BUFFALO LinkStation 220 8TB 2-Bay NAS Network Attached Storage with HDD Included | Home Cloud & Network Storage Solution for Media Backup, File Sharing & Remote Access

As the manual warns, this is very slow until it gets itself settled. Then I get 35 to 40 MBs depending on what computer I'm using. I can also connect my phone and iPad. Once set up, it is just like using any other hard drive. Note: I DON'T have a high speed network so I'm fairly pleased at the speed I do get. I started with 5½" floppy discs and later a dial up 300baud modem (that took 9 hours to transfer an 8MB file) so this makes me happy at all the tech magic that went into it.It comes configured with Raid 1 - Automatic backup to the second drive so (in my case) it has a usable capacity of ~6TB. You can also change it to Raid 0 which gives you access to the full ~12TB.It is available in different capacities.It was a bit confusing to get it setup initially but once I did, it was a very simple matter to find it in Windows File Explorer on multiple computers, iPad Files, and Pixel File Manager.I feel like this is a good price for what it is. Are there better out there? Probably, but I'm happy with this and think you would be, too.My old Apple Time Capsule finally filled up when I switched to the new Mac OS. I called Apple Tech Support and found out that my Time Capsule was “retired” and had limited support. The helpful staff walked me through the replacement of it with a Network Attached Storage (NAS) drive. After a bunch of research, I settled on the Buffalo Linkstation 210. It works great! It is configured to act SOLELY as a time machine backup. I have 2 laptops backing up on it now. It is fast and efficient (and really BIG). Be prepared to download an app to your Mac and read the set up instructions at least twice. Once complete, it works flawlessly. I’m very pleased.It works, for now.I bought this advertised as a new product. What I received was a refurbished product that still had someone else's password on it, so I couldn't use it without doing a factory reset. I didn't bother with the reset and just returned it. A couple days later I got a message from Buffalo informing me Amazon is the one who does fulfillment, so they made the error, and advised me to do a return or replacement.When it comes to NAS devices, I never trust anything refurbished. I gave 4 stars because I've used these in the past and they work well for what they are.I bought this for in home network storage, and as such it works just fine. I intend to buy a couple more for home video server storage and backups. Despite other reviews to the contrary, I found it rather easy to setup. Would recommend.I bought this to replace my WD Mycloud that crashed after a few years causing me to lose all my data. I was nervous because this is a brand I had never heard of but I am really happy with it so far. Set up was easy. You just have to follow instructions. I set it up on my phone first and then realized I would have to use the cd to get it to work on the computer. Glad I have an external DVD drive or I would have had to figure out another way. I actually think the app is more user friendly than the WD app. I love that you can set expiration dates on the share links. That was always a concern to me on the WD because I would be sharing confidential information and really wanted it to expire. So as long as this one doesn't crash, I like it more than i liked the WD equivalent with a slightly smaller pricetag.Installation was as simple as plugging it into the Netfinity router. Installing it on Windows 10 PRO with the disc that was enclosed was easy. Windows 11 PRO was not happy and especially since I did not have a built in CD. Went to the Website since I got message INSTALL FAILURE. The Website is in the "Quick Setup Guide" is the KEY. Finally it installed after a long wait. Does not look like the installation on the Windows 10 system. This is just a heads-up since a novice might have a bit of a problem but it WORKS fine. Use the "Quick Setup Sheet" for Website.For basic users:This may not be the best option for you if you expect to just plug it in and go. Smartphone apps are just about useless, web interface is simple to use but the only add-on installed is uPNP which I never got to work. The cloud file interface for WebAccess as a cloud drive has an issue where I could never actually get it to login to any account so therefore useless. External USB drives are supported however not as expected, it will only show 1 drive if you connect a multi bay external enclosure it won't work as expected. Further note on the external drive is that only the internal drive is treated as a drive with regard to sharing files, you cannot manage or share from external.For advanced users:If you're looking for a stable fast home Linux file server you can certainly make this useful as I did but only from a root Linux terminal. Do a Google search for acp commander, it will allow root shell access where the good stuff is. For my application I have 2 external USB 3.0 enclosures connected, 1 is 2-Bay and the other a 4-Bay, in my case I created shared folders from within the web interface allowing it to manage user accounts and share permissions while in the background I mounted my drives to those folders. Samba pass through works more than fine and it treats the mounts properly for the most part, some instances where files were owned by root they didn't allow me to access as the admin account, no bother though. The internal drive is mounted with exec so you may place executable files on there for later use inside the root shell. SSH is disabled by default but a little more time on Google and you'll have it turned on but I did not get SFTP to work. Full support for Ubuntu repos in apt but at one point the root filesystem reset on me making me think it's not persistent however I did not investigate this aspect and just created scripts on the internal to reset it back to the way I have it set up and I have it on battery backup so I intend to keep it online as long as possible. From what I found it's built from Ubuntu 18.02 with some custom additions from Buffalo, the background process is written in python and called from an nginx web server over a localhost rpc. PHP is not installed by default but I was able to install PHP-FPM 7.2 without any extra effort. Apache is also installed but I could not determine what it's purpose is as the web interface is on nginx.In short for someone willing to go into the background and work from a root shell this can be a nice little device as it's not locked down but otherwise I may recommend a different option (NOT QNAP). Hope this helps someone make the right decision for their needs, I wish someone could have layed it out like this for me prior to purchase but overall I'm happy with the device as a device but only 3 stars due to lack of transparency of features available and the lack of USB support as a physical drive.This device is totaly unusable. The transfer speed is ridiculous and it is complicated to set up. In fact it is so slow, that you won't even be able to use to store anything. Had to return it. I don't even understand how a company actually ended up manifacturing these. One word : WORTHLESS. I rarely write this in my review but, DO NOT BUY !The unit looks neat, well made, and easy to install. However if in 2022 an installation CD (copyright 2013!) is included with a piece of equipment it makes you question how much effort has been applied to update the product and software. I was able to configure the product and access from an Android was easy to achieve But after wading through the 132-page User Manual numerous times I still didn't find anything about setting up user access from a PC to the folders. I figured it out but had to map the folders in Windows. On one machine (Windows 11) the mapping persists but on another (Windows 10) the mapping disappears if the PC reboots.I was looking for a basic NAS for Time Machine backups, file storage and easy to access media storage. Time Machine works great with this NAS. DLNA makes it easy to access my media from all TVs at home. Storing files on the device works great. It comes with a raid 1 configuration as default. You can switch to raid 0 but you lose all redundancy. I'm keeping at as raid 1 since I'm using it to backup my M1 MacBook Air. This NAS doesn't have a lot of the extra features of a more expensive device. It's designed for the basics and does them very well. If you just need to back up a computer, store some files and access some media files from multiple TVs this NAS will do the job well.This is a small nas that suits a basic need at the home network. It isnt a complicated device. Quite nice user interface via web. It will NOT make any tweaker happy but for anyone who just needs a very cheap , SIMPLE device that gets the job done , then this is decent value. This single-drive device is not really great for critical data backups. Its a single drive only and its a mechanical drive so any failure, and all your data is toast. But that isnt the point of this device.If you need something to just store a lot of data and share it in the home network, then this is for you. The NAS is pretty fast -- i'm downloading in my GbE network at around 700mbps which is acceptable in my opinion. The device is SMBv2 which is perfect for windows 10. (note older nas's that are on clearance is typically sMBv1 which isnt supported by windows anymore , without painful changes) . It also supports DLNA therefore most smart devices pickup the nas quickly and youre able to share anything without much tinkering.Though it supports ftp -- i dont care for that in the home nas. It also supports access to your drive via web (provided you setup the ddns). I've had some trouble setting this up -- i ended up giving up because ultimately i dont really care to do this. My suspicion is because 'im double nat'd and i cant gain access to my main carrier modem admin so i'm unable to dmz my main internal router. Nice to know its possible but i have not successfully gotten it working (its likely my problem).the USB port on the back can share another drive OR a printer. Nice options.Leei varios comentarios respecto a que la unidad es difícil de instalar, en realidad no lo es, siempre y cuando no seas un usuario principiante. Si no eres capaz de crear un usuario nuevo en Windows, cambiar una contraseña o entender que existen permisos para objetos probablemente si será difícil de instalar. Con el poco tiempo que tengo utilizando este NAS puedo decir que es solo para usuarios domésticos no es para una oficina o para múltiples usuarios simultáneos. Pese a que tiene interfaz Gigabit Ethernet sostiene tasas de transferencia y lectura que podría hacer sin la necesidad de esta interfaz de hecho se asemeja más a un bus USB 2.0 Es decir lento. Si vas a trabajar tu información directamente en el NAS solo estarás satisfecho mientras sean documentos de texto, hojas de cálculo, pdfs y quizá imágenes. Si buscas reproducir videos o audio directo te llevarás una decepción la unidad no es capaz de entregar suficientes datos para reproducir video en 4K. No tengo otro punto referente con otra marca para comparar. En mi caso el uso que le he dado la unidad ha sido suficiente. Otro punto malo es que no aísla bien el gabinete el ruido del girar del disco y pese a que es de 5400 rpm la verdad si hace mucho ruido sobre un mueble de madera. Eso si no me puedo quejar que es barato en comparación con otras opciones que investigue donde la carcaza sin disco duro tenía el mismo precio que está que ya tiene un disco de 4TB y a 12 meses sin intereses con Amazon.