate both in cost-benefit ratio or performance.

Server Model: After choosing the category that best fits your needs, you have to choose now a server from several models. Here you must meet 4 main factors:

• Disk bays vs. useful space:
  • A 2 disk server allows only RAID1 protection (50% of total space is for available data)
    • Example: With 2x 4TB hard drives, you will only have 4TB available for your data.
  • A server with 3 or more disks already allows RAID5 protection (only 1 disk space is used for protection and the remaining space is available for data)
    • Example: With 6x 4TB disks, you will have 20TB (5x4TB) of available space, leaving one 4TB disk to data protection. If it was possible to set RAID1, you would only have 50% (12TB) of the total available space for documents of your 24TB total disk space.
• Processor: We rated each processor performance with a percentage grade, the higher the value, the faster the processor.
• Memory: It should be as larger as more tasks to run or as many users on the server at the same time.

Price: All prices already include the minimum 1TB disk set, UPS (or rack rails on Datacenter models), Partnerplus Leverage services, VAT and shipping (see shipping and billing conditions).

Features: In the final step of choosing the server, you should check in the description if it has the connections and expansion you want, such as Thunderbolt / USB / HDMI / GbE (1/10), SFP, SFP + and Audio. If not, look for another server that meets all the requirements.

If everything is like you want, select the usable disk space and memory.

Useful Space calculation: You should know what useful space you'll need for your server. To do so, start by measuring the currently occupied space with all your files, photos, videos and music.

Click on the right side mouse button on the disk letter of which you want to know the space used. Then click on properties and check how much space is occupied.

In this example we have 54GB (Gigabytes) occupied. Dividing 54 GB by 1000, you get 0.054TB (Terabytes). Therefore, the space currently occupied is the sum of all values ​​calculated of your disks.

You should choose a server usable space that includes this sum and any further expansion that may fit your budget. The more space available now, the less risk buying more disks and servers in the future. Additionally it's always useful to consider some free space for a system good performance. Do you imagine your PC disk completely full? Also you should consider 10 to 20% of total space for storing snapshots (recovery points in time) for storing and recovering from eventual ransomware attacks easily.

Memory Required calculation: As for the processor, everything here also depends on the tasks you will perform on the server, so there is no general rule that meets all needs. The more memory and processor are needed with more:

• simultaneous tasks,
• user access,
• video, sound and / or image processing,
• virtualization (total memory must be> or = the sum of the memory of the virtual machines)

What´s the Partnerplus Leverage?

Choose your Multifunctional Server

Still can't choose? Let us help you, contact us, or leave your message!