Independent Australian Storage & Infrastructure Authority

NAS Guides & Reviews

Independent Australian storage and infrastructure guides. Real AU pricing, honest verdicts.

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289 articles
TrueNAS Informational

Can You Use Proxmox as a NAS? What Works and What Does Not

Proxmox VE is not a NAS operating system. It does not have built-in SMB shares, drive health dashboards, or consumer-friendly NAS features out of the box. But many homelab builders run Proxmox as their primary OS and use it for NAS-adjacent storage alongside VMs. This guide covers what that looks like in practice, where it works well, and where TrueNAS or Unraid would serve you better.

TrueNAS Informational

ZFS Explained for Home NAS Users: What TrueNAS Does Differently

ZFS is the storage filesystem that TrueNAS is built on, and it works fundamentally differently from the filesystems used by most other NAS platforms. It runs a checksum on every block of data, detects silent corruption automatically, and can repair it without user intervention. For anyone storing data they cannot afford to lose, this changes what a NAS can guarantee.

TrueNAS VS Comparison

Unraid vs TrueNAS vs Proxmox: Which Homelab OS Should You Use?

Unraid, TrueNAS Scale, and Proxmox are the three most popular homelab operating systems. Each is the right answer for a different type of builder. Unraid suits people who want flexible NAS storage with easy Docker containers. TrueNAS suits people who want maximum data integrity with ZFS. Proxmox suits people whose primary goal is running virtual machines. Picking the wrong one wastes time on workarounds that should not be necessary.

Informational

Homelab Server Power Consumption in Australia: Running Costs by Build Type

Homelab power consumption ranges from 10W for a mini PC build to over 300W for an old Xeon rack server. Run 24/7 at Australian electricity rates, that gap can add hundreds of dollars a year to your power bill. Knowing your build's real consumption before buying avoids expensive surprises.

Buying Guide

Where to Buy Homelab and Server Hardware in Australia

Australian homelab builders have four reliable purchasing paths: specialist PC retailers for new consumer hardware, enterprise resellers for rack gear, eBay AU for used hardware at large discounts, and grey import channels for hardware not sold locally.

Synology Informational

Self-Hosting Fatigue: When SaaS Is Actually the Better Choice

Self-hosting gives you control, privacy, and no subscription fees - but it also gives you unplanned maintenance, version conflicts, and the particular joy of debugging a broken container at midnight. This article is an honest look at when self-hosting stops making sense, which categories of software are genuinely better as SaaS, and how to decide where to draw the line.

QNAP Synology VS Comparison

Nextcloud vs Seafile vs Synology Drive: Which Self-Hosted File Sync Is Actually Reliable?

Self-hosted file sync sounds straightforward until you have sync conflicts at 2am, a client update that breaks the desktop app, or a NAS migration that loses file history. This comparison looks at Nextcloud, Seafile, and Synology Drive across the dimensions that actually matter for day-to-day reliability: sync stability, conflict handling, mobile clients, and what happens when things go wrong.

QNAP Synology Informational

Power Cost of Running Docker Containers 24/7 in Australia

Running Docker containers around the clock on a NAS or home server adds to your electricity bill, but how much depends on the container, the hardware, and your state electricity rate. This guide covers real power draw figures, Australian electricity cost calculations, and how to decide which containers are worth running 24/7.

Informational

Australian Privacy Law and Self-Hosted Personal Data: What You Need to Know

Running your own NAS or self-hosted server in Australia puts you in a different legal position than using commercial cloud services. This guide explains which parts of the Privacy Act 1988 apply to home users vs small businesses, what your obligations are, and where the real risks sit.

QNAP Synology VS Comparison

Self-Hosted Note Sync in 2026: Joplin vs Obsidian vs Standard Notes on a NAS

Syncing notes privately through your own NAS is achievable with Joplin, Obsidian, or Standard Notes, but each has different trade-offs in setup complexity, encryption, mobile support, and what happens if your NAS goes offline. This comparison covers what actually works in practice.

QNAP Synology How-To

Rclone for Beginners: How to Sync Your NAS to Any Cloud Provider

Rclone is a free, open-source command-line tool that syncs files between your NAS and virtually any cloud storage provider. This beginner's guide covers installation on Synology and QNAP, configuring your first remote, running your first sync, and automating it to run on a schedule.

Informational

What LLMs Actually Run on 16GB, 32GB and 64GB RAM

A plain-English guide to which local LLM models fit in 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB RAM, what quality trade-offs to expect at each tier, and why NAS RAM constraints matter more than most guides admit.

QNAP Informational

GPU Expansion for NAS: eGPU, PCIe and AI Workloads

Most NAS devices cannot accept a GPU. A small number of QNAP high-end models have PCIe slots, and some support eGPU via Thunderbolt. Here is what is actually possible, what it costs in Australia, and when a dedicated machine is the better call.

Synology Informational

Is Self-Hosting Email Worth It in 2026? The Honest Answer

Self-hosting email is technically possible but almost never worth it. Deliverability failures, constant maintenance, and IP reputation battles defeat most people within months. Here is when it makes sense, and the smarter alternative for everyone else.

QNAP Synology Informational

Running Multiple Self-Hosted Apps on One NAS

RAM is often the first limit when you stack self-hosted apps on one NAS. This guide gives illustrative memory figures for Immich, Jellyfin, Vaultwarden, Nextcloud and Paperless-ngx and shows how to measure your own stack so you can add apps without hitting the ceiling.

QNAP Synology VS Comparison

Nextcloud vs OneDrive for Australian Small Business

Nextcloud vs Microsoft OneDrive compared for Australian small businesses. Covers data sovereignty, Microsoft 365 integration, NBN upload realities, self-hosted NAS costs, and which platform suits teams of 2 to 50 people.