LG NAS or HP Microserver - Which One Is right For You?

Over the past two years a rapid fall in the price of hard disks prices, combined with a big increase in their capacity, means that more tech enthusiasts are now adopting the kind of storage technologies that were once restricted to business.

NAS (Network Attached Storage) and servers are the two main contenders for those looking to store very large amounts of data on a home network that can be accessed locally or remotely, while offering a decent level of redundancy, in case things go slightly awry.

The two storage solutions address slightly different markets, however: NAS devices only appeared relatively recently, and are characterised by the fact that they are generally transportable and can be connected easily to any network.

One of the better units on the market is the LG N2R1 which costs less than £190 (you can get it without any hard disk drives for just £99.99). It comes with a wealth of features.

It stands out from most NAS devices we've seen before for good reasons. Its front fascia is aesthetically pleasing, tastefully merging gray and white.

It comes by default with 2TB onboard storage, in the form of two 1TB hard disks, that can be configured either as RAID1, JBOD or RAID0. The drives are also ‘hot-swappable’. 

LG has judiciously built in a DVD burner, card reader, LCD display and even a USB port.

The N2R1 is also accessible remotely via the web, thanks to a nifty web interface. It supports all major platforms, can act as a network print server, is certfied by the Digital Living Network Alliance, and comes with two-year warranty.

The latest firmware update (available here) adds access to the Microserver via Apple’s iOS, which means you can access the server using an iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch. It also adds multi-printer support, improved SAMBA support, a BitTorrent client and much more.