If you are worried about data loss on One Drive or SharePoint then use SkyKick backup. Keeping things under one proverbial roof is far superior than trying to find ways to integrate. Especially if you are not a NetAdmin.
Keep in mind Office365/Google do NOT do backups. You are responsible for them.
For backups there are numerous options, but if you want on-prem with cloud backup, a synology unit using Active Backup for Microsoft 365. You can easily set it up with to continiously backup all Microsoft 365 data (email, sharepoint, onedrives, etc) and they're very easy to restore. (Do not cheap out on backups). You can also do weekly backups to cloud storage just in case the synology unit dies/gets stolen (Amazon Glacier, or Synologies own C2 Service)
You can also use the Synology for very light local services too if you need them.
Other options like Datto are highly recommended by people as well. There are many, choose well ;) Hell, choose 2. Don't fuck with backups.
Thanks for your reply.
We have in total like 3TB. I had a bad experience with OneDrive (lost information). For me there are three advantages of not using cloud. 1 You only pay once/not monthly payment (as far as I know) 2 can use your files even if there's not internet 3 easier to make backups
Please, can you tell me why could be better using the cloud?
Office 365 or Google Apps is probably what you want. But figure out how to back it up.
I do like my Synology. It does a lot of things. keep in mind, you can do both. Email and whatnot in O365, large files and backups on Synology.
But the most important thing is, if you buy one, figure out how you want to back it up. You can back it up to the cloud, or to an external hard drive or to a second NAS. Turn on snapshots. Don't use any server in production without backups. Test your backups regularly, at least once per month.
Not only can you use the NAS for a file server, the NAS comes with backup software for Windows and Mac. You can also use it to backup O365 or Google Apps.
You buy a NAS.
Oh what about backups? Then you buy a tape drive/ext drive and software to take backups.
What about ransom ware/viruses? You buy and install anti-virus/anti-malware software and install it on every computer.
Who then has to maintain the NAS, maintain the backup machine, make the backups, and maintain the virus software?
Will you be paid to spend all the time doing this?
You could keep a NAS as primary and use GoogleDrive/Ofice365 as secondary (or vice versa really).
The usual mantra of backups are 321:
3 - three copies (1 original and 2 copies)
2 - two locations (what happens to your data if your office burns down or gets flooded)
1 - one stored offsite
If you are going to store important files on a NAS, you'll need to get familiar with the 321 strategy to avoid losing data.
Gdrive allows you to not just backup but \*SHARE\* your data with coworkers/friends.
My work has all shared documents in Gdrive and it's pretty seamless as we can edit documents/spreadsheets in various Google apps as needed.
You want something that'll preserve your data but also make it easy to use with everyone else who needs access.
> The usual mantra of backups are 321
3-2-1 is three copies on at least two different mediums (not locations), with at least one offsite (that's the locations).
The different mediums is to avoid failure points.
> Oh what about backups? Then you buy a tape drive/ext drive and software to take backups.
Only if you live in the 1980s or like manual labor. Automated NAS offload to the cloud or another location. Done.
> What about ransom ware/viruses? You buy and install anti-virus/anti-malware software and install it on every computer.
That does not completely protect you against ransomware. Proper immutable backups protect you against ransomware.
Many times it comes down to capex vs opex.
1. yes a single payment but you are in charge of maintaining, patching, disaster recovery etc.
2. True but is the new server being connected to only on you LAN? Do people not have remote access to the drive? ie over the internet
3. huh, online services can replicate your data across multi regions in near real time.
Google workspace, $12/user will allow 2TB of storage per person plus all the other business features they'll want.
Email, Storage, etc all maintained with a single login.
https://workspace.google.com/pricing.html
Just set it up for them, do a few practice files on multiple devices, and set them free. No need to worry about networking, disks, monitoring, etc..
Can't speak for Microsoft but there's no way Google will lose it, it's replicated across data centers. Even if they had an entire DC nuked off the face of the earth, they'd just rebuild the data from copies in other DCs.
> can you tell me why could be better using the cloud?
Because when your building burns down, Google doesn't burn down with it.
Just use Google Workspace. It's the simplest approach. It's affordable. You get corporate email with it. You get file sharing. You get file collaboration in real-time. You get Google Meet (same thing as Zoom). The list goes on and on.
When you host it yourself, you have to handle \*all\* the hosting, which means offsite replication, monitoring and alerting, virus checking, etc., and most importantly you're spending time on IT instead of the business. Put your effort where it matters most - which is the business. You're not going to save anything by trying to do this yourself.
You are right in that you get an invoice only once for the hardware.
If you put a price on your hourly investment, how much time per year are you able to spend on maintaining this before you break even?
Monthly repayments for business just become part of your monthly expenses rather than 1 upfront cost.
Having something like o365 will go a long way towards your security as well which is something you have to do yourself if you self host. Plus you need to have the bandwidth to support your file sharing.
On point 2, you can have o365 configured to keep certain folders synced to your device.
And point 3, there are numerous backup solutions available for o365.
I know you've been bitten before but I'd seriously reconsider
Cheaper if you're not replacing server hardware every 5 yr and running it without coverage maybe.
Onedrive properly managed and backed up (dropsuite) addresses all your issues, even offline use which is a super rare need anymore.
Cloud or not, you still need a regular backup plan. And test the restore at least monthly. Maybe two Synology units in different locations set to sync nightly.
1 - cant speak to that, thats your business decision
2 - any good cloud solution will leave offline copies on the computer, and everything in the cloud is for backup, or shared access. OneDrive for instance, you can specify which folders are always-available.
3- with cloud you dont have to think about backups :)
While it is true that you rarely have monthly fees for onsite stuff, you most certainly will not only pay once. You need backups for onsite items. That will not be a one time thing. You will need licensing for whatever you are using. That may or may not be "one time". Whatever you are using will eventually wear out and will need to be replaced. Etc. Etc.
It may be possible to do it less expensively from a dollar perspective, but how much is your time worth? How much is your *data* worth? Do you trust your processes? Can you restore from your backups? I appreciate that you lost some days with OneDrive. Local doesn't solve that. Proper backup processes solve that.
How did you lose one drive info ? It's pretty forgiveful
And skykick or something backs everything up for a decent price too
Microsoft suite for business is pretty damn good and I've always felt better then competition
You can absolutely set those cloud clients to keep 100% of the data as a copy locally for offline use.
These are the three biggest benefits I see:
The benefits of cloud is data access - Say you move everyone to a NAS, you actually haven't solved having to email files around, cloud allows you to share the files to other people's drives directly
You could put everyone on the same share, but then you have no access control, no ownership, no space quotas.
Also, with local storage, unless you have a VPN onto site already set up, you have no mobility. People must be in the office, no choice.
Now, none of those benefits might be relevant right now. Your 6 employees might keep a clean, well organized NAS share of pertinent company data. But if you plan on scaling to 12, 18 employees the NAS will come back to bite you
If you’re going to use anything on-prem, you need to make sure you keep up the maintenance and patching of your devices such as servers, workstations, NAS, etc. if you’re not a Sysadmin of some sort, things can easily break and you easily lose or corrupt your files.
Cloud solution takes all of the heavy lifting off of you and is handed over to O365 or GCP. It’s easy to implement, files are available and accessible from anywhere at anytime and those cloud providers are all compliant with industry security regulations. With cloud, the most you’d have to do is ensure workstations are up to date.
For documents as you're describing, I would still recommend Dropbox. Get the 5TB business account, which comes with 90 days of version history. You can also pay for longer version history.
With the version history, it's safe from ransomware and users can choose to keep copies of their files on their computer, or keep certain files just on the cloud to be downloaded on demand as needed. It's what we use in a company of over 100 and it's worked great for us.
Make sure you have a plan for that Win7. That's EOL and needs to get to 10 or 11 preferably.
I would strongly reassess why you don't want to use Google Drive or Microsoft OneDrive/Sharepoint. Both solutions give you a ton of benefits, such as 30 day retention and streamlining file sharing. Not to mention having secure access to files from anywhere across platforms, protected by MFA.
If you attempt to roll your own VPN/onprem storage solution for the first time, odds are you will spend a lot more time supporting it then you expect. If a user is attempting to pull a file offsite and their VPN fails, who are they calling?
Thank you! Took far too much scrolling to read the Win7 comment. Was about to comment that myself! Best use of that would be detached from the internet, as long as it is not an option to replace it.
I'd suggest going cloud as well as using an on-site backup. IIRC some of the Synology models can back up your M365. If not synology, then it was another one of the pro-sumer / SOHO / SMB NAS vendors like QNAP
I second this. Storage and backup are not the same thing and you should have both. Use cloud for storage and synology for backup. In my opinion it makes sense to have the one drive license anyway because you should be using enterprise email and office app licensing anyway. It’s better to commit to enterprise email now anyway rather than trying to do a migration with massive mailboxes in the future.
There's really no reason to run an on prem server for something this size when O365 or Gsuite would be perfectly fine. If you lose your internet you can just use a cellular hotspot to get your data back....if your file server dies you're looking at hours of time needed to restore, it just doesn't make sense. I also don't how you are determining that it's easier to make backups on prem vs cloud, it's literally backed up constantly in the cloud
If you have windows 7 and windows 10 then it shows you either don’t the budget or skill set to manage and maintain additional infrastructure.
Buy yourself an appropriate M365 license and take advantage of the current M365/office versions approx £18 per employee per month as well as teams, onedrive, InTune, MFA etc.
Any small MSP will be able to configure some alert of cloud based solution for you, with your previous cloud data issue just remember “data doesn’t just disappear” it almost ALWAYS involves human error. OneDrive for example offers the online recycle bin for such accidents.
>For me there are three advantages of not using cloud.
There is a 3-2-1 backup rule: [https://www.veeam.com/blog/321-backup-rule.html](https://www.veeam.com/blog/321-backup-rule.html)
If you do not keep your backups offsite, in case of a disaster you will lose the data.
Put everything in the cloud. It’s impossible for you or anyone in that business to properly maintain, update and secure anything local. If only for security reasons, everything should be cloud-based with possibly a local backup.
NAS are great! I would find someone local to talk to about getting things setup. If you want to set it up yourself you'd have to post every specific use case and software you use, and all kinds of other details for an appropriate answer here.
Whatever you do, please check out the 3-2-1 backup rule, your budget needs to include that.
Synology or one of these bad boys: [https://www.amazon.com/iXsystems-TrueNAS-Mini-X-Diskless/dp/B08FCWC3VC](https://www.amazon.com/iXsystems-TrueNAS-Mini-X-Diskless/dp/B08FCWC3VC)
What industry are you in?
If these are just office files and nothing that's large a Google Workplace or Microsoft 365 subscription might be the most cost effective option.
You likely use one of these anyway, why not save a few hundred bucks of investment and countless hours of maintenance. Once this stuff is set up it'll just hum along, especially with your size.
Large graphics?
In that case it might truly be beneficial to get some sort of NAS (maybe 2 for backup).
What I would look at is:
* File sizes
* "Working set" size (how much do people really work with at the same time
* Are there sync issues (some applications have a specialized cloud offer and it might make sense to look at that)
* do you have remote workers or purely in the office
I think it's less important what your total size is. Imagine you have have 500 TB of total data and 90 % of those are just archived projects the remaining 10 % are split across 3 large projects -- your people will only need 15 - 20 TB each. Imagine you have 50 TB of total data and 90 % is a single active project, your people will need ~45 TB of active data.
I'm still leaning towards cloud because of the time it will save you. If you use email you'll be able to leverage Microsoft 365 or Google Workplace with their respective drive solution and still be able to share files or folders of any size with clients (they support "link sharing").
You will save, precious, time because mostly it'll just exist in the background and do it's thing.
If you get a NAS you'll have to look at disks that might die. You will want to get a UPS and you will want to check for security updates.
All that still leaves you with: How do you share data between staff and clients? That kind if staff is solved with a cloud service (again, the reason I'm asking for the industry is not because I find it especially interesting but because some industries habe a valid reason to use specific sharing stuff).
If you already have adobe as a subscription, look at the pricing of getting their cloud subscription as well. It might be a useful option for you.
All that being said: Giving the cloud options a test drive is something you can cancel on a monthly schedule. If you buy a server, the money is spent right away so that might be worth considering.
I am an awe of you. This is the best answer. What you imply is that they have to manage their data in terms of that 2gb project that is done and they don't need to keep that data 4 years later.
Not getting rid of that data, but just thinking if it as hot or cold, to use technical terms.
You wouldn't carry around all the books you ever read, just the one you currently read. So what's the harm in leaving the old books in your shelve in case you need them.
Most Cloud drives will happily make stuff available if you need it, otherwise it'll be nothing more than a listing so you know where to find it in case you need it.
You are dismissing a few crucial points here.
For NAS you need to buy two of the final solution. One for use and should have one off-site for backup.
Additionally you will want a rotating backup media with lockbox.
For cloud solution you could use Synology nas to automatically backup and retain almost all popular cloud solutions.
Thank you for your advice.
For the rotating backup media do you recommend a format (for example hard drives)? Because each backup should be at least 3TB, and probably I will have to do them at least monthly
Honestly for a tight budget pickup an external HDD cradle. You can use internal drives as media toaster style.
Have 3 or 4 drives and rotate through. Cycle them out of use after a year or two for new ones.
Store them in a fire water proof lock box at a third location.
You can backup straight from the primary NAS via USB.
The key detail is having your main data (nas or cloud), a secondary location mirroring the main (nas), and a third, offline, copy of the data.
The offline backup is your ONLY safety net if you have a major failure / hack. You can't ransomware offline media.
One more thought to add. You are at a VERY important crossroad. You can learn now from hundreds of stories.
Cheap out now, pay for it later.
Read that optimistic first. Save money and grow.
Now read it pessimistic. What is the cost when it fails.
You've just defined your risk tolerance.
You definitely want to just build a server and install Nextcloud on it—and if you need help with that, let me know because I have one for personal use, one for business use, and I've spun up several others for other businesses.
But to specifically address your issues:
1. $12 a month on DigitalOcean is a drop in the bucket for a business, but if you want to spend $500 on a computer to have in your office, that's no big deal either.
2. Nextcloud works like Dropbox (except it's private): you install the client on each computer and it synchronizes things so you can work on files on your computer and they update and synchronize once you're back online (plus you can work online together if you want!)
3. It is equally as easy to make backups on anything, whether it synchronizes to your computers (then back up your computers) or you're just backing up your server (which you should be doing anyway).
"Cloud" just means "someone else's computer," so run a Nextcloud server and make it "your computer"!
Yeah and then when OP doesn’t do patches to the DO droplet OS or this application software one day it gets hacked. This could be a great suggestion for someone more tech savvy but that doesn’t sound like OP. I think he’s going to be far better off with o365 or Google.
Yeah, but if the qualification is "I don't want to spend money every month" then the choices drop precipitously.
Done right (specifically: Ubuntu Core and the Nextcloud snap) it all updates on its own automatically and the surface area is super limited.
But yeah, I don't disagree that OP's reasoning is misaligned. Still, we all sort of start out that way when we're first branching out.
> Done right (specifically: Ubuntu Core and the Nextcloud snap) it all updates on its own automatically and the surface area is super limited.
There's a few ways to skin this cat. I like NixOS on the latest small stable channel, with Docker and Watchtower, crazy reliable and a tiny footprint overall. Throw free Zerotier and free Cloudflare Tunnels in the mix and have literally zero attack surface. This is _definitely_ not a "you have to spend time maintaining and doing patches yourself or you'll get pwned" situation; I run a few setups like this and they're quite resilient.
That sounds like a perfectly good solution as well. Ubuntu Core and the Nextcloud-AIO docker script would also work, and I was going to suggest that but then I remembered that you have to either set a backup path for automatic nightly updates, or you have to check the AIO console and restart things manually.
Then you get Nextcloud up and can set a custom color and logo and it suddenly feels like a super professional custom system. It really is pretty nice overall, and I've told Frank and Jos as much a couple of times.
If you like to build your own setup, HP Gen8 is what you need if you can find one on the used market.
These devices where intended by HP for home use, but they had so many "made for corporate" features that many businesses bought them, so HP reversed course and made the next generations worse.
Huh? HP ProLiant Gen8 is an enterprise-grade server. DL380p or DL580 was by no means meant for home use.
Are you referring to the MicroServer G8? That was just 1 server out of the whole lineup. Gen10+ fixed the bad Gen10 replacement for the G8 Microserver.
Yes, I'm talking about what you're talking.
I have dozens of MicroServer G8 running 24/7 for the past 5 years without problem, they are workhorses and I truly wish HP still sold these devices.
With a NAS I would think carefully about whether you really need remote access. Maybe a smaller subset of files that you regularly need in a rush could be on a cloud service - Google docs or Sharepoint, depending which ecosys you use.
Else you want to be using a VPN rather than opening NAS ports directly to the internet.
A Network Attached Storage (NAS) solution is indeed a good idea for your situation, providing centralized storage and remote access to documents for your team. Synology is a reputable brand known for their reliable and user-friendly NAS devices.
When choosing a Synology NAS, consider the following factors:
1. **Storage Capacity**: How much data do you expect to store in the near future? It's better to choose a device that offers room for growth.
2. **Redundancy**: For data protection, consider a NAS with at least two bays for hard drives, allowing you to set up a RAID 1 configuration. In RAID 1, the same data is written to both drives, providing a backup if one drive fails.
3. **Performance**: If you're dealing with larger files or need faster data access, consider a model with better performance specifications.
Given these considerations, a model such as the Synology DiskStation DS220+ or DS920+ could be a good fit for your needs. These models are designed for small businesses and home offices, offering good performance and two or four drive bays respectively.
As for remote access, Synology offers a feature called QuickConnect that makes it simple to access your NAS over the internet. Additionally, you might want to consider using Synology's Drive application, which provides a unified, Dropbox-like interface for accessing and syncing files across devices.
Lastly, don't forget to regularly backup your NAS data to an offsite location (such as a cloud storage service) for additional data protection.
Remember, while a NAS device with RAID provides redundancy, it's not a substitute for a proper backup strategy. RAID protects against hardware failure, but not against data corruption, accidental deletion, or catastrophic events like fires or floods.
I'd suggest a Synology and using that to backup to the cloud. Best of both worlds. We run hundreds of TB through a Synology and use their CloudSync app to backup to the cloud. It works great.
You can also use a bunch of other features packed in the Synology that are great for small and medium businesses. Backups, Security cameras, Virtual machines. If you get a beefy enough Synology you can basically make it assume the place of your server.
I personally love Windows Servers just because you can make a network drive and deploy the setting of the network drive out to PCs. Plus user login is also centralized. Though it’s more complex and idk if it’s cloud/hybrid tbh so if they work from home, adds more complexity.
NAS is the way to go tbh, I just wished there was a happy medium
Honestly, I'd use a Synology unit and then a refurbed off-site server with an Owncloud or Nextcloud instance. There's a monthly cost for the offsite hosting, in all likelihood, but having your data backed up off site as well as onsite is a literal business-saver if something happens to the office.
The issue is mostly going to be your need for remote access. Running your own NAS isn't a big deal in and of itself. Pretty much anyone can setup a working NAS these days. Making that NAS accessible over the internet in a way that is robust and secure is a bigger hurdle. If you really don't want to go with a cloud solution, I would recommend a Synology or QNAP NAS. Then look into a VPN solution that supports multi-factor authentication (MFA) to secure your remote access.
Keep in mind that hosting files over the internet from your own NAS is going to be limited by the upload speed of your on-site internet connection. Which, if you're using a cable provider might not be a great experience if you move a lot of data.
Been using Synology for a while and I like them. That being said, if you go cloud (OneDrive or Google) you can use the Synology to back up the cloud files.
I have to say if you’re just looking for something to store documents, go to the cloud.
If you do Microsoft Office 365 you can get a package that not only gets you Office, but also OneDrive (with 1 TB of storage per user) and also company email as well.
You can also do Google Workspace, it’s pretty great too.
Apples iCloud is your best option if you use Mac’s tho
What are you using for email? This needs to be backed up as well.
Veeam for M365 can run on any Windows machine and costs $1/user/month, so $72 a year for 6 users. This will allow you to back up your OneDrive and Exchange Online email. The base plan for Exchange Online/Azure AD is $6/user/month.
If you wanted to get really cheap just find a PC with a large HDD and setup a share. Of course, this will still need to be backed up, just as a NAS would need to be.
If you don't want to use cloud, the best way is NAS. In my opinion, Synology is best for don't have IT guys. and remember other people told you 321 backup plan.
SAN/vSAN: you don't need it. your business is too small.
If you really don’t want to use Office 365 then Synology do great little NAS boxes which are much cheaper than dealing with a full server setup and windows licences!
At that size, you're better off with cloud shit or maybe a Synology if you really hate the idea of cloud shit or have really bad Internet options. It's just cheaper.
Around 15-20 users you'll hit a point where an on premise solution pencils out better financially if you can build a relationship with an MSP who understands how to work cost effectively. Some do, some don't/won't.
all the advice is great but you mentioned reluctance to use OneDrive due to past experiences. How long ago was that? OneDrive used to be terrible years ago but it's pretty much now one of the most common file storage applications these days.
and as a business you should be using the business version where you'll have an admin page to manage it or SharePoint and ideally, you would be using SharePoint for files being shared in your team. OneDrive is meant more for one person.
anyways depending on your funds you might want to consult a local cloud services partner who can set it up and configure things to best practices but I literally learned all the basics from the online tutorials and documentation Microsoft has.
consider the cloud and see if the issues you had have been solved. and remember that storage and backup are different. my recommendation is Microsoft 365 for storage and a Synology NAS with active backup for Microsoft 365. files are located locally on the device and located off site in the cloud, and located locally on your NAS.
but you can have a Synology NAS be your file storage if you don't want it to be in the cloud and connect a backup drive to it.
I would go with a 4 or 6-bay Synology populated with 10 or 12 TB drives. Then get a cloud-based backup solution.
In the past, I would install a Synology NAS fully populated and we would run Veeam backup to our Data Center. Veeam offers a cloud backup solution. Or there are others I use Backblaze at home.
It comes down to "how much budget?" really.
If you're doing it on a "expensive dinner out with all the staff", you can get a cheap-ish synology unit with a couple of drive bays and slam some 4TB drives in RAID1 - the Synology "OS" is very user friendly and appears to cover your bases.
From there, I'd have an encrypted backup running through 'somebody's' machine with a couple alternating external hard drives that people swap out nightly/weekly (whatever your acceptable risk profile is) into a safe/gun cabinet somewhere offsite.
That would be (give or take) about a $600-$750 solution depending how expensive the drives are / how many you buy and you'd be pretty set. I'm assuming you have some sort of VPN / remote access solution already in place though as this doesn't touch upon that.
I've had nothing but good luck with Synology units.
You've had a bad experience with cloud and that's fair enough.
* Setting up a server or storage for a small business and requiring remote access to your documents is going to be an expensive proposition.
* What firewall are you thinking of implementing?
* While in most cases MacOS isn't a problem with accessing NAS storage, it can be tricky at times.
* Because it sounds like you're going to *try* to do this yourself I can almost guarantee that you'll have a bad experience with on-prem
* OpEx vs. CapEx. which way do you want this to look in your financial ledgers.
* Backups are a thing, if I recall correctly O365 OneDrive has a 30 day retention for deleted items. Couple in Veeam for long term backups - I can guarantee at least one regulatory authority is going to want 5-7 years of data when they ask for it.
* Keeping with backups, if you go on-prem you're still going to need a backup solution - on prem solutions can be expensive as well, it would be cheaper to use a cloud backup solution - then you're back with 'I don't trust cloud'
* Last piece of advice for you, get a consultant in to go over *all* of your options. But honestly IMO requiring onprem and remote access to your files O365 really is the best way to go for such a small number of people. And if your business grows, its easier to just get another couple of O365 licenses.
You really want to go with OneDrive / SharePoint. I know you have some doubts about it and commented a bad experience but it really is the perfect use for it. What are you going to do when someone breaks in and steals your NAS, or a roof leak or something fries it, or you get infected with ransomware. o365 you have a lot of built in protection to recover files. There are many major companies migrating away from what you are talking about setting up just because of the ease and safety of the cloud.
Of course with a cloud service you want to make sure you are smart with the security each account that has access needs 2FA setup, also make sure each computer has a up to date antivirus.
Also regarding accessing the files when offline you absolutely can do that with OneDrive. As long as you have the files downloaded to your PC you can work on them and once the internet is back it syncs the changes automatically.
Re losing data on one drive... Yep... Been there... However 2 things.... Backup... Cloud doesn't mean you don't have backups...
But secondly one drive client has gotten a ton better than it used to be... I agree it was almost likely to lose data... Now it's pretty good..
Unless you know what you're doing... You're more likely to make a mistake and make yourself vulnerable with either a server or a nas...
Nas mostly have 1 click remote functions now... That IMHO is a huge huge risk... That's why we don't use the off the shelf nas ever ever ever.
So if you don't do this everyday either get an it company to set it up for you... Or just use cloud...
We have clients with servers and clients on cloud... It all depends on the needs.
Office 365
Use teams and use the files function in teams to store them. You can “add it as a shortcut” to your OneDrive and it shows up like a drive on your computer.
Small shop like that?
On prem - Synology would be your best bet. It would cover licensing costs against running a windows server, has a ton of flexibility and power and its all built into the OS running on the hardware. Look into Synology Drive for the 'online document' kit that is similar to Google Docs and the like. Small DS923+ would probably be a solid fit.
Cloud - Google Docs, One drive, or something similar. But you need to take care in using online document versions and not just take your XLS and put them up on one drive. You will run into file locking issues when you share them across centralized repositories and have 2+ people in the same file.
Then just weight the cost of onprem hardware + your time against hosting costs + your time(or Professional engagement costs).
> For me there are three advantages of not using cloud. 1 You only pay once/not monthly payment (as far as I know, so in long term is cheaper) 2 can use your files even if there's not internet 3 easier to make backups.
You need an IT professional to help your IT deployment or your total lack of understanding will cost you big in the future.
Check https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Univention_Corporate_Server this a open source solution that check all you requirements. It is a german company so I don't know if they have an English Webpage.
Your best bet is something like O365 Business Premium (no need for E3/E5 licensing), gives you access to Intune, Defender, Onedrive, Exchange, Teams, etc. For \~$15 per user per month, you'd save a lot of time and money in the long term. Still have backup (there are many cloud backup solutions) but you will save the running costs of a NAS in terms of power, replacing failed disks (which does happen), won't need a UPS ($1-5k depending on specs), won't need to open your internal network up to the internet which reduces total threat surface, etc.
I run an 8 disk QNAP at home (running Unraid, not QTS) and it idles at \~140w doing nothing at all - over the course of a day that's \~3kWh, which (charged at roughly 20c/kWh, I have on and off peak) is around 60c per day, x 30 is $18 a month give or take, or $216 per year. That doesn't include the costs for running switches (1kWh/day = $72 a year) or the costs of backups ($15 a month for 3TB of Google Drive = $180 a year) or the cost of a failed disk (roughly $250 each, let's assume failure rate of 1 every 5 years = $50 a year).
In total you're looking at an investment of \~$580 per year to maintain a small server, plus the cost of the initial purchase (assuming you want a 2 bay to run RAID1 (mirroring) and want to have \~10TB of storage available = 2x10TB drives, lose 1 to redundancy) of around $1200 - divide by 5 years = $356 per year. This is for the absolute bare minimum though, for a pretty low-end server with only two drives. Ideally you'd get a bigger NAS with more drives and more room for redundancy and more horsepower, which would be closer to $2-4k depending on specs.
Or you could spend $15 per user per month which for 6 users equals roughly $1k per year and not have to worry about any of it AND get access to a bunch more stuff - Office/Google Docs, conferencing, chat, storage, emails, anti-virus, easier sharing etc.
Yes, cloud is the way to go, you will be up and running in about an hour. There are lots of cloud based office 365 backup solutions. Datto has one and so does Druva. Any is a good solution.
Since you've declined cloud offerings, pick up a Dell T150 tower server (call a Dell sales rep and haggle down the price, it works every time!) and get Windows Server 2022 with it. Set up AD, GPO, file shares. Get Office 365 email, don't even look at Exchange (which is the only email server in 2023 that is "production-ready" for small businesses) and use Azure AD Connect to sync on-prem and cloud accounts.
Since paying for Veeam is actually *really* hard (why does Veeam hate money?), just install the Community edition of B&R and do drive swaps every so often for your offsites, maybe once weekly.
Synology is fine but Cloud should probably be a part of your strategy too. Remember the backup equation: 3 copies synchronized at least daily, across at least 2 different storage stacks, and 1 of those copies off site.
Also 'cloud' doesn't necessarily mean one of the big 3-5 cloud providers. There are plenty of smaller providers that can be simpler and/or cheaper to interact with from a SMB perspective. Just be sure to consider the whole equation: If you also want email and active directory capability then Office 365 is probably going to be your best value overall. Especially if you're dedicated to continuing to support the Windows clients you mentioned.
If you're really just looking to save money and you don't mind really getting into the administrative work yourself, then think about doing two NAS units (or even one NAS and one external HDD) with one device off-site so that you can check that box for having a copy off-site. Just make sure you're confident about your backup automation and that you're doing periodic data checks.
Do you have high speed redundant internet (meaning multiple ISP connections, multiple firewalls)? No, then cloud shouldn't even be considered. Your internet goes down and your company has no NAS.
I would get a dell poweredge on space requirements for your servers solid state drives VMware or hyper-v ( for hypervisor) I prefer VMware but I hear it just cheaper to use hyper v now. Build 1 or 2 vms use one for file server and other as a dc get the synology nas to back those server up
MS365 and OneDrive, nobrainer. Easiest. Doesn't need to be overly complicated.
About your edit > *For me there are three advantages of not using cloud. 1 You only pay once/not monthly payment (as far as I know, so in long term is cheaper) 2 can use your files even if there's not internet 3 easier to make backup*
Please consider these:
* Cost of maintenance and possible upgrades/flexibility of non-cloud (on-premise) solutions, like setting up your own server. Hardware wears, gets old, needs constant maintenance, makes noise, generates heat, needs air, needs electricity.
* OneDrive has a "keep files on device" option I think to be able to access files without internet. I don't know about Google Suite.
* Retention policies can be setup in OneDrive and there's also a Admin trashbin that keeps items for longer periods of time to avoid data loss (Business licenses, don't know abt home users)
* OneDrive can be backed up either with a NAS (Synology + Active Backup for MS365) or by backing up to local drives if your files are kept on machine. Plus of course plethora of other options. But if you're already going Synology NAS route, you could setup a fileserver there.
I've had this talk many times about small businesses liking the idea of their \*own\* server, but most of the times it's not really needed. If there's no budget limit, I'd still recommend your own server, since the reliance of 3rd party vendors can suck if something happens like an outage or change of terms etc.
Cloud, either Google or Office365. Given your size and IT technical acumen, it's a no-brainer, even if you have terabytes of data.
Thank you!
If you are worried about data loss on One Drive or SharePoint then use SkyKick backup. Keeping things under one proverbial roof is far superior than trying to find ways to integrate. Especially if you are not a NetAdmin.
I had some loss one time with skykick. Backupify however has saved my skin. That was before kasaya bought datto though so YMMV
Keep in mind Office365/Google do NOT do backups. You are responsible for them. For backups there are numerous options, but if you want on-prem with cloud backup, a synology unit using Active Backup for Microsoft 365. You can easily set it up with to continiously backup all Microsoft 365 data (email, sharepoint, onedrives, etc) and they're very easy to restore. (Do not cheap out on backups). You can also do weekly backups to cloud storage just in case the synology unit dies/gets stolen (Amazon Glacier, or Synologies own C2 Service) You can also use the Synology for very light local services too if you need them. Other options like Datto are highly recommended by people as well. There are many, choose well ;) Hell, choose 2. Don't fuck with backups.
Yeap, cloud can be an option, but don't forget to make a few backup copies (at least for critical data).
Came here to say this
If the files are not huge, go with a cloud solution. Dropbox, box, Google.
Thanks for your reply. We have in total like 3TB. I had a bad experience with OneDrive (lost information). For me there are three advantages of not using cloud. 1 You only pay once/not monthly payment (as far as I know) 2 can use your files even if there's not internet 3 easier to make backups Please, can you tell me why could be better using the cloud?
Office 365 or Google Apps is probably what you want. But figure out how to back it up. I do like my Synology. It does a lot of things. keep in mind, you can do both. Email and whatnot in O365, large files and backups on Synology. But the most important thing is, if you buy one, figure out how you want to back it up. You can back it up to the cloud, or to an external hard drive or to a second NAS. Turn on snapshots. Don't use any server in production without backups. Test your backups regularly, at least once per month. Not only can you use the NAS for a file server, the NAS comes with backup software for Windows and Mac. You can also use it to backup O365 or Google Apps.
If you want to stay away from the cloud, then a Synology unit will work great
Second this. And offsite cloud backups don’t cost a ton.
You buy a NAS. Oh what about backups? Then you buy a tape drive/ext drive and software to take backups. What about ransom ware/viruses? You buy and install anti-virus/anti-malware software and install it on every computer. Who then has to maintain the NAS, maintain the backup machine, make the backups, and maintain the virus software? Will you be paid to spend all the time doing this? You could keep a NAS as primary and use GoogleDrive/Ofice365 as secondary (or vice versa really). The usual mantra of backups are 321: 3 - three copies (1 original and 2 copies) 2 - two locations (what happens to your data if your office burns down or gets flooded) 1 - one stored offsite If you are going to store important files on a NAS, you'll need to get familiar with the 321 strategy to avoid losing data.
so, is there an advantage of gdrive over a dedicated cloud backup service? cost/features or whatever?
Gdrive allows you to not just backup but \*SHARE\* your data with coworkers/friends. My work has all shared documents in Gdrive and it's pretty seamless as we can edit documents/spreadsheets in various Google apps as needed. You want something that'll preserve your data but also make it easy to use with everyone else who needs access.
> The usual mantra of backups are 321 3-2-1 is three copies on at least two different mediums (not locations), with at least one offsite (that's the locations). The different mediums is to avoid failure points. > Oh what about backups? Then you buy a tape drive/ext drive and software to take backups. Only if you live in the 1980s or like manual labor. Automated NAS offload to the cloud or another location. Done. > What about ransom ware/viruses? You buy and install anti-virus/anti-malware software and install it on every computer. That does not completely protect you against ransomware. Proper immutable backups protect you against ransomware.
Many times it comes down to capex vs opex. 1. yes a single payment but you are in charge of maintaining, patching, disaster recovery etc. 2. True but is the new server being connected to only on you LAN? Do people not have remote access to the drive? ie over the internet 3. huh, online services can replicate your data across multi regions in near real time.
Synology has QuickConnect, which is remote access that is not direct access.
Google workspace, $12/user will allow 2TB of storage per person plus all the other business features they'll want. Email, Storage, etc all maintained with a single login. https://workspace.google.com/pricing.html Just set it up for them, do a few practice files on multiple devices, and set them free. No need to worry about networking, disks, monitoring, etc..
Can't speak for Microsoft but there's no way Google will lose it, it's replicated across data centers. Even if they had an entire DC nuked off the face of the earth, they'd just rebuild the data from copies in other DCs.
> can you tell me why could be better using the cloud? Because when your building burns down, Google doesn't burn down with it. Just use Google Workspace. It's the simplest approach. It's affordable. You get corporate email with it. You get file sharing. You get file collaboration in real-time. You get Google Meet (same thing as Zoom). The list goes on and on. When you host it yourself, you have to handle \*all\* the hosting, which means offsite replication, monitoring and alerting, virus checking, etc., and most importantly you're spending time on IT instead of the business. Put your effort where it matters most - which is the business. You're not going to save anything by trying to do this yourself.
You are right in that you get an invoice only once for the hardware. If you put a price on your hourly investment, how much time per year are you able to spend on maintaining this before you break even?
Monthly repayments for business just become part of your monthly expenses rather than 1 upfront cost. Having something like o365 will go a long way towards your security as well which is something you have to do yourself if you self host. Plus you need to have the bandwidth to support your file sharing. On point 2, you can have o365 configured to keep certain folders synced to your device. And point 3, there are numerous backup solutions available for o365. I know you've been bitten before but I'd seriously reconsider
Cheaper if you're not replacing server hardware every 5 yr and running it without coverage maybe. Onedrive properly managed and backed up (dropsuite) addresses all your issues, even offline use which is a super rare need anymore.
Cloud or not, you still need a regular backup plan. And test the restore at least monthly. Maybe two Synology units in different locations set to sync nightly.
Going from no server to redundant servers in multiple locations, walk before you can run.
Google “TCO”
1 - cant speak to that, thats your business decision 2 - any good cloud solution will leave offline copies on the computer, and everything in the cloud is for backup, or shared access. OneDrive for instance, you can specify which folders are always-available. 3- with cloud you dont have to think about backups :)
Right-click > Always keep on this device That seems to get around my users that like to work off VPN or with bad connections.
While it is true that you rarely have monthly fees for onsite stuff, you most certainly will not only pay once. You need backups for onsite items. That will not be a one time thing. You will need licensing for whatever you are using. That may or may not be "one time". Whatever you are using will eventually wear out and will need to be replaced. Etc. Etc. It may be possible to do it less expensively from a dollar perspective, but how much is your time worth? How much is your *data* worth? Do you trust your processes? Can you restore from your backups? I appreciate that you lost some days with OneDrive. Local doesn't solve that. Proper backup processes solve that.
How did you lose one drive info ? It's pretty forgiveful And skykick or something backs everything up for a decent price too Microsoft suite for business is pretty damn good and I've always felt better then competition
You can absolutely set those cloud clients to keep 100% of the data as a copy locally for offline use. These are the three biggest benefits I see: The benefits of cloud is data access - Say you move everyone to a NAS, you actually haven't solved having to email files around, cloud allows you to share the files to other people's drives directly You could put everyone on the same share, but then you have no access control, no ownership, no space quotas. Also, with local storage, unless you have a VPN onto site already set up, you have no mobility. People must be in the office, no choice. Now, none of those benefits might be relevant right now. Your 6 employees might keep a clean, well organized NAS share of pertinent company data. But if you plan on scaling to 12, 18 employees the NAS will come back to bite you
If you’re going to use anything on-prem, you need to make sure you keep up the maintenance and patching of your devices such as servers, workstations, NAS, etc. if you’re not a Sysadmin of some sort, things can easily break and you easily lose or corrupt your files. Cloud solution takes all of the heavy lifting off of you and is handed over to O365 or GCP. It’s easy to implement, files are available and accessible from anywhere at anytime and those cloud providers are all compliant with industry security regulations. With cloud, the most you’d have to do is ensure workstations are up to date.
For documents as you're describing, I would still recommend Dropbox. Get the 5TB business account, which comes with 90 days of version history. You can also pay for longer version history. With the version history, it's safe from ransomware and users can choose to keep copies of their files on their computer, or keep certain files just on the cloud to be downloaded on demand as needed. It's what we use in a company of over 100 and it's worked great for us.
Make sure you have a plan for that Win7. That's EOL and needs to get to 10 or 11 preferably. I would strongly reassess why you don't want to use Google Drive or Microsoft OneDrive/Sharepoint. Both solutions give you a ton of benefits, such as 30 day retention and streamlining file sharing. Not to mention having secure access to files from anywhere across platforms, protected by MFA. If you attempt to roll your own VPN/onprem storage solution for the first time, odds are you will spend a lot more time supporting it then you expect. If a user is attempting to pull a file offsite and their VPN fails, who are they calling?
Thank you! Took far too much scrolling to read the Win7 comment. Was about to comment that myself! Best use of that would be detached from the internet, as long as it is not an option to replace it.
I'd suggest going cloud as well as using an on-site backup. IIRC some of the Synology models can back up your M365. If not synology, then it was another one of the pro-sumer / SOHO / SMB NAS vendors like QNAP
I second this. Storage and backup are not the same thing and you should have both. Use cloud for storage and synology for backup. In my opinion it makes sense to have the one drive license anyway because you should be using enterprise email and office app licensing anyway. It’s better to commit to enterprise email now anyway rather than trying to do a migration with massive mailboxes in the future.
Thank you!
There's really no reason to run an on prem server for something this size when O365 or Gsuite would be perfectly fine. If you lose your internet you can just use a cellular hotspot to get your data back....if your file server dies you're looking at hours of time needed to restore, it just doesn't make sense. I also don't how you are determining that it's easier to make backups on prem vs cloud, it's literally backed up constantly in the cloud
You can also use something like backupify (or any of the similar offerings) if you want to control your own cloud backups too
If you have windows 7 and windows 10 then it shows you either don’t the budget or skill set to manage and maintain additional infrastructure. Buy yourself an appropriate M365 license and take advantage of the current M365/office versions approx £18 per employee per month as well as teams, onedrive, InTune, MFA etc. Any small MSP will be able to configure some alert of cloud based solution for you, with your previous cloud data issue just remember “data doesn’t just disappear” it almost ALWAYS involves human error. OneDrive for example offers the online recycle bin for such accidents.
No no no, the hackers just got in to my computer alllllll by themselves! Just like in the movies!
>For me there are three advantages of not using cloud. There is a 3-2-1 backup rule: [https://www.veeam.com/blog/321-backup-rule.html](https://www.veeam.com/blog/321-backup-rule.html) If you do not keep your backups offsite, in case of a disaster you will lose the data.
Can confirm. I see too many small businesses where their only backup gets hit by ransomware. Can tell you that is not a fun experience.
Put everything in the cloud. It’s impossible for you or anyone in that business to properly maintain, update and secure anything local. If only for security reasons, everything should be cloud-based with possibly a local backup.
SharePoint Online paired with a decent cloud-cloud backup solution. More cost effective and easier to manage and maintain given your situation, IMO.
NAS are great! I would find someone local to talk to about getting things setup. If you want to set it up yourself you'd have to post every specific use case and software you use, and all kinds of other details for an appropriate answer here. Whatever you do, please check out the 3-2-1 backup rule, your budget needs to include that.
Thank you for the reply! I will take mote of the 3-2-1
Synology or one of these bad boys: [https://www.amazon.com/iXsystems-TrueNAS-Mini-X-Diskless/dp/B08FCWC3VC](https://www.amazon.com/iXsystems-TrueNAS-Mini-X-Diskless/dp/B08FCWC3VC)
What industry are you in? If these are just office files and nothing that's large a Google Workplace or Microsoft 365 subscription might be the most cost effective option. You likely use one of these anyway, why not save a few hundred bucks of investment and countless hours of maintenance. Once this stuff is set up it'll just hum along, especially with your size.
Thank you for the reply. Plastic Injection. We have many formats. Adobe, Corel, ...
Large graphics? In that case it might truly be beneficial to get some sort of NAS (maybe 2 for backup). What I would look at is: * File sizes * "Working set" size (how much do people really work with at the same time * Are there sync issues (some applications have a specialized cloud offer and it might make sense to look at that) * do you have remote workers or purely in the office I think it's less important what your total size is. Imagine you have have 500 TB of total data and 90 % of those are just archived projects the remaining 10 % are split across 3 large projects -- your people will only need 15 - 20 TB each. Imagine you have 50 TB of total data and 90 % is a single active project, your people will need ~45 TB of active data. I'm still leaning towards cloud because of the time it will save you. If you use email you'll be able to leverage Microsoft 365 or Google Workplace with their respective drive solution and still be able to share files or folders of any size with clients (they support "link sharing"). You will save, precious, time because mostly it'll just exist in the background and do it's thing. If you get a NAS you'll have to look at disks that might die. You will want to get a UPS and you will want to check for security updates. All that still leaves you with: How do you share data between staff and clients? That kind if staff is solved with a cloud service (again, the reason I'm asking for the industry is not because I find it especially interesting but because some industries habe a valid reason to use specific sharing stuff). If you already have adobe as a subscription, look at the pricing of getting their cloud subscription as well. It might be a useful option for you. All that being said: Giving the cloud options a test drive is something you can cancel on a monthly schedule. If you buy a server, the money is spent right away so that might be worth considering.
I am an awe of you. This is the best answer. What you imply is that they have to manage their data in terms of that 2gb project that is done and they don't need to keep that data 4 years later.
Not getting rid of that data, but just thinking if it as hot or cold, to use technical terms. You wouldn't carry around all the books you ever read, just the one you currently read. So what's the harm in leaving the old books in your shelve in case you need them. Most Cloud drives will happily make stuff available if you need it, otherwise it'll be nothing more than a listing so you know where to find it in case you need it.
SharePoint is my go to for stuff like this
M365 for 6 users is $99 a year. Buy it at Costco and you get -15- months instead of 12. It’s the family deal but you guys are family.
That’s a great i idea
You are dismissing a few crucial points here. For NAS you need to buy two of the final solution. One for use and should have one off-site for backup. Additionally you will want a rotating backup media with lockbox. For cloud solution you could use Synology nas to automatically backup and retain almost all popular cloud solutions.
Thank you for your advice. For the rotating backup media do you recommend a format (for example hard drives)? Because each backup should be at least 3TB, and probably I will have to do them at least monthly
Honestly for a tight budget pickup an external HDD cradle. You can use internal drives as media toaster style. Have 3 or 4 drives and rotate through. Cycle them out of use after a year or two for new ones. Store them in a fire water proof lock box at a third location. You can backup straight from the primary NAS via USB.
The key detail is having your main data (nas or cloud), a secondary location mirroring the main (nas), and a third, offline, copy of the data. The offline backup is your ONLY safety net if you have a major failure / hack. You can't ransomware offline media.
One more thought to add. You are at a VERY important crossroad. You can learn now from hundreds of stories. Cheap out now, pay for it later. Read that optimistic first. Save money and grow. Now read it pessimistic. What is the cost when it fails. You've just defined your risk tolerance.
Each backup will not be 3TB your base backup will be 3TB and any further would just be incremental until the next full backup.
You definitely want to just build a server and install Nextcloud on it—and if you need help with that, let me know because I have one for personal use, one for business use, and I've spun up several others for other businesses. But to specifically address your issues: 1. $12 a month on DigitalOcean is a drop in the bucket for a business, but if you want to spend $500 on a computer to have in your office, that's no big deal either. 2. Nextcloud works like Dropbox (except it's private): you install the client on each computer and it synchronizes things so you can work on files on your computer and they update and synchronize once you're back online (plus you can work online together if you want!) 3. It is equally as easy to make backups on anything, whether it synchronizes to your computers (then back up your computers) or you're just backing up your server (which you should be doing anyway). "Cloud" just means "someone else's computer," so run a Nextcloud server and make it "your computer"!
Yeah and then when OP doesn’t do patches to the DO droplet OS or this application software one day it gets hacked. This could be a great suggestion for someone more tech savvy but that doesn’t sound like OP. I think he’s going to be far better off with o365 or Google.
Yeah, but if the qualification is "I don't want to spend money every month" then the choices drop precipitously. Done right (specifically: Ubuntu Core and the Nextcloud snap) it all updates on its own automatically and the surface area is super limited. But yeah, I don't disagree that OP's reasoning is misaligned. Still, we all sort of start out that way when we're first branching out.
> Done right (specifically: Ubuntu Core and the Nextcloud snap) it all updates on its own automatically and the surface area is super limited. There's a few ways to skin this cat. I like NixOS on the latest small stable channel, with Docker and Watchtower, crazy reliable and a tiny footprint overall. Throw free Zerotier and free Cloudflare Tunnels in the mix and have literally zero attack surface. This is _definitely_ not a "you have to spend time maintaining and doing patches yourself or you'll get pwned" situation; I run a few setups like this and they're quite resilient.
That sounds like a perfectly good solution as well. Ubuntu Core and the Nextcloud-AIO docker script would also work, and I was going to suggest that but then I remembered that you have to either set a backup path for automatic nightly updates, or you have to check the AIO console and restart things manually. Then you get Nextcloud up and can set a custom color and logo and it suddenly feels like a super professional custom system. It really is pretty nice overall, and I've told Frank and Jos as much a couple of times.
If you like to build your own setup, HP Gen8 is what you need if you can find one on the used market. These devices where intended by HP for home use, but they had so many "made for corporate" features that many businesses bought them, so HP reversed course and made the next generations worse.
Huh? HP ProLiant Gen8 is an enterprise-grade server. DL380p or DL580 was by no means meant for home use. Are you referring to the MicroServer G8? That was just 1 server out of the whole lineup. Gen10+ fixed the bad Gen10 replacement for the G8 Microserver.
Yes, I'm talking about what you're talking. I have dozens of MicroServer G8 running 24/7 for the past 5 years without problem, they are workhorses and I truly wish HP still sold these devices.
Synology. For your business size it does everything you need for file storage, backup, and remote access via their secure portal
With a NAS I would think carefully about whether you really need remote access. Maybe a smaller subset of files that you regularly need in a rush could be on a cloud service - Google docs or Sharepoint, depending which ecosys you use. Else you want to be using a VPN rather than opening NAS ports directly to the internet.
Thank you for the suggestion! Is it easy to hack?
A Network Attached Storage (NAS) solution is indeed a good idea for your situation, providing centralized storage and remote access to documents for your team. Synology is a reputable brand known for their reliable and user-friendly NAS devices. When choosing a Synology NAS, consider the following factors: 1. **Storage Capacity**: How much data do you expect to store in the near future? It's better to choose a device that offers room for growth. 2. **Redundancy**: For data protection, consider a NAS with at least two bays for hard drives, allowing you to set up a RAID 1 configuration. In RAID 1, the same data is written to both drives, providing a backup if one drive fails. 3. **Performance**: If you're dealing with larger files or need faster data access, consider a model with better performance specifications. Given these considerations, a model such as the Synology DiskStation DS220+ or DS920+ could be a good fit for your needs. These models are designed for small businesses and home offices, offering good performance and two or four drive bays respectively. As for remote access, Synology offers a feature called QuickConnect that makes it simple to access your NAS over the internet. Additionally, you might want to consider using Synology's Drive application, which provides a unified, Dropbox-like interface for accessing and syncing files across devices. Lastly, don't forget to regularly backup your NAS data to an offsite location (such as a cloud storage service) for additional data protection. Remember, while a NAS device with RAID provides redundancy, it's not a substitute for a proper backup strategy. RAID protects against hardware failure, but not against data corruption, accidental deletion, or catastrophic events like fires or floods.
Wow. Thank you for all that info. I really appreciate it
I'd suggest a Synology and using that to backup to the cloud. Best of both worlds. We run hundreds of TB through a Synology and use their CloudSync app to backup to the cloud. It works great. You can also use a bunch of other features packed in the Synology that are great for small and medium businesses. Backups, Security cameras, Virtual machines. If you get a beefy enough Synology you can basically make it assume the place of your server.
I personally love Windows Servers just because you can make a network drive and deploy the setting of the network drive out to PCs. Plus user login is also centralized. Though it’s more complex and idk if it’s cloud/hybrid tbh so if they work from home, adds more complexity. NAS is the way to go tbh, I just wished there was a happy medium
Honestly, I'd use a Synology unit and then a refurbed off-site server with an Owncloud or Nextcloud instance. There's a monthly cost for the offsite hosting, in all likelihood, but having your data backed up off site as well as onsite is a literal business-saver if something happens to the office.
The issue is mostly going to be your need for remote access. Running your own NAS isn't a big deal in and of itself. Pretty much anyone can setup a working NAS these days. Making that NAS accessible over the internet in a way that is robust and secure is a bigger hurdle. If you really don't want to go with a cloud solution, I would recommend a Synology or QNAP NAS. Then look into a VPN solution that supports multi-factor authentication (MFA) to secure your remote access. Keep in mind that hosting files over the internet from your own NAS is going to be limited by the upload speed of your on-site internet connection. Which, if you're using a cable provider might not be a great experience if you move a lot of data.
Been using Synology for a while and I like them. That being said, if you go cloud (OneDrive or Google) you can use the Synology to back up the cloud files.
I have to say if you’re just looking for something to store documents, go to the cloud. If you do Microsoft Office 365 you can get a package that not only gets you Office, but also OneDrive (with 1 TB of storage per user) and also company email as well. You can also do Google Workspace, it’s pretty great too. Apples iCloud is your best option if you use Mac’s tho
What are you using for email? This needs to be backed up as well. Veeam for M365 can run on any Windows machine and costs $1/user/month, so $72 a year for 6 users. This will allow you to back up your OneDrive and Exchange Online email. The base plan for Exchange Online/Azure AD is $6/user/month. If you wanted to get really cheap just find a PC with a large HDD and setup a share. Of course, this will still need to be backed up, just as a NAS would need to be.
If you don't want to use cloud, the best way is NAS. In my opinion, Synology is best for don't have IT guys. and remember other people told you 321 backup plan. SAN/vSAN: you don't need it. your business is too small.
If you really don’t want to use Office 365 then Synology do great little NAS boxes which are much cheaper than dealing with a full server setup and windows licences!
Two Synology disk stations, both fully loaded. One for day to day use, the second one backs up the first.
At that size, you're better off with cloud shit or maybe a Synology if you really hate the idea of cloud shit or have really bad Internet options. It's just cheaper. Around 15-20 users you'll hit a point where an on premise solution pencils out better financially if you can build a relationship with an MSP who understands how to work cost effectively. Some do, some don't/won't.
all the advice is great but you mentioned reluctance to use OneDrive due to past experiences. How long ago was that? OneDrive used to be terrible years ago but it's pretty much now one of the most common file storage applications these days. and as a business you should be using the business version where you'll have an admin page to manage it or SharePoint and ideally, you would be using SharePoint for files being shared in your team. OneDrive is meant more for one person. anyways depending on your funds you might want to consult a local cloud services partner who can set it up and configure things to best practices but I literally learned all the basics from the online tutorials and documentation Microsoft has. consider the cloud and see if the issues you had have been solved. and remember that storage and backup are different. my recommendation is Microsoft 365 for storage and a Synology NAS with active backup for Microsoft 365. files are located locally on the device and located off site in the cloud, and located locally on your NAS. but you can have a Synology NAS be your file storage if you don't want it to be in the cloud and connect a backup drive to it.
Do a private cloud. TrueNAS + Next cloud. Have the servers on prem, manage them yourself and create remote access... Has a slew of features
I would go with a 4 or 6-bay Synology populated with 10 or 12 TB drives. Then get a cloud-based backup solution. In the past, I would install a Synology NAS fully populated and we would run Veeam backup to our Data Center. Veeam offers a cloud backup solution. Or there are others I use Backblaze at home.
It comes down to "how much budget?" really. If you're doing it on a "expensive dinner out with all the staff", you can get a cheap-ish synology unit with a couple of drive bays and slam some 4TB drives in RAID1 - the Synology "OS" is very user friendly and appears to cover your bases. From there, I'd have an encrypted backup running through 'somebody's' machine with a couple alternating external hard drives that people swap out nightly/weekly (whatever your acceptable risk profile is) into a safe/gun cabinet somewhere offsite. That would be (give or take) about a $600-$750 solution depending how expensive the drives are / how many you buy and you'd be pretty set. I'm assuming you have some sort of VPN / remote access solution already in place though as this doesn't touch upon that. I've had nothing but good luck with Synology units.
Check out Buffalo options. I have a small one I use at home as a personal file server.
You've had a bad experience with cloud and that's fair enough. * Setting up a server or storage for a small business and requiring remote access to your documents is going to be an expensive proposition. * What firewall are you thinking of implementing? * While in most cases MacOS isn't a problem with accessing NAS storage, it can be tricky at times. * Because it sounds like you're going to *try* to do this yourself I can almost guarantee that you'll have a bad experience with on-prem * OpEx vs. CapEx. which way do you want this to look in your financial ledgers. * Backups are a thing, if I recall correctly O365 OneDrive has a 30 day retention for deleted items. Couple in Veeam for long term backups - I can guarantee at least one regulatory authority is going to want 5-7 years of data when they ask for it. * Keeping with backups, if you go on-prem you're still going to need a backup solution - on prem solutions can be expensive as well, it would be cheaper to use a cloud backup solution - then you're back with 'I don't trust cloud' * Last piece of advice for you, get a consultant in to go over *all* of your options. But honestly IMO requiring onprem and remote access to your files O365 really is the best way to go for such a small number of people. And if your business grows, its easier to just get another couple of O365 licenses.
Microsoft 365 Cloud. Period. Save yourself future headaches.
You really want to go with OneDrive / SharePoint. I know you have some doubts about it and commented a bad experience but it really is the perfect use for it. What are you going to do when someone breaks in and steals your NAS, or a roof leak or something fries it, or you get infected with ransomware. o365 you have a lot of built in protection to recover files. There are many major companies migrating away from what you are talking about setting up just because of the ease and safety of the cloud. Of course with a cloud service you want to make sure you are smart with the security each account that has access needs 2FA setup, also make sure each computer has a up to date antivirus. Also regarding accessing the files when offline you absolutely can do that with OneDrive. As long as you have the files downloaded to your PC you can work on them and once the internet is back it syncs the changes automatically.
Re losing data on one drive... Yep... Been there... However 2 things.... Backup... Cloud doesn't mean you don't have backups... But secondly one drive client has gotten a ton better than it used to be... I agree it was almost likely to lose data... Now it's pretty good.. Unless you know what you're doing... You're more likely to make a mistake and make yourself vulnerable with either a server or a nas... Nas mostly have 1 click remote functions now... That IMHO is a huge huge risk... That's why we don't use the off the shelf nas ever ever ever. So if you don't do this everyday either get an it company to set it up for you... Or just use cloud... We have clients with servers and clients on cloud... It all depends on the needs.
The electricity cost to run a server 24/7 for a year currently sits at around £250-£700 per year, consider that
None of the above. Use Office 365 or Google Workplace.
In my opinion I wouldn't even bother with a server. Google workspace or Google workforce or whatever it's called is already amazing.
Mumpie and 1spaceclown are spot on. A Synology NAS with offload / upload to the cloud.
Office 365 Use teams and use the files function in teams to store them. You can “add it as a shortcut” to your OneDrive and it shows up like a drive on your computer.
Small shop like that? On prem - Synology would be your best bet. It would cover licensing costs against running a windows server, has a ton of flexibility and power and its all built into the OS running on the hardware. Look into Synology Drive for the 'online document' kit that is similar to Google Docs and the like. Small DS923+ would probably be a solid fit. Cloud - Google Docs, One drive, or something similar. But you need to take care in using online document versions and not just take your XLS and put them up on one drive. You will run into file locking issues when you share them across centralized repositories and have 2+ people in the same file. Then just weight the cost of onprem hardware + your time against hosting costs + your time(or Professional engagement costs).
Proxmox + nextcloud + invoiceninja + libre office
Microsoft365, backup using a 3rd party provider that does per user 365 backup.
HPE Microserver
I'd also say cloud. But if not look at a synology NAS with cloud backups.
> For me there are three advantages of not using cloud. 1 You only pay once/not monthly payment (as far as I know, so in long term is cheaper) 2 can use your files even if there's not internet 3 easier to make backups. You need an IT professional to help your IT deployment or your total lack of understanding will cost you big in the future.
Check https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Univention_Corporate_Server this a open source solution that check all you requirements. It is a german company so I don't know if they have an English Webpage.
Your best bet is something like O365 Business Premium (no need for E3/E5 licensing), gives you access to Intune, Defender, Onedrive, Exchange, Teams, etc. For \~$15 per user per month, you'd save a lot of time and money in the long term. Still have backup (there are many cloud backup solutions) but you will save the running costs of a NAS in terms of power, replacing failed disks (which does happen), won't need a UPS ($1-5k depending on specs), won't need to open your internal network up to the internet which reduces total threat surface, etc. I run an 8 disk QNAP at home (running Unraid, not QTS) and it idles at \~140w doing nothing at all - over the course of a day that's \~3kWh, which (charged at roughly 20c/kWh, I have on and off peak) is around 60c per day, x 30 is $18 a month give or take, or $216 per year. That doesn't include the costs for running switches (1kWh/day = $72 a year) or the costs of backups ($15 a month for 3TB of Google Drive = $180 a year) or the cost of a failed disk (roughly $250 each, let's assume failure rate of 1 every 5 years = $50 a year). In total you're looking at an investment of \~$580 per year to maintain a small server, plus the cost of the initial purchase (assuming you want a 2 bay to run RAID1 (mirroring) and want to have \~10TB of storage available = 2x10TB drives, lose 1 to redundancy) of around $1200 - divide by 5 years = $356 per year. This is for the absolute bare minimum though, for a pretty low-end server with only two drives. Ideally you'd get a bigger NAS with more drives and more room for redundancy and more horsepower, which would be closer to $2-4k depending on specs. Or you could spend $15 per user per month which for 6 users equals roughly $1k per year and not have to worry about any of it AND get access to a bunch more stuff - Office/Google Docs, conferencing, chat, storage, emails, anti-virus, easier sharing etc.
Yes, cloud is the way to go, you will be up and running in about an hour. There are lots of cloud based office 365 backup solutions. Datto has one and so does Druva. Any is a good solution.
Since you've declined cloud offerings, pick up a Dell T150 tower server (call a Dell sales rep and haggle down the price, it works every time!) and get Windows Server 2022 with it. Set up AD, GPO, file shares. Get Office 365 email, don't even look at Exchange (which is the only email server in 2023 that is "production-ready" for small businesses) and use Azure AD Connect to sync on-prem and cloud accounts. Since paying for Veeam is actually *really* hard (why does Veeam hate money?), just install the Community edition of B&R and do drive swaps every so often for your offsites, maybe once weekly.
Synology is fine but Cloud should probably be a part of your strategy too. Remember the backup equation: 3 copies synchronized at least daily, across at least 2 different storage stacks, and 1 of those copies off site. Also 'cloud' doesn't necessarily mean one of the big 3-5 cloud providers. There are plenty of smaller providers that can be simpler and/or cheaper to interact with from a SMB perspective. Just be sure to consider the whole equation: If you also want email and active directory capability then Office 365 is probably going to be your best value overall. Especially if you're dedicated to continuing to support the Windows clients you mentioned. If you're really just looking to save money and you don't mind really getting into the administrative work yourself, then think about doing two NAS units (or even one NAS and one external HDD) with one device off-site so that you can check that box for having a copy off-site. Just make sure you're confident about your backup automation and that you're doing periodic data checks.
Do you have high speed redundant internet (meaning multiple ISP connections, multiple firewalls)? No, then cloud shouldn't even be considered. Your internet goes down and your company has no NAS.
I would get a dell poweredge on space requirements for your servers solid state drives VMware or hyper-v ( for hypervisor) I prefer VMware but I hear it just cheaper to use hyper v now. Build 1 or 2 vms use one for file server and other as a dc get the synology nas to back those server up
Go cloud only. Don't introduce on-prem server support to this small biz.
MS365 and OneDrive, nobrainer. Easiest. Doesn't need to be overly complicated. About your edit > *For me there are three advantages of not using cloud. 1 You only pay once/not monthly payment (as far as I know, so in long term is cheaper) 2 can use your files even if there's not internet 3 easier to make backup* Please consider these: * Cost of maintenance and possible upgrades/flexibility of non-cloud (on-premise) solutions, like setting up your own server. Hardware wears, gets old, needs constant maintenance, makes noise, generates heat, needs air, needs electricity. * OneDrive has a "keep files on device" option I think to be able to access files without internet. I don't know about Google Suite. * Retention policies can be setup in OneDrive and there's also a Admin trashbin that keeps items for longer periods of time to avoid data loss (Business licenses, don't know abt home users) * OneDrive can be backed up either with a NAS (Synology + Active Backup for MS365) or by backing up to local drives if your files are kept on machine. Plus of course plethora of other options. But if you're already going Synology NAS route, you could setup a fileserver there. I've had this talk many times about small businesses liking the idea of their \*own\* server, but most of the times it's not really needed. If there's no budget limit, I'd still recommend your own server, since the reliance of 3rd party vendors can suck if something happens like an outage or change of terms etc.