Data Management

NAS (Network-Attached Storage)

NAS (Network-Attached Storage) devices have become a staple piece of networking equipment, in both home and small business networks. A NAS can provide data storage and sharing abilities across a network. However, the NAS devices we have tested in PC Labs lately can also do far more: many of them have extensive capabilities, including both backup and data-recovery options, as well as application add-ons to plump up the feature set even further.

Besides providing a way to store and share data on a network, many NAS devices also offer additional server modes. Just about all of the current NAS products on the market support UPnP and DLNA, and are ideal to use as multimedia servers. Just store multimedia content such as video on a share on a NAS, and your DLNA and UPnP supported clients can stream that data.

Increasingly, vendors are creating software on NASes that integrate with sites like Facebook or YouTube. With this integration, you can designate a folder to automatically upload pictures you place into it to websites such as Facebook or videos to YouTube. These NASes often have user-friendly features such as the ability to create slideshows.