My Linksys NAS200 Review

I have had the NAS200 for about 4 months now. I did quite a bit of research before I bought the unit and found that there isn’t much of selection for Network Attached Drives. There are a couple that are less expensive but they seemed really cheap and when I found reviews they were hard to set up and only worked with some people. There were also a few on the other end that were extremely expensive. There was one or two I was looking at in this price range that had hard drives included, but since I had an extra hard drive I wanted to use and I like the option to expand in the future, I bought the Linksys NAS200. The system was extremely easy to install, it’s small, quiet and has two USB ports for even more expansion, using thumb drives. Setting up the connection on the computers was easy as well. Installing any drive into the NAS200 will need to be formatted, so if you have a hard drive full of information that you are putting into your NAS200, you will need to copy the info onto a DVD or another hard drive, let the NAS200 format it and then copy it back over. Copying the files back to the Linksys is when I first realized the speed factor. It took about 2 1/2 – 3 hours to transfer 78k files, 9k folders, 30 gigs. Now don’t let that discourage you.

If you are running a small business that will require a lot of access to a lot of shared files all day, this would not be your choice. If you run a small web based business where you would need to access files but you tend to keep them open, working on them throughout the day and you have a small budget, this may be your choice. I personally have a desktop and laptop and work with websites and other small projects a lot. It is extremely convenient to be able to access the same, updated file from either computer whenever I need the file. I store my music, pictures, 3D and websites files as well as my resume and little files on the NAS200. It seems like I have just been putting files that I keep temporarily on my computers and the rest on the drive.

Now to get your mind working with ideas even more, there are programs (for about $40) that will synchronize your Outlook .pst file, like a home-based Microsoft Exchange Server. I found these programs after I tried storing my .pst on the drive and using that for the desktop and laptop. What I found was only one computer can access the .pst at a time, you would have to close out Outlook on one computer before you put it to sleep or just close it out in general, before you can access the .pst in Outlook from the other computer. I still have yet to buy one of these programs, but when I do I will write an interview about my experience with the program I choose.

Overall I would recommend the Linksys NAS200. I’ve never had a connection problem with it and the convenience way outweighs the lag for me. I have not tried the backup button on the unit yet but I will amend this review when I do, I will also be adding pictures soon. I hope this review was helpful to you.

Pros

• Inexpensive
• Shared files
• Multiple computers can access at the same time
• SATA (ONLY) (But may be considered a negative too, due to higher price and you may not have a SATA hard drive laying around)
• Two hard drive capacity
• UPnP AV server
• Supports individual, JBOD, RAID 0 and RAID 1
• Comes with software (Some other network storage devices I looked at did not come with bundled software. From the reviews I read, some people had quite a bit of trouble getting their other storage device to work, if at all.)
• Easy to set up
• Quiet
• Two USB ports for thumb drive storage

Cons

• Slow when saving, copying, transferring
• Accessing folders is a little slow, but bearable
• No gigabit Ethernet
• No auto backup (although there is a ‘Backup’ button on the system)
• NAS200 needs to format the hard drives you put into it before it can use it (Copy the info on the hard drive, let NAS200 format it and then copy the info back to the hard drive. 3 hours with 30 GB)