D-Link DNS-321 2-Bay Network Storage Enclosure

Comment:
I have been using this device for about three weeks now and overall i am satisfied with its preformance. I currently only have one hard drive installed, a Seagate 1.5 TB Barracuda. Getting it up and runing was a bit tricky as it would get to 94% during formatting and freeze, but updating the firmware seemed to correct this. Getting it connected to my network and mapping the drive was a breeze with the included software. The FTP server has been somewhat slow, i have tried accessing it from about 5 different locations (coffee shop, resturants, and friends home) and the fastest download speeds achieved has been 100kbs/s. This maynot be too much of a problem depending on what your wanting to access. Overall, a great purchase. This was purchased mostly as storage for my music and videos and to allow access to those files from the other computers in my residence (3 others computers). I have the labtop plugged into the tv to watch the videos over wireless and have had no problems.

Comment:
The disk drives were easy to install. After going through the initialization of the NAS, it was up and running. I did have to download a driver for my 64bit Vista OS to see it. But once it was installed, everything worked perfectly.

Comment:
I bought one and installed 2 1.5TB drives as Raid 1. I downloaded and installed the latest firmware before I formatted the drives, just to be sure. This little box is great. It worked perfectly from the moment I started and has been fine since. I replaced a Netgear SC101. The SC101 is very slow and requires special drivers that don't work and play well on a computer with SATA drives. The DNS-321, on the other hand, requires no special drivers (even with WIN98) and is fast. The management software is typical for D-Link in that it isn't particularly intuitive nor is the documentation all that clear, but it does the job.

Comment:
Installed NAS 321 and two 500 G WD Green drives. Setup was easy using Win 7 beta on Dell 530S. Have been using for a week now and no problems. Hard drives seem run quiet and cool. NAS unit is quieter than expected after one of the reviews mentioned the noise. I am still figuring out the FTP stuff. I recommend this unit and hard drives from WD

Comment:
Excellent product. Performs flawlessly, with ease of setup (though I would have preferred a more stringent security default but it's easily adjustable). FYI, there is no need to mess around with presetup of drives or any nonsense with the exception of possibly a soft restart (which appears to be an issue with any drives 1TB or more and not just related to Hitachi). The unit itself is using a stripped down version of *nix (not sure which) with ext2. The OS you use on your system is irrelevant to gain accessibility and functionality from the NAS unless you for some reason MUST use the useless applications that come with the unit. As long as you have a browser, and know how to find the unit's IP, there is nothing to install. Simply call up the unit's IP in your browser and start configuring/setting it up. Took all of 5 minutes not counting the format time.

Comment:
I have read in a few places especially on the support.dlink.com web site that the DNS-321 doesn't really support the hitachi drives. And, there is a work around (as another user has stated in the above). The method to which i have utilized to get the drives to format was utilizing, Linux to get the drive up and running (I haven't seen the options in the mac). Here is what i did to get it working: I brought the hard disk into the linux environment, used gparted to format the disk and then i popped it into the nas and it worked. Just make sure you format the disk in ext3 Other than that, the NAS is for the most part working flawlessly.

Comment:
Yahoo no longer lets you setup email through smtp unless you have their paid email

Comment:
You need to update the firmware when you get it but after I did that my dual 1.5T disks showed up and away I went. Easy to configure easy to use and I have had it for a couple mounths without any issues. Email's me every day =)

Comment:
Networks great, speed is fair (approx. 100-120 Mbps running on a 1 Gbps network, but this will be partly due to the hard drive write times) and has decent web-based interface. Running for 45 days now but sad to say that the 24/7 DLINK help for 30 days was very poor. They could not advise me how to set up the SMTP email notifications for a standard Yahoo account. All they would say is that ''it will work'' and then ''you must talk to your service provider''. Anyone who knows how, drop the answer in a review. Thanks.

Comment:
I was a little concerned at first when I handled the product out of the box. I was afraid it was going to be kind of flimsy and rattle and make noise when accessing the drives. I was wrong. Very little noise. Full of features! Works like a charm! I put 2 1TB drives in and running RAID 1 so the drives mirror one another. This was the perfect solution to my storage/backup needs. I don't use the installed backup software so I can't comment on that. Overall, I'm very pleased.

Comment:
I have generally had a good experience with the DNS 321 however I want to warn you that support on the 321 is basically non existent. I have had a bad experience with the UPNP support in particular. The DNS 323 has had multiple firmware upgrades that have fixed many problems that exist on the 321 also, but these basic repairs are simply not available for the DNS 321. For example, the 321 cannot handle file sizes larger than 2GB with its UPNP server, meaning I can not stream HD video to my PS3 (this was one of the main reasons I purchased this unit). I recommend the 323 instead because DLINK will hang you out to dry with this model if you have any problems.

Comment:
I accidentally knocked my 321 off a shelf - it dropped 3 feet onto its face (rigid styrofoam broke its fall), and both hard drives dislodged, disconnecting from their SATA ports. Seconds later my blackberry beeped - it sent me an email saying both hard drives failed and it signed the email, ''Sincerely, Your DNS-321''. Who knew technology could be so polite, especially after the trauma it had just suffered. Thankfully I re-seated both drives and they've been working ever since.