My use is probably pretty far out there I am hosting a dozen servers via iSCSI (using Citrix XenServer) for a test lab. We needed an inexpensive iSCSI device with decent capacity for a 7x24 lab.Well, the Netgear NeadyNAS Ultra 6 delivers.
I purchased it about 3 months ago and it has been rock solid I started with 3 drives and added one more after a week and then another five in use now.
It may be a quiet unit in our datacenter there is so much fan noise from other equipment all I can is the Ultra can't be heard above other less-quiet boxes.
It runs cool, starts very quickly, and so far has had no hiccups with inexpensive Western Digital Cavaiar Black 1TB drives.
We don't use any of the Tivo or other options.
We do boot 4 XenServers (hypervisors) and load 12 virtual servers off of the shared storage on the ReadyNAS. We allowed the Netgear box to use its default storage configuration, a proprietary RAID architecture and no problems there. Adding the additional drivers worked just as advertised plug in the drive, and in about 24 hours (maybe less) the drive is a member of the RAID configuration.
Setup and connection with iSCSI was so flawless and easy we thought we were missing something. No, it's really "that easy". iSCSI allows server grade equipment to connect and use it as shared storage.
We were not expecting performance to challenge EMC or NetApp or Equallogic we wanted fast and cheap. However, the performance is "very good" with one caveat don't try to run a dozen servers *and* add a disk we found out during the period where the additional drive is joining the array you will probably (we did) drop connections. Let the NetGear do it's thing, then reboot the devices on the shared storage.
This is a very high quality prosumer device that will deliver excellent value for your bucks. Recommended.
The ReadyNAS not only has support for CIFS, NFS, iSCSI, FTP, HTTP but it also allows you to install a boat load of other add-ons. Some of the add-ons I have installed from the add-on community so far include: Cacti (to monitor the systems and keep logs for a year), ReadyNAS Photos (nice photo sharing program), SSH shell (allows you to connect to the console and run unix commands), eXtplorer, and xplorer. There are tons of applications already made for this system however, being that this is running a Linux OS with MySQL, Perl and Apache already installed there isn't much you can't do with this puppy.
I am not saying you have to be a techy to use the ReadyNAS system, it really is simple out of the box. However I am saying if you are a techy you can really have at this little device.
p.s. Living in San Francisco I used the XRaid with two parity drives. Nice to have the extra safety option.I bought this purely for use with my TiVos. This review of the Ultra 6 is from a use-with-TiVo point of view. It does have full Network Attached Storage capability for storing any and all of your other computer files, music, etc.
Unfortunately, as shipped, the software it came with (4.2.12) did not work well with TiVos. Neither did 4.2.13.
Netgear has listened, learned, and responded. Software version 4.2.14-T14 (T14 is beta version just released the week of this review) works VERY well with TiVos. All problems that I have experienced have been fixed, and some useful backdoor features added.
Thus, I can rate it at 4 stars, despite previous problems.
The TiVo function of the Ultra 6 will automatically transfer TiVo shows flagged as Keep Until I Delete (GREEN circle) from your TiVo(s) to the Ultra 6.
If it would transfer non-KUID-flagged shows (YELLOW circle) as well, I would rate it at 5 stars.
It will not transfer shows that have the copy protection flag set by the broadcaster.
On TiVo series 3 models, the transfer is slow, due to the series 3 TiVo hardware, not the Ultra 6. A 1 hour high def broadcast show (~6 GB) will take about 1 hour to transfer.
A series 4 Premiere TiVo will transfer much faster, due to changes inside the series 4 hardware compared to the series 3 hardware.
The Ultra 6 appears at the bottom of the TiVo Now Playing list. Select it to display the shows on the Ultra. Select a show and transfer it back to your TiVo to watch it.
With all six drive bays of the Ultra 6 filled with 2 TB drives in a RAID configuration that allows a single drive failure, you get 9 TB of space for your TiVo shows and any other files.An amazing product! I initially convinced my wife to let me get a NAS drive in order to help backup our pictures and research document, data, etc. After doing a week's worth of solid research, I settled on the Ultra 6 for a couple of reasons.
XRaid-2: Great configurations and ability to hot-swap, with auto-expanding makes it easy to use without having to baby-sit the system to transfer data back and forth once it completes long-duration striping
6-Bays: This gives great options for expandability in the future as I get more data plus the ability for RAID6/XRaid-2 with Dual-Redundancy is definitely worth the extra bucks especially when considering future-proofing larger capacity drives that increase failure occurrances
Compatibility: A brief review of their HCL (Hardware compatibility list) showed a variety of companies, types, and devices from hardware and memory, to USB UPS and Wireless. And that's just the stuff they've tested with
With the device, I bought (just for financial reasons) only 3 drives, just enough to get redundancy going and start storing data. One note to keep in mind, you should get 4 from the start so that you can activate dual-redundancy. If you don't, you have to perform backup's and start from scratch to reactivate dual-redundancy with >= 4 drives (more on that in a bit)
*** This has been updated recently, and thanks to their on-going support, you can do a dual-redundancy activation even if you did not start with it! Another testament to their continued support for their devices! ***
After getting this device, I immediately started transferring data, setup the TIVO connections (which is still not a very reliable feature for auto-transfers, but still great for storage ** This too was updated and now works great! **), the remote access, and the picture hosting. All worked great.
Being a software developer in a past (and semi-current) life, I also found some information in the forums (A WONDROUS resource by the way) to help me set up a Subversion (SVN) Revision Control system. Getting that all set up was easy and straight-forward, and still easily configurable.
After a couple of weeks, it struck me that it would probably be a pain in a couple months when I wanted to add more drives and switch over to dual-redundancy and have to backup and restore everything ** NOTE above update **, so I bought a couple more drives. I have to say, I was expecting quite the pain in backing up and restoring the data, but the entire process of backing up, installing, and restoring my data (with all settings in place) took about 12 hours for about 100 Gb's of data. I had started with 3 500 gb drives and ended with 6, and process was smooth and easy.
This device definitely has my recommendation for programmers, media-enthusiasts, and even general users looking for some common-access, easy-to-install, protected media. Don't forget that this is not a sufficient single backup system, but it provides easy to use options for conducting backups on the data shares you create on the device (or elsewhere connected for that matter). Only a few months in, but between the built-in features, the ability for new features created by 3rd party programmers, and the forum assistance, ReadyNas Ultra's got my vote!
** As noted with updates above, I'm currently 1 year into this product and I'm still loving it. Support has been great, I have had 0 problems, and continued development on the firmware and free software available for it makes this a great-future-proof device. Initially, I was hoping to get 3 years out of it...best case. At this point, I can say with high confidence I'll easily make it 5-7 years without having to get another device...A couple extra bucks for higher capacity drives and I'm set :)Purchased the ReadyNAS Ultra 6 diskless device at the end of September 2010. Out of the box it was very easy to setup and configure. I already owned a ReadyNAS NV+ with 4 disks and thought I would go Netgear again. I was looking at the Drobo, but I thought the price was a little much for 5 disks.
In my home theater I am using a Playstation3 (PS3) for media streaming. The ReadyNAS Ultra was instantly visible to the PS3 and accessible. I moved over a large about of data and started enjoying the videos on the Sharp Aquos. The Ultra started out to be whisper quiet and hardly noticeable, but I ran into one issue. The device started to have a grinding noise coming from it that easily filled the house and became very concerning. I removed all disks, rebooted, restored the factory defaults and such with no success. I called tech support and after 2 hours on the phone, they agreed to replace the unit. The issue appears to be a fan that sounds like a radiation sensor. Apparently I'm the only person indicating this issue in the world. You can check out my recording at bit.ly/readynasfan courtesy of AudioBoo. This recording really helped to prove my issue via the iPhone4. I'm hopeful that the unit will be returned in the next two weeks so I can add to this review. Tech Support only pays for shipment back to you so after a $16 charge, it is off to the postal store.
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