Storage Management

Storage Management

Store your data in a reliable, scalable, and SSD-aware QNAP NAS

Storage & Snapshots Manager

With its intuitive graphical interface, Storage & Snapshots Manager makes it easy to manage disks, volumes, storage pools, iSCSI storage, and SSD caches.

  • Storage Overview

    Quickly obtain the status of all volumes and storage pools at a glance. Now, you can also easily identify the type of each volume and LUN.

  • Snapshot Overview

    Manage your snapshots with a professional and detail-driven interface. All the snapshot versions and the time of your latest snapshot are precisely recorded.

Global Settings

Configure global settings for storage, disks, and snapshots to ensure optimal RAID performance and health. Adjust settings for all snapshots on the NAS.

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RAID management, upgrade, and migration

Based on the number of hard drives in the NAS, you can choose from various RAID types that provide varying levels of performance and data redundancy. It is also easy to expand and migrate the RAID without interrupting system operations.

 

» Learn more: RAID management

Select a volume type or LUN that suits your needs

Create multiple volumes on the storage pool for various applications in typical business environments with different workgroups. Volume sizes can also be shrunk, ensuring your NAS can adapt to changing needs.

  • Static Volume

    Static Volumes are created directly on a RAID group. They give the best performance for random file access (up to 20% faster than other disk volumes). This option is suitable for creating high-performance storage spaces for file sharing or online collaboration.

  • Thick Volume

    Thick Volumes are created from pre-allocated storage pool space. The capacity is reserved and expandable. This option is suitable for general usage.

  • Thin Volume

    Thin Volumes can be created with more space than the usable storage capacity, and take physical space from the storage pool only as data is written to the volume. Thin provisioning maximizes storage utilization and is useful for dynamic storage spaces and limited storage shared by multiple users.

  • Block-based iSCSI LUN

    Besides storing data, the volume can be utilized as an iSCSI LUN. The block-level iSCSI LUN provides less overhead which improves the overall read/write performance. It also supports virtualization applications (such as VAAI thin provisioning and storage reclaim and Microsoft® ODX) as an ideal choice for iSCSI storage solution.

Note: Thin volumes require close attention to storage utilization to prevent downtime due to insufficient storage space. Space of thin volumes means the maximized potential capacity. Other volumes may utilize the physical space. If the usable space is insufficient for snapshot reversion, the snapshot reversion operation will not function.

SSD cache acceleration

Adding an SSD cache to a QNAP NAS is an easy way to increase the performance of your storage - especially for IOPS-demanding applications. You can launch, stop, or change settings to meet your needs at any moment without shutting down the system.

» Learn more: SSD caching

Write-only cache RAID 5/6 SSD caches Global SSD cache
You can dedicate resources to greatly boost write-intensive applications, such as media storage and IoT log services to enjoy maximized ROI on SSDs. RAID 5/6 configurations for sequential-access applications or a read-only cache can provide quality performance similar to a RAID 10 SSD cache along with more caching space that’s beneficial for boosting frequently-used data. Global SSD cache acceleration can share a single SSD volume/RAID with all volumes/iSCSI LUNs for a read-only or read-write cache.

True SSD-aware storage: Software-defined SSD extra over-provisioning

You can allocate additional SSD over-provisioning space (from 1% to 60%) to help optimize SSD random write speeds and lifespan - allowing you to potentially attain enterprise-grade SSD performance levels and endurance from affordable consumer SSDs! A unique SSD Profiling Tool helps evaluate the best over-provisioning ratio based on the target IOPS performance.

» Learn more: SSD Extra Over-provisioning

Qtier technology drives Auto Tiering

Qtier™ technology automatically moves data between high-performance SSDs, SAS drives and high-capacity SATA disks based on access frequencies, allowing you to enjoy exceptional application performance and lower TCO of storage at the same time.

» Learn more: Qtier

Allocation priority

Manually configure the storage tier for a folder’s new data to be placed in. This provides customizable flexibility to arrange tiered storage suited for system and application demands and allows for maximum utilization of SSDs for IOPS-demanding tasks.

Qtier maximizes the value of SSDs

What’s better, Qtier’s IO-aware feature empowers SSD tiered storage to not only store active data but also reserve a cache-like space to handle burst I/O in real time, beneficial for maximizing the advantages of SSDs for both optimal capacity and performance.

» Learn more: Qtier for SSD

RAID 50/60 balances capacity,
protection and performance

When using a NAS with over 10 disks, RAID 50/60 not only provides greater data protection than a single RAID 5/6, but also maximizes the usable storage space compared to RAID 10. Besides data storage, and with an obvious random write performance boost when using SSD RAID, RAID 50/60 also offers a great choice for professional video streaming and database usage.

Comprehensive RAID types offered by QNAP

RAID Type RAID 5 RAID 6 RAID 10 RAID 50 RAID 60
Number of Disks At least 3 At least 4 At least 4 At least 6 At least 8
Number of Disk Faults Tolerated 1 2 1 in each sub-array 1 in each sub-array 2 in each sub-array
Write Performance          
Capacity          
Ideal Usage General applications General applications VDI hosting and databases High-frequency backup High-capacity VDI or media editing

Note:

1. The actual fault tolerance of RAID 50/60 depends on the number of RAID groups.

2. RAID 50/60 is highly recommended for NAS models with more than 10 drives.

Flexible and economical storage expansion

You need an easy solution to increase storage capacity when running out of space. QNAP provides several ways to expand your NAS storage as needed to accommodate data and business growth.

  • Upgrade RAID Capacity

    Hot swap lower-capacity drives with larger-capacity drives.

    » Learn more: Online RAID Capacity Upgrade

  • Attach Expansion Enclosures

    Connect one or more QNAP expansion enclosures for seamless capacity expansion.

    » Learn more: Storage Expansion Compatibility

  • VJBOD

    Use VJBOD (Virtual JBOD) to expand your storage capacity by using the unused storage of other QNAP NAS. Up to 8 QNAP NAS can be mounted as local disks on the host NAS.

    » Learn more: VJBOD

  • Migrate to a New NAS

    Install your NAS hard drives into a larger QNAP NAS and retain all your existing data and configurations.

    » Learn more: Migrating from an old NAS