Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Linkstation NAS, January 30, 2009
The 2TB Linkstation Pro Duo does everything the folks at Buffalo say it will. The configuration utility is a simple web based utility like used on many routers. The setup offers many powerful features like adding numerous user accounts with varying permissions to different shared folders. I have used this feature to give each person their own backup folders for their PC's in addition to putting all our digital pictures in one place for everyone to use.
Out of the box it comes setup for Raid 0, non mirrored, 2TB capacity. Change over is easy but did take about 5 hours for the drive to perform disk tests. Once completed, it has a 1TB capacity and all the data is mirrored on both drives so you won't loose data (why I bought this drive).
One default I changed on the drive was to set a static IP address for the drive, otherwise a router reboot might cause the IP address to change which can cause problems with breaking your mapped drive (found this out on a print server a few years ago).
For everyone who complains that Vista won't work with this product, TURN OFF the Antivirus/Firewall. Turns out my Trend Micro firewall was on and I couldn't get the install to work. Once I figured it out, everything started working fine. If you have a firewall in your router there is no need for using the Windows or Antivirus firewalls.
Drive is quiet - I have it on top of my entertainment center, where the router is, in the living room and can't hear it run. Works fine with wireless access thru the router but that makes it slower that being direct connected. Not really an issue except for the first time you do a full image backup of the computer, then it's worth running the cable to make this go faster (takes a long time to copy 100 Gig!!!)
Web Access is the coolest feature of all, I can upload or download files remotely with nothing but IE or Firefox. You can even setup an account that is Read Only so others can see your pictures but can't delete them by accident. I'm not a big network kind of person so it took me a while to figure out how to do this but it does work!
Good Product at a Great Price!
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
All you need, probably, March 6, 2009
Buffalo Technology LS-W2.0TGL/R1 2TB LinkStation Pro Duo Shared Network Storage (Black)
I was looking for a RAID 1 (I do not trust the rest in this price range) and as large as possible. Ran into many in Amazon and this brand had better review than the others. This model showed up recently and the price (309$)was tempting, it only had four 5 Star review which makes it risky, but I received it yesterday and pretty happy with the result.
What I like about LinkStation:
Easy setup: You do not need to install the supplied software if you are geek enough to find the IP address in router menu. Web Interface is pretty easy with its help if you do not understand any parameter. I changed it from RAID 0 to RAID 1 in 2-3 minutes but the check disk after that took a long time (6-7 hours). It can easily be administered and the files system can be accessed from PC, Linux (I tested it with Ubantu 9.1, Open Suse 11, Yellow Dog 6 and all work fine) and MAC (I have not used it with MAC). It also has FTP that is more efficient protocol for bulk data transfer, with many different front end software in the market that makes it as easy as a file system.
Media Server: It has a DLNA (UPnP protocol) Media Server inside that makes it way more valuable. My TV (Sony XBR6) can only play photos on the Media Server, so I bought a SONY Play Station 3 (a Gaming Console + Blue Ray Player + Web Browser + UPnP media render) to play the media (Music, Photo and Video) stored in the LinkStation on my TV, and it works awesome. There are many cheaper solutions ( around 160$) if you just want the wireless access and play on TV. Also consider Sony XBR9 has a built-in Media Server client (Ethernet Only) in it. I am not sure it matches the speed of a PS3, because the XBR6 photo player is pretty slow. So the combination of PS3 and Linkstation works well, both wireless and wired.
Scalability: You can add as many LinkStation to your network and instead of RAID 1 have a scheduled backup between LinkStations weekly, considering the home media is not changing every day.
What I do not like about LinkStation:
Documents coming on CD are outdated.
You can not take a Disk out to test your RAID (call me paranoid)
P.S. Use of RAID 1 is expensive, especially in this price range, so do not expect it to be high speed in writing; However it looked to me faster than many USB external disks, but definitely slower that ATA second disk (7200 RPM) I have in my laptop. Also I was using Wireless G and not connected directly to my Gigabit router.
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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Horrendous Customer Support, April 1, 2009
Okay, so I should have looked at the reviews on Amazon first. I needed more space and thought I got a great price on this device. Well, after installing it and trying to connect it to my network I discoved one little itty bitty problem (okay, so I'm being sarcastic) - the software that is supposed to be installed DOES NOT SHOW UP on my Windows Vista Machine. No big deal, right? WRONG! The software also wasn't on the disk and, therefore, couldn't be manually installed either. Of course, nothing about this is mentioned on Buffalo's site.
So, I called Buffalo's non-existent 24/7 tech support. I spent an HOUR and a HALF on the phone only to be disconnected THREE TIMES and never spoke to anyone. After looking at other Amazon reviews for Buffalo products, I discovered that a lot of other people have had similar problems: one person suggested looking at the BBB report for Buffalo - they have a rating of F - that's right, an F - for refusing to respond to consumers who have bought their products.
Since I first wrote this review last night, I've been able to successfully contact Buffalo and they finally resolved the problem. As a result, I've now "upgraded" my rating to three stars (from my intial rating of one star).
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