Kodi Community Forum

Would you guys recommend the QNAP TS-251 2-Bay Personal Cloud NAS to use with Kodi?
If yes, the 1GB memory or 4GB memory?

Thread moved to hardware

I got a QNAP TS-451 (upgraded to 8GB ram) and it does what it's supposed to do.
I'm running some lxc containers with gitlab, plex etc. as well, that's why I have 8GB of ram.

So generally speaking, yes it will work with kodi just fine.

From a nerd perspective though, the firmware could be better and boot time is annoyingly slow (e.g. in case of firmware updates)

But the biggest downside IMO is how shares work.
Assume you have a "root"-directory called "Multimedia". You can share that one via nfs, smb etc. just fine
but you can NOT share a sub directory of "Multimedia" (e.g. Movies, TV-Shows or Music).
This doesn't matter to much if you are the only user but if you have multiple, you either give them access to "Multimedia"
or you don't at all.

Personally I like "deep" folder structures organized in a sensible way rather than throwing everything into "root" and that's
what I did (as I'm the only user of the NAS).

But as I said, it does what it's supposed to do (sharing files via network) and that works just fine

(2016-05-27, 08:46)DarrenHill Wrote: [ -> ]Thread moved to hardware

Thanks. After I posted I realized.

(2016-05-27, 09:44)Tadly Wrote: [ -> ]I got a QNAP TS-451 (upgraded to 8GB ram) and it does what it's supposed to do.
I'm running some lxc containers with gitlab, plex etc. as well, that's why I have 8GB of ram.

So generally speaking, yes it will work with kodi just fine.

From a nerd perspective though, the firmware could be better and boot time is annoyingly slow (e.g. in case of firmware updates)

But the biggest downside IMO is how shares work.
Assume you have a "root"-directory called "Multimedia". You can share that one via nfs, smb etc. just fine
but you can NOT share a sub directory of "Multimedia" (e.g. Movies, TV-Shows or Music).
This doesn't matter to much if you are the only user but if you have multiple, you either give them access to "Multimedia"
or you don't at all.

Personally I like "deep" folder structures organized in a sensible way rather than throwing everything into "root" and that's
what I did (as I'm the only user of the NAS).

But as I said, it does what it's supposed to do (sharing files via network) and that works just fine

Thanks for this very informative response.
I love the idea of multiple users, but I guess I can do without it. However without file permissions it'll be risky. Anyone can delete my files. Is this all due to the firmware?

(2016-05-27, 12:22)marhutchy Wrote: [ -> ]Thanks for this very informative response.
I love the idea of multiple users, but I guess I can do without it. However without file permissions it'll be risky. Anyone can delete my files. Is this all due to the firmware?

No no no.. you have permissions and you can have multiple users.
Following my previous example, you can set different access-rights per "root"-folder per user. That's not an issue.
Further you can set user/group permission on a file/folder basis (unix system) and restrict access that way.

What I meant is that you can't share the folder "Movies" within "Multimedia" on its own. So you either share the whole
"Multimedia" folder to user x,y and z or you put the "Movie" folder into "root" (not as sub directory of "Multimedia").
This will ultimately lead to a looooooot of folders within your "root" directory.
(at this point I should mention that by "root" I do NOT mean literal / but instead the most toplevel directory you'r allowed to
create folders in as of the firmware.)

You can do a lot on this system as it "just" a unix (pretty stripped down but still)

Let me visualize what I mean:
Hope that clears it up a bit

btw. there's a live demo of the software you can have a (somewhat restricted) play with
https://www.qnap.com/i/en/support/con_sh...wone&cid=8

I have a Synology and it has the same problem (shares only on root folders). But I think you can add permissions on the folder level.

(2016-05-27, 09:44)Tadly Wrote: [ -> ]I got a QNAP TS-451 (upgraded to 8GB ram) and it does what it's supposed to do.
I'm running some lxc containers with gitlab, plex etc. as well, that's why I have 8GB of ram.

So generally speaking, yes it will work with kodi just fine.

From a nerd perspective, though, the firmware could be better and boot time is annoyingly slow (e.g. in case of firmware updates)

But the biggest downside IMO is how shares work.
Assume you have a "root"-directory called "Multimedia". You can share that one via NFS, smb etc. just fine
but you can NOT share a sub directory of "Multimedia" (e.g. Movies, TV-Shows or Music).
This doesn't matter to much if you are the only user but if you have multiple, you either give them access to "Multimedia"
or you don't at all.

Personally, I like "deep" folder structures organized in a sensible way rather than throwing everything into "root" and that's
what I did (as I'm the only user of the NAS).

But as I said, it does what it's supposed to do (sharing files via network) and that works just fine

What RAM did you use for the upgrade?

(2016-05-27, 13:04)Tadly Wrote: [ -> ]

(2016-05-27, 12:22)marhutchy Wrote: [ -> ]Thanks for this very informative response.
I love the idea of multiple users, but I guess I can do without it. However without file permissions it'll be risky. Anyone can delete my files. Is this all due to the firmware?

No no no.. you have permissions and you can have multiple users.
Following my previous example, you can set different access-rights per "root"-folder per user. That's not an issue.
Further you can set user/group permission on a file/folder basis (unix system) and restrict access that way.

What I meant is that you can't share the folder "Movies" within "Multimedia" on its own. So you either share the whole
"Multimedia" folder to user x,y and z or you put the "Movie" folder into "root" (not as sub directory of "Multimedia").
This will ultimately lead to a looooooot of folders within your "root" directory.
(at this point I should mention that by "root" I do NOT mean literal / but instead the most toplevel directory you'r allowed to
create folders in as of the firmware.)

You can do a lot on this system as it "just" a unix (pretty stripped down but still)

Let me visualize what I mean:

Code:

root (underneath here you create shareable folders)
  |- Multimedia (this directory you can share via NFS, smb, etc.)
     |- Movies (will be shared indirectly as the folder above was shared. Can have a specific user/group assigned to it though)
     |- Music (same as above)
     |- TV-Shows (same as above)
         |- <whatever> (same as above)

Hope that clears it up a bit

btw. there's a live demo of the software you can have a (somewhat restricted) play with
https://www.qnap.com/i/en/support/con_sh...wone&cid=8

I see. I see.

I have both a qnap and synology. I personally prefer the QNAP over synology.

I would max out the available memory when you get it... because ... why not? you are investing in a great piece of hardware might as well get it up to spec as it should be.

I have a much much older model 639-Pro circa 2007 that still runs like a champ.

(2016-05-27, 16:15)bry- Wrote: [ -> ]I have both a qnap and synology. I personally prefer the QNAP over synology.

I would max out the available memory when you get it... because ... why not? you are investing in a great piece of hardware might as well get it up to spec as it should be.

I have a much much older model 639-Pro circa 2007 that still runs like a champ.

Why do you like the Qnap over the Synology?

hardware seems more sturdy, the OS.

(2016-05-27, 16:42)bry- Wrote: [ -> ]hardware seems more sturdy, the OS.

I bought the Synology D1815+ and setting the SHR(raid 5) took me almost a week
How fast is the Disk Expansion on the Qnap?

getting a bit offtopic here - I believe I followed this many years ago: http://forum.qnap.com/viewtopic.php?t=10268

Quick noob questions to all of you that have experience with NAS:
When I play media from the NAS via NFS do I have to worry about buffering, or is that a bandwidth issue?
Decoding of the media files are done by the media player and not the NAS right?

Correct.

Sent from my XT1254