These network-attached storage (NAS) devices connect directly to your home office network and provide a shared storage space that's independent of any individual machine. Such devices used to be expensive, industrial-grade products, but small, consumer market units are selling in increasing numbers out of retail stores such as Staples and Best Buy. The units come with an Ethernet patch cable that you plug into an open port on your Ethernet switch or router. Once it's attached to your network, any computer on your network ' wireless or wired ' should be able to use the device.
If your computers are networked, shared network storage devices offer an easy way to share files, and most include backup software that should allow for painless, set-it-and-forget-it automated backups of the data residing on all of your network-attached computers.
After testing four such units, I'm happy to report that these devices can indeed solve those problems in a home or small office environment, although getting the systems set up and configured properly isn't nearly as plug and play as I had hoped. That could be frustrating for small business owners and home office users, who tend to be novices with little time or patience for technical glitches.
Setting expectations
My interest in network storage arises from the happy convergence of dropping prices with cumulative aggravation over my current home office setup. NAS has been around for years in data centers, but the prices have dropped to the point where a $200 consumer-grade unit could easily meet my needs.
I work from a home office and telecommute four days a week. I have a Computerworld -issue laptop, a home computer where I pay the bills and keep personal business, a Windows XP PC for my daughter, a Wi-Fi-enabled laptop that I use for mobility around the house and an Apple iMac I use for multimedia and for testing purposes. I have different data sets scattered across all of those machines, yet I'd like to be able to access any data from any machine. If I'm working on my home machine I'd like to check in on my work files rather than go downstairs to my work computer. If I switch to my wireless laptop in the living room, I'd like access to both my personal and professional data.
Since all of my machines are networked, I could use Windows networking to share folders on each, but with five different machines the shared folder scenario becomes a bit confusing. The arrangement also has its quirks. Most recently someone shut off a computer upstairs that contained an important Excel spreadsheet that I had open. The file became corrupted and I was unable to recover it.
With a shared file space on a NAS device, I could place all of those files in one location and make them available from any workstation in the house. A dedicated shared storage device would also use less power than a shared folder on a computer, and because the units don't use a cooling fan, they run quieter too.
My other issue is backups. Like most people, I don't do them often enough -- in part because digital photos and other multimedia files have swelled the size of backups, requiring multidisc backup sets that I have to baby-sit.
For my purposes, a NAS device must integrate storage needs in a home office environment where a heterogeneous mix of business and consumer machines need access to common files. That includes Windows and Mac clients. Linux support is a plus, although I do not have any such machines in use at this time. It also needs to provide consistent, consolidated backup, access to common files -- for both wireless and wired machines -- and secure access using basic password protection.
The winning unit needs to offer at least 250GB of storage space to accommodate backups and shared data. It needs to be easy to set up and use by someone who is not an expert on Windows networking and doesn't like to tinker with hardware and software. It has to work seamlessly with my Computerworld laptop. And as a small business/small office with no corporate reimbursement for the expense, I want it to be damned cheap.
Those were my requirements. In selecting devices, however, I decided to look at a range of options that include basic units, plus with "nice to have" features such as disk mirroring for fault tolerance, remote access/content publishing capabilities, and printer sharing. While the products I tested differ in features, most vendors offer comparable units with comparable feature sets in each product category.
The lineup
I tested the Buffalo Technologies Inc.'s LinkStation, Iomega Corp.'s StorCenter, Western Digital Corp.'s NetCenter, and Seagate Technologies' Maxtor Shared Storage II. Each configuration varied a bit.
I also looked at Seagate's Mirra Sync and Share Personal Server, which allows you to back up data and then share selected content with other users on your local network or over the Web. It didn't quite meet my basic file sharing needs, but is worth considering for those interested in publishing photos or other online content to friends, family or business associates.
To learn about setting up NAS at home for sharing files and photos over the Internet, see "".
All of the units expect to receive an IP address from a dynamic host configuration protocol (DHCP) server in order to work on your network. Your broadband modem or router/firewall device in your office usually provides DHCP services. However, if you're using a simple Ethernet network hub or switch without DHCP capability and you don't have broadband access to the Internet, you may not be able to network these devices.
In each case the enclosed documentation was Spartan. Most packages include a storage unit, power cord, network cable, installation CD (with a PDF version of the manual) and basic instructions to get you up and running. All of the units include two USB ports that support additional disk drives. Some also allow you to share a printer by attaching it to a USB port.
Full documentation is either online or on the installation CD. Assuming that your Windows networking is functioning properly, most of these devices should show up in My Network Places soon after you turn them on, and you should be able to map a drive letter to each device in Windows Explorer. This was the case with most of the units, although I had problems getting some models to network with my Computerworld laptop.
The installation software provides access to device configuration settings and attempts to set up drive mappings and desktop shortcuts. Most drives also include basic backup software and tout a range of features that promise faster network speeds and disk transfer rates. For basic data storage in a home environment, such differences probably don't mean much, unless you plan to stream lots of multimedia content from the shared disk.
Then there are the nice to haves that are tacked on - including remote access, printer sharing and media streaming. These tend to be vendor "checklist item" features that most users never take advantage of, but they may come in handy in some cases.
Print serving is a nice feature -- if you happen to want to place your printer next to the share storage device. Some devices also support the Universal Plug and Play (UPNP) and Digital Living Network Alliance media server specifications, which means that they can stream multimedia content to your home entertainment system by way of a digital media adapter that you buy separately. I did not test this feature, however.
Setting up remote file transfer protocol (FTP) access is a different can of worms entirely. Most products don't document the ins and outs of configuring FTP very well -- nor do they warn of the security issues. An FTP server presents a security risk and a firewall configuration hassle that's best left to network experts. The NetCenter, for example, requires that you open ports 20 and 21 to the outside world. Then you'll need to configure up a rule in your firewall to map the IP address of your cable or DSL modem to the dynamic IP address given to the network storage device. A dynamic IP address assignment can change over time, and if it does you'll have to map that again.
"FTP is still an advanced user feature and requires some firewall configuration," admits Brian Verenkoff, with Buffalo Technologies' technical support. "Due to security flaws in FTP, it's best left for advanced users anyhow." Buffalo plans to add features that will make setup and security for FTP access easier, he adds.
FTP servers in a corporate environment reside in a demilitarized done, or DMZ, that is "firewalled" off from the rest of the internal network where your important data lies. Turning on FTP on a home NAS device allows access not only to your internal network, but if something goes wrong it could potentially put at risk all of the data on the shared storage device, not just the folder with FTP access.
During testing with my work laptop I experienced setup problems that lead to several conversations with Dave Callahan, director of IT at Computerworld. He thinks less network-savvy small and home office users should steer clear of FTP. "It's a stupid idea to share to the Internet," he says flatly. "You don't want anyone from the outside coming anywhere near your network."
Do you really need the configuration headaches and the risks of opening up ports to a home network -- especially when remote FTP services are available on the Internet? I decided to pass.
On the security front, all of the units I tested provide password-protected access to the network storage device's management console, and most allow the creation of usernames and passwords to access shared folders. Some let you set permissions to allow read-only or read/write access. For most home and small office environments, however, basic password access to the resource is probably sufficient.
The configuration utilities that come with these products can be password-protected. However, anyone with physical access to the device can defeat that by activating a reset switch on the unit. From there, secure access to drive shares can be disabled. All of these devices are small and could easily be carried away under a jacket, so if you have a lot of visitors, consider keeping the devices in an area where they will be physically secure.
Buffalo Technology Linkstation Pro Gigabit Shared Network Storage
With a street price around $200 ($419.99 list), the LinkStation was one of the least expensive units I tested and easily offered the most features for the money. Fortunately, the more advanced features don't get in the way for users who just want the basics.
My test unit had a capacity of 320GB, but Buffalo also offers a 500GB model. Linkstation uses SATA drives with 1.5Gbit/sec. throughput. The bells and whistles start with four indicator lights on the front of the unit that indicate power, connectivity, errors and status message waiting (messages can be viewed from the management console).
Setting up is relatively painless, especially on the iMac, although the software installation process could be more straightforward. The enclosed Link Navigator installation disk walks the user through physically setting up the unit and connecting it to the network. It concludes by creating a desktop shortcut to the shared disk and installing the NAS Navigator configuration utility.
Link Navigator presents two options: "Connect LinkStation to Network" and "Connect LinkStation to PC." The former consists of the step-by-step pictorial that walks the user through the physical setup. The latter actually installs the software. If the user clicks on the "Connect LinkStation to Network" option first, he must know to circle back to the first screen and run "Connect LinkStation to PC" to complete the process.
In my package the Link Navigator utility failed to properly install the bundled backup software from Memeo Inc. However, I did find a rudimentary backup program, AutoBackup, on the shared disk and installed that. According to Buffalo technical support, AutoBackup is an older program that shouldn't have been loaded on the shared disk. I was able to download a copy of Memeo from Buffalo's technical support.
Memeo includes a license for one PC (it does not support the Mac). Additional licenses are $29.95 or 3 licenses for $49.95.
Once installed, Memeo is mindlessly easy to use. Users create a backup name, choose a destination device and can check a button that encrypts the backup (which substantially slows down the backup process). The software runs the backup immediately, continuously updates it as you make changes to your data, and maintains up to three historical versions of each file.
Memeo does not include an option to compress backups to save disk space. Also, the software can only back up to the shared drive, not from it. So if you maintain a shared folder on the network drive, Memeo can't back up that data to a local disk or to another shared storage device. Steve Owens, vice president of business development at Memeo, says a new version that supports that capability should be available early in 2007.
For those so inclined, the LinkStation offers a wealth of configuration options, available through a password protected user interface. You can restrict folder access by creating user accounts and groups and you can set folder permissions to allow read only, read/write or no access for each user or group. LinkStation was the only product I tested that integrates with Active Directory, Windows Server Message Block or Windows NT domain controllers to authenticate users. That feature might be helpful to some small businesses, but I suspect it will be beyond the needs of most home and small offices.
The configuration utilities that come with these products can be password-protected. However, anyone with physical access to the device can defeat that by activating a reset switch on the unit. From there, secure access to drive shares can be disabled. All of these devices are small and could easily be carried away under a jacket, so if you have a lot of visitors, consider keeping the devices in an area where they will be physically secure.
Buffalo Technology Linkstation Pro Gigabit Shared Network Storage
LinkStation Pro LS-320GL
With a street price around $200 ($419.99 list), the LinkStation was one of the least expensive units I tested and easily offered the most features for the money. Fortunately, the more advanced features don't get in the way for users who just want the basics.
Iomega offers a $209 single-drive shared storage device similar to that offered by Buffalo, but I opted to test the $439.95 dual-drive configuration, which allows mirroring on two internal 250GB disk drives for disaster recovery. Both drives are SATA with 3Gbit/sec throughput. That's a very nice feature to have, but it also adds about $200 to the cost while cutting available storage space by half.
Iomega's 500GB StorCenter is a shorter (just under 5 in. tall), wider (just over 3 in.), more compact unit that's less likely to get knocked over than other models I tested. The single-disk, 250GB model can't be mirrored, but a four-disk, 1TB unit supports a fault-tolerant, RAID 5 configuration. The StorCenter was the only unit I tested that uses a parallel ATA disk interface rather than the newer, serial ATA standard, which offers faster transfer rates. In daily use, however, the unit was not noticeably slower than the other units.
The 500GB model can be configured to stripe data across the two disks (RAID 0), ostensibly to increase performance. RAID 0 is the default. Alternately, the system can make both drives appear as a single volume, filling up first one disk, then the other. Performance-wise, most users probably won't notice a difference either way. But if pieces of every file are stored on both drives, all files could become corrupted when one drive fails in a RAID 0 configuration. By contrast, with drive spanning only the files stored on the failed drive would be lost. Given that, my preference would be to opt for drive spanning or mirroring. I chose the latter.
Setting up mirroring requires reformatting the drive, a process that takes a few hours. Once set up, mirroring was transparent and worked seamlessly.
Like most NAS devices, the StorCenter appears on the network as a Microsoft Windows Network resource that can be located and mapped as a drive letter in Windows Explorer. Iomega includes a discovery and device configuration tool that automates that process. While the installation software puts a shortcut to the discovery software on the desktop, it doesn't place a shortcut to the StorCenter shared disk there.
The StorCenter's firmware-based configuration utility is accessible from a browser. It enables basic device configuration as well as features such as FTP services and shared printing. The configuration utility can be password-protected, and you can create password-protected user accounts and restrict access to shared folders by user. Users have either full or no access. Another nice feature: shared folders can be configured with a space quota. No other model did that.
Iomega's StorCenter also can be configured as a media server, which enables multimedia streaming to home entertainment systems equipped with a UPNP-compatible digital media adapter. I did not test this feature, however.
While you can set up access to a shared folder via FTP, the function's usefulness is limited. Access is via anonymous FTP with no password, although you can configure the shared folder to restrict activity to downloads, uploads or both. As with the other products, documentation on this feature is sparse, and the user is left to figure out how to successfully map to the device through his firewall.
Finding the information on how to set up a network printer connection is tricky as well. The configuration utility says to run the discovery tool and click on "Connect to Network Printer" to install the driver. In the version of the discovery tool I tested no such option existed. An "About network printing" option located there takes the user to Iomega's support page, but a search on "network printing" turned up no relevant results. More helpful was the Iomega Information Center html document, installed locally with the Iomega software. It provided step-by-step directions and I networked an HP LaserJet printer without problems.
Connecting my Computerworld -issued ThinkPad was another matter. The discovery tool found the StorCenter device but could not configure it, instead displaying a "drive is offline" error. Iomega's troubleshooting instructions suggested disabling the Windows firewall software on the machine. The same firewall hadn't blocked other machines on the network from accessing the StorCenter. Nonetheless, I decided to give it a try.
Unfortunately, turning off the firewall on the corporate machine was a nonstarter. My laptop is part of the Computerworld domain, and the configuration is locked down through Active Directory group policy settings that are out of my control. I made a call to Dave Callaghan, Computerworld 's director of IT, to ask for permission to temporarily disable the firewall. After a jovial "Ha ha ha, that's very funny, Rob," Callaghan promptly denied my request -- a denial you're likely to hear as well if you have any problems configuring the StorCenter to work with your business machine.
One nice feature of Iomega's technical support is the IM chat function. Soon I was running through the problem with a technician named Tracy. While the StorCenter showed up as a network object, no folders were visible, and I could not map to it. I use Cisco client software to connect into Computerworld's virtual private network (VPN), and Tracy suggested that I activate it. Once I logged into the Computerworld VPN, the discovery tool was able to map the drive, although I still could not map to it myself from within Windows Explorer. The machine subsequently crashed when I closed the VPN session. Uninstalling the Iomega software and reinstalling from a new disk sent by Iomega produced the same result. After that initial glitch, however, the system and the StorCenter ran fine.
I was not able to track down the source of the problem, and Iomega's product wasn't the only one to have trouble with my Computerworld laptop. The Western Digital NetCenter had similar issues.
The StorCenter included a copy of Iomega's Windows only Backup Pro software, but the company is now bundling EMC's Retrospect Express 7.5, which will work with Macs or Windows machines and can configure an emergency boot disk that you can use to restore lost files and system settings. With plenty of product in the channel, it's possible that users will find the earlier backup utility in the box. Iomega will sell you the new software, but it will set you back an additional $20.
While you can configure Retrospect to encrypt backup files, the backup process slows the operation considerably. "It takes a big performance hit," acknowledges Duke McKinley, support supervisor at Iomega, adding that most customers don't use the encryption option for this reason. I was able to configure Retrospect to back up my shared folder on the StorCenter to a local disk as well as feed backups of my local machines to folders on the StorCenter. Retrospect lets you choose which days to back up and the time of the backup. It also lets you create up to seven daily backup sets or two weekly backup sets and rotate them automatically -- a handy feature if you need to go back in time to find data that was already erased or corrupted when the last backup occurred. It can also compress the backup, which saves space but slows the backup process. Finally, you can require a password to access the backup set.
Western Digital NetCenter Network Drive
Western Digital's NetCenter is a basic workhorse NAS device and was fast and easy to set up and gets the job done. It also comes with capable backup software. It comes in capacities ranging from 160GB to 500GB and is SATA with 3Gbit/sec throughput. A 250GB model sells for $249.99 but I opted for the larger, 500GB unit, which has a list price of $399.99. Unlike the Iomega model I tested, the 500GB NetCenter uses a single drive and so it cannot be mirrored. Western Digital does not offer a mirroring option in the NetCenter line.
The units are Mac and PC compatible and -- like the Iomega unit -- includes EMC Retrospect Express 7.5 backup software. Like the other units, the NetCenter includes two USB ports for attaching extra storage. It also supports network printer sharing by attaching your printer to one of the USB ports.
It does not offer FTP or media streaming, and it was the only unit I tested that does not support Gigabit Ethernet network speeds. I didn't notice much of a performance difference in my testing, however. Practically speaking, I doubt that network speed will make a noticeable difference to most home office or small office users, unless you're streaming multimedia content or transferring large volumes of files on a regular basis.
NetCenter comes with EasyLink discovery program, which locates the shared disk, maps shared folders that you select, and lets you place shortcuts to them on the desktop. The NetCenter Manager software allows the user to configure the device settings and set up printer sharing.
Disk security was simple and therefore easy to set up. After password protecting the NetCenter console, I used a file-sharing wizard that walked me through creating shared folders, which can be made public or private by assigning a password to each. After you're done you'll probably want to map each user's workstation to the new folder.
Printer sharing involved connecting the printer, clicking on the "Printers and Faxes" icon on the NetCenter hard drive and following the directions.
As with the Iomega StorCenter, my Computerworld laptop had difficulty recognizing and therefore mapping to shared folders on the NetCenter device. I was not able to determine the exact source of the problem, but I was able to resolve the problem by using the same method described in the Iomega section above.
Maxtor Shared Storage II
Seagate aptly describes the Maxstor Shared Storage II line as "simple shared storage, automatic backup and media serving for small networks." It offers the 320GB unit that I tested, as well as a 500GB and 1TB model. All support Gigabit Ethernet and use 7200 rpm disks with a 3Gbit/sec SATA interface. The product line does not support disk mirroring. It does support UPnP audio visual media streaming.
Unlike other units I tested, when you plug in the Shared Storage II it doesn't automatically appear on your network as a shared resource. You must run the installation utility, reboot, and then run the Maxtor EasyManage utility and set up a user account. The Shared Storage II then creates a public folder and a personal folder space and a drive mapping to it.
EasyManage creates a new personal folder for each user. This administrative tool does not let you configure all user accounts from a single computer, however. You must install the software and configure each new user machine by machine.
The Shared Storage II doesn't just set up shared folders; it creates a hierarchy of subfolders within each that include My Documents, My Backup, My Library, My Movies, My Music, My Photos, My Sites and My Software, as well as a shortcut to the Public folder (which contains a similarly named set of subfolders). Users can turn on a feature that lets you drag and drop files on the shared drive and have them automatically sorted into the correct folder based file type.
EasyManage includes a rudimentary backup feature that backs up data from workstations to the My Backups subfolder on the shared disk. The user can select which files and folders to back up, can opt to save up to 10 "historical versions" of each file, and can schedule the time of day and days of the week for backups to take place. EasyManage can't back up data from the shared disk to a local disk, although it can be configured to back up to a USB-attached hard disk drive.
There are no options to use compression or to encrypt backup files. On the plus side, the backup software can be used on more than one Mac or PC client without paying additional license fees.
Recommendations
All of the units performed capably, so the type of unit you choose really depends on your needs, the price you're willing to pay, and which features you prefer.
The 500GB Iomega StorCenter was only unit I tested that supports Linux clients. It also supports disk mirroring, which can help ensure business continuity for small office environments. In the mirrored configuration, the cost per gigabyte for the $439.95 device is about twice that of a single, 250GB shared disk. Still, that's not a lot to pay if you need fault-tolerant storage. Mirroring has another benefit: like most shared storage devices, the StorCenter saves file version histories when backing up. If it fails, you lose access to your file version histories. Mirroring helps preserve that data.
With a street price of about $200, the 320GB Buffalo LinkStation is aggressively priced and has the most sophisticated security configuration options for small office environments. It doesn't include a print server function though, nor media streaming support.
If you want media streaming, the Maxtor Shared Storage II supports UPnP, as does the StorCenter, but the latter uses an older-style, parallel ATA disk interface rather than the newer, faster serial ATA in the Maxtor unit. The Shared Storage II was also the only unit I tested that doesn't support older, Windows 98 machines.
The Western Digital NetCenter model I tested shows how tempting it can be to upgrade to a larger drive. The 500GB NetCenter has a list price of $399.99 but street prices are around $275 -- that's just $75 more than what the 320GB Buffalo model sells for online.
Because I want to store shared data on the network storage device and maintain data on local PC and Mac machines as well, the capability to do bidirectional backups is important. Both the Iomega StorCenter and Western Digital NetCenter, with EMC Retrospect Express, met that requirement. Client licenses to back up all of my workstations, however, will require a $49 upgrade to Restrospect Professional 7.5 (the regular cost if you're not upgrading is $119). That covers three client licenses. I'll need two more, at $37 each.
The backup software included with Maxtor's Shared Storage II doesn't require additional licenses. Unfortunately, while it can back up all clients to the shared disk, unique data on the shared disk can only be backed up to another, USB-attached storage device. Memeo, which came with the Buffalo device, doesn't support the iMac.
You could easily use the Backup utility that comes with Windows XP to set up bidirectional backups with any of these shared drives. However, I wanted the more advanced features in Retrospect, such as the ability to restore from a file version history, and I wanted to use one consistent utility that could back up both the iMac and Windows machines.
For my requirements, therefore, the Western Digital NetCenter gets the nod. One possible concern is the network speed - 100 Mb/sec. Ethernet versus 1,000Mb/sec. (1GB) for other units I tested. With my daughter getting into more streaming video and audio, I suppose that this could possibly make a difference -- if I had standardized the rest of my network on Gigabit Ethernet. I haven't, however, and I suspect that most home and small office users haven't either.
In fact, most home offices are using 802.11G wireless Ethernet, which runs at 54Mb/sec. at best. And with wired Gigabit Ethernet routers and adapters still selling for a premium, most users with wired Ethernet are still opting for 10/100 Ethernet devices, according to my local computer dealer. Finally, while multimedia files in my network are likely to be backed up to the network storage device, they will be played from the local disk drives on the OS X and Windows machines.
The 500GB NetCenter model I tested has more room than I need, and with a $399.99 list price ($275 street) it's at the high end of my budget.
Backups of all data and configuration information for the five machines in my environment come in at less than 30GB (According to Seagate the typical business user has less than 50GB of data). I don't plan to do full system backups, which would require more space. So for this household, even the 160 GB NetCenter ($199) would do fine today. That said, my teenage daughter's video and audio files are building up rapidly. My best choice is to split the difference and go with the 320GB NetCenter, which retails for $249 and sells online for about $220. With the backup software upgrade that puts the total cost just under $350.
Home NAS for content sharing
Seagate Technology LLC's Mirra Sync and Share Personal Server is a different class of product from rest of the devices I tested in a review of network-attached storage (NAS) for your home. While it backs up data from Windows and Macintosh computers, the Mirra Sync's primary purpose is to let you publish that content so that it is accessible to other users on your local network or to users over the public Internet. A classic application for the Mirra Sync would be for sharing a library of photos with family or a group of friends. It also provides a way to remotely access and update your files when you are on the road or as a way to share documents with a select group of people.
Not surprisingly, the Mirra Sync costs a bit more than the other shared-storage devices in this group. The 500GB model lists for $599.99; a 320GB model sells for $499.99. The unit itself is heftier than a simple shared-storage device (it measures 4' in. wide by 8 in. tall by 8' in. deep), and it has a relatively noisy fan that you won't want near your desktop.
For Computerworld's story on how to set up storage networks at home, see "Hands-on: Setting up a storage network in your home."
Once installed, the Mirra Sync client software starts by asking you to choose the files you want to back up and can maintain up to eight revisions of each file. Backups are slowly copied directly to the Mirra Sync and are not compressed or encrypted. You can and should password protect backups because if you don't, other users on your network will be able to see and possibly delete your backups.
Once you've created your backup sets, you can choose to enable Web access for those backups and then share any folder within a backup set. Data can be shared by choosing other users on your network from a list or over the Web by entering the e-mail addresses of remote users you want to invite to access your data. Remote users then register and obtain a password at the Mirra.com Web site, which redirects them to the shared files on your Mirra Sync device. By default, users can download image files but don't have write access to shared folders. For reasons discussed below, I recommend keeping it that way.
Nuts and bolts
Mirra.com overcomes some technical challenges that you would encounter in trying to publish content directly to the Web. It maintains a link to your local Mirra Sync's IP address, and it redirects users to the resources shared on that device. That's important because your broadband modem or router assigns a dynamic IP address to the Mira Sync and other clients on your local network that is not visible from the public Internet. By using Seagate's free Domain Name System redirect service, the Mirra Sync gets around that problem -- so long as your firewall leaves UDP Port 19430 and TCP Ports 80 and 443 open. (This might explain why it would not work on my Computerworld-issued laptop).
Mirra Sync is not a traditional shared network storage device but replicates, or synchronizes, file changes between systems. That's an important difference to understand. While NAS devices use file-sharing protocols such as the Common Internet File System (CIFS) to facilitate file sharing and allow file and record locking to prevent people from overwriting changes to one anothers' files, the Mirra Sync simply uses replication to keep files up to date. When a file is changed in one location, versions in other locations are automatically overwritten with the new version.
Also, while Mirra Sync will back up My Documents and other settings, it does not back up encrypted files (such as that created by my Password Safe program), nor will it back up hidden or temporary files and folders.
You start by choosing folders and files you want backed up in the Mirra Personal Server software's Backup and Restore tab.
Once data is backed up to the Mira Sync, you enable sharing in the Web Access Tab and then share folders to users in the Sharing Tab.
Using a browser, users can log into their accounts at www.mirra.com and view shared folders and backup sets available to them on the Mira Sync server.
Once the sharing tab is selected files can be viewed on the public Internet.
Replication risks
Replication is a two-way street and can quickly get confusing if you are allowing others to update or add to your backup set. Let's say you back up a folder and share it with Joe. It's possible for another user to download and synchronize a local copy of your shared folder. That means that changes the user makes to the files in their local copy of your shared folder are then replicated back up to the Mirra Sync server and then down to the original source copy on your desktop, overwriting it. If you both have the file open at the same time, whoever saves last will overwrite the changes made by the other.
Security is fairly limited. Remote users must use their e-mail address as their account names and can create passwords of their choosing. There is no enforcement of strong passwords, and you can make five attempts to guess a user's password. The system then locks you out for 10 minutes, and then you can try again.
For sensitive data, your best security is to password protect backups and not enable sharing of backup sets. Bear in mind, however, that passwords can't be retrieved if forgotten.
Net Net
Mirra Sync's ability to let you publish content to the Web is a very cool concept, and the product now offers much more disk space for the money than it did when first introduced a few years ago, when 80GB and 120GB models were the norm. The disk drives are parallel ATA, and the list price is $499.99 for a 320GB model and $599.99 for 500GB. But does it make sense?
Increasingly, programs and data are moving into the Internet cloud, not to the edges. Photo sharing sites allow uploading of photos for free or for a relatively small charge. SmugMug Inc., for example, lets subscribers upload unlimited amounts photos for $39.95 per year versus $599.99 for 500GB of capacity on the Mirra Sync.
SmugMug won't allow you to share other files, of course, nor will it provide remote access to your files while you're on the road. However, there are risks in setting up a personal server that requires you to keep certain ports in your firewall open and that relies on a third-party service to authenticate and provide users with remote access to resources inside your firewall. More importantly, there are risks to having a server designed to publish to the public Internet also hold backups of all of your important data, not just that which you want to share.
In the business world, data for publication to users on the Web resides on a separate server that's isolated from the rest of the internal network in what security experts like to call a demilitarized zone or "DMZ." Furthermore, that same server would never be used to hold backups of other important business data. Why should your home- or small-office network be any less secure?
For those who enjoy the idea of directly publishing noncritical files such as photos over the Web, the risks are probably fairly small. Seagate suggests other applications, such as for a real estate office that wants to show clients photographs of properties for sale (although publishing them on a Web site might be easier for customers than having them log into the Mirra Web site). If you want to do so, however, my advice, is to upload only the files you want to share and use another method for your data backups.