Price : Too low to display
Digital media grows exponentially everyday - photos, music, videos, documents, and so on. Connected homes need a reliable, affordable and simple storage solution that will centralize all multimedia content and make it accessible anytime, anywhere, and on any screen. The ReadyNAS Ultra Family is a series of powerful network attached storage (NAS) with built-in media server capabilities that allow advanced home users to store, share, and protect their digital assets with confidence. The ReadyNAS Ultra Plus series offers the highest performance in NETGEAR’s home storage lineup, up to 30% more performance than the ReadyNAS Ultra series. These diskless models are designed for home users who want maximum performance, and the ability to customize their own affordable and easy-to-manage storage solution.
This review is from : NETGEAR ReadyNAS Ultra 4 Plus (Diskless) Network Attached Storage (RNDP400U)
Wow! Much more than I expected . Coming from the world of big iron servers and storage systems I was somewhat skeptical of these types of NAS devices. The RNDP400U is a refreshing surprise in that it does all that Netgear says it is supposed to do and more!I purchased this unit to replace an aging Sun server equipped with a SCSI Hardware RAID array that I have been using at home for years and that has become terribly inadequate in terms of storage capacity. I needed major more storage and I wanted to make certain that it would be reliable over the long term and easy to upgrade as the need arose.The OBE (Out of the Box Experience) was excellent. I just slipped the drives (2x Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Bare Drive ST2000DL003) into the first two bays and plugged it in. I fired up the discovery tool and presto, the web management page came up and I configured the unit. It did take 8+ hours to format the 2TB mirror which I thought was a pretty long time.Working my way through the menus I discovered the ability to add various Apps which NetGear calls Addons. The most valuable one was the ssh Addon that allowed me to ssh into the unit which as a Unix admin I was pleased to be able to do.I setup the various shares and user accounts via the web interface and then scheduled rsync jobs to copy the data from my Sun/Solaris server directly to the ReadyNAS.I also had a bunch of pictures and video on USB drives and found that they could be connected to the ReadyNAS and the files copied directly (using the ReadyNAS web interface) from the external USB drive to the ReadyNAS shares. Considering the GBytes of data that I had to deal with this saved me a bunch of time.Once everything was on the ReadyNAS I found that I could then use an external USB drive as a backup device! I REALLY love this feature! It allows me to connect an external USB drive that I can then backup everything on the ReadyNAS to and keep that drive in a safe/alternative location for disaster recovery. It gives me the peace of mind of knowing that if the ReadyNAS were to ever fail I would have a complete copy of my files on a USB drive that I could attach directly to any Linux system or restore directly to another ReadyNAS.The ReadyNAS also supports rsync which makes it very simple to setup regularly scheduled (from the ReadyNAS) backup jobs to offsite network storage. In addition you can schedule backups of your PCs directly from the ReadyNAS just using SMB and file sharing from each PC. This makes it pretty easy to backup any local files and settings from your PCs. Another great feature is the ability to make shares available using NFS so that any Unix/Linux system can mount shares directly from the ReadyNAS.The performance is really very good - especially when compared to my former Sun/Solaris with hardware SCSI RAID with high performance SCSI drives. It may be old but it is still very fast and the ReadyNAS performed 30-40% faster than the Sun server. Quite a feat when you consider that I am using the 5900rpm Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB drives. Power consumption is between 45 and 110W depending on the level of activity and this is just 15% of the power consumption of my Sun server and way less noise. The ReadyNAS is almost inaudible!!I am also impressed with the DLNA functionality. The ReadyNAS automagically appeared in the list of source on my Tivo and WD Live TV boxes and all music, video and picture were immediately accessible on those devices. No fuss!For those that are Unix nerds - having the ssh app allows you to login to the console and you will find a pretty standard (although stripped down) Linux distribution. You can do any and all things that you would expect to do from the command line on any typical Linux system. I personally found it very useful when I was moving and re-arranging the tones of files and stuff because I was able to things much faster directly from the command line vs. using Windows Explorer or the web browser interface. Given the level of power that I have found, I intend to configure email service to fully replace the email services being performed by by Sun/Solaris system and once that is complete I will be able to turn off the Sun power hog.I would highly recommend the RNDP400U to anyone who wants to have a solid, high performance NAS whether at home or at the office. The ability to have scheduled backup to a connected USB drive as well as network backup to other servers using rsync (whether another ReadyNAS or Unix system)and also to the ReadyNAS Vault - an offsite data storage service offered directly by NetGear and bundled with the RNDP400U which provides a 2 year trial of ReadyNAS Vault with 2GB of storage for Free.If you travel or want access to the stuff you have on the ReadyNAS Netgear provides web and ftp remote access and they also have a PC based ReadyNAS Remote that allows secure remote access to shares on the ReadyNAS without complicated router or VPN setup. Access from Windows and Macs are over File Explorer and Finder, so you can easily drag & drop files like you would normally do in your LAN environment. To use ReadyNAS Remote, you will need to install a small client on your PC or Mac and you're ready to go.The plethora of file sharing and streaming protocols is impressive fully supporting just about anything our digital media world could ask for and if it isn't built in there are Netgear offered addons and a vibrant community/open source that has all sorts of addons available as well. It is in fact the vibrancy of the ReadyNAS community that I find is a good indicator of how successful this product is and how likely it is to be supported well into the future. The open architecture of the ReadyNAS allows it to be used for far more than just a file server.After having the ReadyNAS in my home for several months I can say that I am very satisfied with it and have recommended to my friends and colleagues for their home and/or business needs. I am quite sure that anyone who purchases this or a similar/newer model will likely be very satisfied.
Wow! Much more than I expected . Coming from the world of big iron servers and storage systems I was somewhat skeptical of these types of NAS devices. The RNDP400U is a refreshing surprise in that it does all that Netgear says it is supposed to do and more!I purchased this unit to replace an aging Sun server equipped with a SCSI Hardware RAID array that I have been using at home for years and that has become terribly inadequate in terms of storage capacity. I needed major more storage and I wanted to make certain that it would be reliable over the long term and easy to upgrade as the need arose.The OBE (Out of the Box Experience) was excellent. I just slipped the drives (2x Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Bare Drive ST2000DL003) into the first two bays and plugged it in. I fired up the discovery tool and presto, the web management page came up and I configured the unit. It did take 8+ hours to format the 2TB mirror which I thought was a pretty long time.Working my way through the menus I discovered the ability to add various Apps which NetGear calls Addons. The most valuable one was the ssh Addon that allowed me to ssh into the unit which as a Unix admin I was pleased to be able to do.I setup the various shares and user accounts via the web interface and then scheduled rsync jobs to copy the data from my Sun/Solaris server directly to the ReadyNAS.I also had a bunch of pictures and video on USB drives and found that they could be connected to the ReadyNAS and the files copied directly (using the ReadyNAS web interface) from the external USB drive to the ReadyNAS shares. Considering the GBytes of data that I had to deal with this saved me a bunch of time.Once everything was on the ReadyNAS I found that I could then use an external USB drive as a backup device! I REALLY love this feature! It allows me to connect an external USB drive that I can then backup everything on the ReadyNAS to and keep that drive in a safe/alternative location for disaster recovery. It gives me the peace of mind of knowing that if the ReadyNAS were to ever fail I would have a complete copy of my files on a USB drive that I could attach directly to any Linux system or restore directly to another ReadyNAS.The ReadyNAS also supports rsync which makes it very simple to setup regularly scheduled (from the ReadyNAS) backup jobs to offsite network storage. In addition you can schedule backups of your PCs directly from the ReadyNAS just using SMB and file sharing from each PC. This makes it pretty easy to backup any local files and settings from your PCs. Another great feature is the ability to make shares available using NFS so that any Unix/Linux system can mount shares directly from the ReadyNAS.The performance is really very good - especially when compared to my former Sun/Solaris with hardware SCSI RAID with high performance SCSI drives. It may be old but it is still very fast and the ReadyNAS performed 30-40% faster than the Sun server. Quite a feat when you consider that I am using the 5900rpm Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB drives. Power consumption is between 45 and 110W depending on the level of activity and this is just 15% of the power consumption of my Sun server and way less noise. The ReadyNAS is almost inaudible!!I am also impressed with the DLNA functionality. The ReadyNAS automagically appeared in the list of source on my Tivo and WD Live TV boxes and all music, video and picture were immediately accessible on those devices. No fuss!For those that are Unix nerds - having the ssh app allows you to login to the console and you will find a pretty standard (although stripped down) Linux distribution. You can do any and all things that you would expect to do from the command line on any typical Linux system. I personally found it very useful when I was moving and re-arranging the tones of files and stuff because I was able to things much faster directly from the command line vs. using Windows Explorer or the web browser interface. Given the level of power that I have found, I intend to configure email service to fully replace the email services being performed by by Sun/Solaris system and once that is complete I will be able to turn off the Sun power hog.I would highly recommend the RNDP400U to anyone who wants to have a solid, high performance NAS whether at home or at the office. The ability to have scheduled backup to a connected USB drive as well as network backup to other servers using rsync (whether another ReadyNAS or Unix system)and also to the ReadyNAS Vault - an offsite data storage service offered directly by NetGear and bundled with the RNDP400U which provides a 2 year trial of ReadyNAS Vault with 2GB of storage for Free.If you travel or want access to the stuff you have on the ReadyNAS Netgear provides web and ftp remote access and they also have a PC based ReadyNAS Remote that allows secure remote access to shares on the ReadyNAS without complicated router or VPN setup. Access from Windows and Macs are over File Explorer and Finder, so you can easily drag & drop files like you would normally do in your LAN environment. To use ReadyNAS Remote, you will need to install a small client on your PC or Mac and you're ready to go.The plethora of file sharing and streaming protocols is impressive fully supporting just about anything our digital media world could ask for and if it isn't built in there are Netgear offered addons and a vibrant community/open source that has all sorts of addons available as well. It is in fact the vibrancy of the ReadyNAS community that I find is a good indicator of how successful this product is and how likely it is to be supported well into the future. The open architecture of the ReadyNAS allows it to be used for far more than just a file server.After having the ReadyNAS in my home for several months I can say that I am very satisfied with it and have recommended to my friends and colleagues for their home and/or business needs. I am quite sure that anyone who purchases this or a similar/newer model will likely be very satisfied.
NETGEAR ReadyNAS Ultra 4 Plus (Diskless) Network Attached Storage (RNDP400U) Reviews
Love my Readynas Ultra4 Plus . This is the third Readynas that I own and never had a problem with any of them. I test one feature at a time and thus far they have all passed.
The GUI is always available. The Raidar always detects my Readynas. I loaded Orb and can access my Readynas and watch my home videos or listen to music from anywhere that has internet connectivity. Readynas remote (Remote VPN connection for file transfers)works great. I wrote some scripts that has my Readynas send me a test e-mail everyday or lets me know which files are duplicates. The Ultra4 shuts down automatically when the power goes out to my house (Ultra is attached to a UPS). Everything just works. I have tested all of the various RAID levels, rebuilding of drives, drive failure detection and all have worked fine on all of the models I have. My Ultra4 streams movies and music to my IPOD touch, laptops and desktops(Linux, Mac or Windows). I backup all my computers to the Ultra4 over my network. My Readynas sends text messages to my cellphone when the power flickers in my house or if an issue is detected on one of my hard drives. All of the features work...Just make sure you know for sure that you are putting known good hard drives in the unit. They also should be on the HCL (Hardware compatibility list).
Love my Readynas Ultra4 Plus . This is the third Readynas that I own and never had a problem with any of them. I test one feature at a time and thus far they have all passed.
The GUI is always available. The Raidar always detects my Readynas. I loaded Orb and can access my Readynas and watch my home videos or listen to music from anywhere that has internet connectivity. Readynas remote (Remote VPN connection for file transfers)works great. I wrote some scripts that has my Readynas send me a test e-mail everyday or lets me know which files are duplicates. The Ultra4 shuts down automatically when the power goes out to my house (Ultra is attached to a UPS). Everything just works. I have tested all of the various RAID levels, rebuilding of drives, drive failure detection and all have worked fine on all of the models I have. My Ultra4 streams movies and music to my IPOD touch, laptops and desktops(Linux, Mac or Windows). I backup all my computers to the Ultra4 over my network. My Readynas sends text messages to my cellphone when the power flickers in my house or if an issue is detected on one of my hard drives. All of the features work...Just make sure you know for sure that you are putting known good hard drives in the unit. They also should be on the HCL (Hardware compatibility list).
NETGEAR ReadyNAS Ultra 4 Plus (Diskless) Network Attached Storage (RNDP400U) Opinions
Phenomenal Product - I love it . I had a 1 TB drive dedicated to music and video storage. In addition, I was setting up my audiophile home theater system and wanted to replace my iTunes 128k mp3 files with much larger lossless FLAC files. I was running out of space, so I started looking for a server to use as a media server. I was concerned about some of the reviews when I purchased this unit last week. I am pleased to say that but for a couple of glitches that I feel are pretty minor and readily fixable, this is one sweet unit. I am computer literate and relatively network literate, so I know generally my way around a router, and its functions. I have my Ultra Plus set up with 3 Seagate 2 TB drives on the Hardware Compatibility List. I figured that I didn't need the extra space yet, and the 3 TB drives would come down in price significantly by the time I needed to throw another disk in. First, installing the drives was a snap. People, READ (AND FOLLOW) THE INSTRUCTIONS! Follow the setup wizard and you will be streaming and backing up in no time, just like I was. So many problems with products are caused by not following the instructions exactly. After I finished with the setup wizard, I installed the latest firmware. All good. Then I copied all of my music and movies over from my desktop hard drive. All good. Fired up my DNLA compliant box in my home theater and there was the Ultra Plus, and I was able to stream very demanding 1080p movies with AC3 with no problems whatsoever, both wirelessly and using a Belkin Gigabit Powerline adapter. This product really delivers. There are tons of extras, such as emails or texts when there are problems, etc.
The glitches: The Ultra Plus comes with a "ReadyDNLA server" built in. For reasons I still don't understand, when using ReadyDNLA, I can't see the subfolders that I added to the Media Folder, such as Music, TV, Video. Not sure why, but for me, it's a non-issue because my media box recognizes the NAS and the subfolders (not using the ReadyDNLA) and I can play media that way with no problem. I will work on the ReadyDNLA at some point. Next, the power button is illuminated with a blue light. After a week, it burnt out. Again, no big deal, since the server is hidden away anyway, and I can see it using the Raidar program that comes with the Ultra Plus. The final glitch is that I usually view the contents of the media folder from my desktop using Windows Explorer. For reasons unknown, once in a while Windows Explorer fails to see the Ultra Plus under the network tab. When that happens, the easy fix is to close Windows Explorer, run Raidar, click on "browse" and Windows Explorer opens up with the Ultra Plus folders displayed. Again, it is a glitch, but no big deal.
This is a great unit. I highly recommend it.
Phenomenal Product - I love it . I had a 1 TB drive dedicated to music and video storage. In addition, I was setting up my audiophile home theater system and wanted to replace my iTunes 128k mp3 files with much larger lossless FLAC files. I was running out of space, so I started looking for a server to use as a media server. I was concerned about some of the reviews when I purchased this unit last week. I am pleased to say that but for a couple of glitches that I feel are pretty minor and readily fixable, this is one sweet unit. I am computer literate and relatively network literate, so I know generally my way around a router, and its functions. I have my Ultra Plus set up with 3 Seagate 2 TB drives on the Hardware Compatibility List. I figured that I didn't need the extra space yet, and the 3 TB drives would come down in price significantly by the time I needed to throw another disk in. First, installing the drives was a snap. People, READ (AND FOLLOW) THE INSTRUCTIONS! Follow the setup wizard and you will be streaming and backing up in no time, just like I was. So many problems with products are caused by not following the instructions exactly. After I finished with the setup wizard, I installed the latest firmware. All good. Then I copied all of my music and movies over from my desktop hard drive. All good. Fired up my DNLA compliant box in my home theater and there was the Ultra Plus, and I was able to stream very demanding 1080p movies with AC3 with no problems whatsoever, both wirelessly and using a Belkin Gigabit Powerline adapter. This product really delivers. There are tons of extras, such as emails or texts when there are problems, etc.
The glitches: The Ultra Plus comes with a "ReadyDNLA server" built in. For reasons I still don't understand, when using ReadyDNLA, I can't see the subfolders that I added to the Media Folder, such as Music, TV, Video. Not sure why, but for me, it's a non-issue because my media box recognizes the NAS and the subfolders (not using the ReadyDNLA) and I can play media that way with no problem. I will work on the ReadyDNLA at some point. Next, the power button is illuminated with a blue light. After a week, it burnt out. Again, no big deal, since the server is hidden away anyway, and I can see it using the Raidar program that comes with the Ultra Plus. The final glitch is that I usually view the contents of the media folder from my desktop using Windows Explorer. For reasons unknown, once in a while Windows Explorer fails to see the Ultra Plus under the network tab. When that happens, the easy fix is to close Windows Explorer, run Raidar, click on "browse" and Windows Explorer opens up with the Ultra Plus folders displayed. Again, it is a glitch, but no big deal.
This is a great unit. I highly recommend it.
Netgear ReadyNas Ultra 4 . NETGEAR ReadyNAS Ultra 4 Plus Network Attached Storage (RNDP400U)Purchased this unit with four 2TB recommended Western Digital Caviar Green disks. Installation was a snap. Just a matter of screwing disks to the mounts, plug them in, and push start.
Chose X-RAID2 for simplicity. Wound up with roughly 5.5TB of disk usable disk space. That seemed pretty efficent to me, considering the faster access and fault tolerance. That and the fact that eventually I could replace with 3TB disks later one at a time seemed worthwile.Since I use primarily Fedora as opposed to Debian, it took a little digging to get mysql to work, due to socket access rather than the port access. Apache installation was a snap. I imported my HTML, PHP and mysql data and had everything working faster than I though it would take.My last task is to get some type of java app server, probably tomcat or glassfish.With root access to ssh, the box should be very configurable.Unit is quiet. Access plenty fast. Have found it to be perfect as a learning tool, and great for storing and playing large video files over wireless.
Chose X-RAID2 for simplicity. Wound up with roughly 5.5TB of disk usable disk space. That seemed pretty efficent to me, considering the faster access and fault tolerance. That and the fact that eventually I could replace with 3TB disks later one at a time seemed worthwile.Since I use primarily Fedora as opposed to Debian, it took a little digging to get mysql to work, due to socket access rather than the port access. Apache installation was a snap. I imported my HTML, PHP and mysql data and had everything working faster than I though it would take.My last task is to get some type of java app server, probably tomcat or glassfish.With root access to ssh, the box should be very configurable.Unit is quiet. Access plenty fast. Have found it to be perfect as a learning tool, and great for storing and playing large video files over wireless.
Easy to setup . As far as NASs go, this was an easy setup. However, it's still not quite simple enough to appeal to the mass market yet... But Netgear is getting there.
Cons Review
System died less than 1 month after purchase . DO NOT BUY THIS! It will break, and NetGear tech support is horrible.
I purchase the ReadyNAS Ultra 4+ in March 2011.
April 2011: The device has been in operation less than a month and has already failed. After spending the morning on the phone with tech support, I found out that it will cost $30 to get a replacement. Very disappointing. Hopefully my data comes up when I get the new unit.
June 2011 Update: Received the new unit, but it started acting up shortly after I received it. The data appears intact, but the system is saying that two of the drives are dead and the system is degraded. I opened a case with NetGear tech support 11 days ago, and the problem is still not resolved. Tech support has been extremely frustrating. I've spent a lot of time on this... I regret this purchase.
July 1: The system is still down. I've spent countless hours with NetGear tech support, and it's still broken. All sorts of weird behavior and failures... the most recent issue is everything is suddenly READ ONLY... I can't write to the NAS. I've had it, and I want my money back, which is probably going to be more Herculean effort to achieve.
July 12: I give up. NetGear tech support is now implying that there is a fundamental issue with the unit (probably an incompatibility with the Seagate drives I'm using, which were on the compatibility list), and that replacing it won't help. And both Amazon and Netgear are refusing to give me my money back.
I purchase the ReadyNAS Ultra 4+ in March 2011.
April 2011: The device has been in operation less than a month and has already failed. After spending the morning on the phone with tech support, I found out that it will cost $30 to get a replacement. Very disappointing. Hopefully my data comes up when I get the new unit.
June 2011 Update: Received the new unit, but it started acting up shortly after I received it. The data appears intact, but the system is saying that two of the drives are dead and the system is degraded. I opened a case with NetGear tech support 11 days ago, and the problem is still not resolved. Tech support has been extremely frustrating. I've spent a lot of time on this... I regret this purchase.
July 1: The system is still down. I've spent countless hours with NetGear tech support, and it's still broken. All sorts of weird behavior and failures... the most recent issue is everything is suddenly READ ONLY... I can't write to the NAS. I've had it, and I want my money back, which is probably going to be more Herculean effort to achieve.
July 12: I give up. NetGear tech support is now implying that there is a fundamental issue with the unit (probably an incompatibility with the Seagate drives I'm using, which were on the compatibility list), and that replacing it won't help. And both Amazon and Netgear are refusing to give me my money back.
Product Image
Feature NETGEAR ReadyNAS Ultra 4 Plus (Diskless) Network Attached Storage (RNDP400U)
- 4-bay DLNA Certified NAS System with anytime multimedia streaming features
- Uses Intel Dual Core Processor for maximum performance for cutting-edge prosumers (advanced home users/media enthusiasts)
- First NAS system to offer mobile access and streaming using Orb transcoding add-
- First NAS system to offer remote DLNA media streaming using Skifta media shifting add-on
- First NAS system to be certified TiVo Compatible, allowing users to extend the capacity of their TiVo DVRs -
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- Netgear ReadyNAS Duo 2-Bay 2 TB (2 x 1 TB) Network Attached Storage
RND2210
Product Details
EAN : 0606449074932UPC : 606449074932
MPN : 0606449074932
Brand : Netgear
Weight : 14 pounds
Height : 9 inches
Length : 13 inches
Width : 12 inches
Binding : Personal Computers
ItemPartNumber : RNDP400U100EUS
Manufacturer : Netgear Inc
Model : RNDP400U
Publisher : Netgear Inc
SKU : MIP-NETRNDP400U
Studio : Netgear Inc
Where To Buy
You can buy NETGEAR ReadyNAS Ultra 4 Plus (Diskless) Network Attached Storage (RNDP400U) on Amazon . Click here to Read More
