Lifespan of Synology NAS

[Mike48]

Hello all,

I am wondering about the expected lifespan of my Synology DS414 and what people's experiences have been this regard.

Specifically, I wonder about--

1. Usual lifespan
2. Warning signs of failure
3. Practicality of repair
4. Ability to move discs to a new Synology
5. Preference for a new one (Plus series, Value series, j series?)
   

It is used for audio and shared file storage.

[simoncn]

The chassis/electronics should go on more or less indefinitely, at least until you need a new NAS to improve performance or run the latest DSM.

At some point one of the disks will fail. If you are using RAID, you can just replace it, ideally with the same type of disk if you can still buy it. You should also have a backup in case of some kind of catastrophe such as a lightning strike or a mains power surge or undervoltage.

It is easy to move disks but you should wipe them before moving them to the new NAS, then restore your data from backup. If they are already several years old, you need to consider how much life they are likely to have left.

The j range is quite low-spec and I would pay a bit more to get a "value" model. Whether you need to move up to "plus" depends on what you are doing with the NAS.

[Mike48]

Thanks, Simon; that's helpful.

Yes, I am using RAID; and yes, I have backups. And the DS414 is plugged into a UPS (those, of course, are not certain to work when you finally need them!).

[Snoopy08]

I have a 6 year old DS414 running Synology Hybrid Raid. Lost 1 disk 18 months ago and the system sent an alert. Silly me, left it for a few weeks when a second one went! Fortunately, I had a backup on my 9 year old DS211j.

So, cannot tell you when the NAS itself goes. And if it does, probably not worth it to repair. There are some limitations on HDD migrations, see section 3
https://www.synology.com/en-us/knowledge...d_later#t3

My NAS is used for music and lots of files from family. I would not go for the J series given our usage patterns. My MinimServer with convolution is currently running on an NUC. Not sure whether I would get a high end NAS to run MinimServer or get a value series one?

[DavidL]

Another data point:
I got a DS412+ in 2013, with 4 x WD 4TB Red disks. 1 disk failed after several warnings in 2018, at 35000 hours. I replaced it with the same type WD 4TB Red. Now have 47000 hours on the clock, running 24/7. After the failure in 2013 I bought an additional WD 4TB Red disk so that I would be able to immediately replace any failed disk and hopefully avoid a situation with 2 failed disks. I'd recommend this course of action.
I'd agree with Simon that it is worth investing in a model with a more powerful cpu etc. The DS412+ has no problems with my current music streaming needs but I'll probably replace it with a more recent model which will support streaming of 1080p video rather than 720p that is the limit for the DS412+.

[Mike48]

Thanks, Snoopy and David. It seems likely the DS414 has years of life on it. The suggestion of keeping a spare drive on hand is a good one.

I installed four (3 Tb) HGST Deskstar drives in December, 2014, and haven't received a failure warning yet. Though HGST now is part of Western Digital, it's descended from Hitachi, whose drives have performed well for me -- though I don't have a statistically valid sample.

Considering the drives' age, I will not move them to a new NAS when I upgrade.

[Snoopy08]

6 years is getting on for NAS disk drives. Rather than rely on the Synology alerts, suggest running the drive S.M.A.R.T. tests regularly.

Been using WD Red but started to use Seagate Ironwolf as well. Synology can run the additional Ironwolf diagnostics as well.

[Mike48]

I have had the quick SMART test scheduled for daily run.

I added the extended SMART test on a monthly schedule.

Sound right?

[Snoopy08]

Sounds about right...

[lyapounov]

(16-05-2020 17:40)Mike48 Wrote:  Hello all,

I am wondering about the expected lifespan of my Synology DS414 and what people's experiences have been this regard.

Specifically, I wonder about--

1. Usual lifespan
2. Warning signs of failure
3. Practicality of repair
4. Ability to move discs to a new Synology
5. Preference for a new one (Plus series, Value series, j series?)
   

It is used for audio and shared file storage.

As everyone mentioned, the big issue is the HD itself.

In an ideal world, you should always be in RAID mode (easy), and never buy the two (or more) HD from the same provider at the same time.

Here is a common disaster:
1) a HD starts having failure.
2) of course, you buy a new HD, and let the RAID populate the new HD (something around a few days, depends upon the size of the HD, but also upon your processor)
3) which means you put your remaining HD under huge stress, as it does a lot of read at low level continously for a few days.
4) catastrophy: as both old HD came from same batch, the remaining old HD is also failing while transferring, meaning you loss your data

So: either buy from two different providers, like amazon or...; or alternatively, buy a new one every 2-3 years or so, and replace the oldest hD in the array; meaning you always have a new HD in the RAID array

How long does a HD last ?
A very interesting link, which gives stats on brand failure (Backblaze is a hoster - professional look at this website):
Backblaze Hard drive Stats

Apart from the HD: I realized I had a very old DS207+ in my garage (DS207+ was the top 2 bays in 2007); so I thought "great, I will use it as a backup / sync server". Well, unfortunatly, the latest DSM is DSM 3.2, while we are at DSM6, soon DSM 7 hopefully...

Don't forget that the DSM won't up update after a while :-)