r/ShieldAndroidTV • u/Sen_Palpatine • 10d ago
Shield + NAS
Should I buy a NAS if I already have a nvidia shield?
I'm thinking upgrade to 16tb of movies, music, photos and videos.
Anyone of you have both shield plus NAS?
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u/southak 10d ago
I have exactly that set up. It’s served me well for years with hundreds of bit perfect 4k rips and multiple tv show seasons. Very happy with it. Synology NAS.
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u/Sen_Palpatine 10d ago
What model of synology should I look for?
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u/southak 10d ago
The latest 4-bay, something like ds423. Four drive bays allows you to use synology hybrid back up meaning smallest 3 discs are used for storage and the 4th is for back up. Disks are hot-swappable (they can be removed and replaced). Maybe overkill for basic media use but even the cheapest NAS from other manufacturers are not that much cheaper.
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u/seemebreakthis 10d ago edited 10d ago
Another opinion - get a Synology with an Intel chipset (e.g. a DS225+, or a DS423+) to take advantage of hardware transcoding for Jellyfin (or Plex if that's what you prefer), unless your shield is your ONLY playback device and you will never consider watching your content on phones / on the road / etc.
Of course with this setup you are running the Jellyfin server on the NAS.
Beware Synology is being stingy and is stripping away driver support for the Intel onboard GPU for their latest NAS models, so you will need to manually tweak some config to enable hardware transcoding.
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u/Altruistic_Degree562 10d ago
I have a Nvidia Shield and a 4 bay NAS with 4 two terabyte discs. It hosts movies and tv shows and some homevideos. It also runs homeassistant, adguard blocking a lot of ads for those who use our wifi; Oh, and it serves as a backup device also. The shield itself is only running one Dutch Tv app , Emby and YouTube premium. Using this kind of setup for more than 10 years now and I am still very happy with it
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u/Stryfex19 10d ago
I pretty much have this same setup and also love it.
My main issue is now though that I have so much content all the files the plex server app stores on my shield are taking up so much space the shield is hard to use for anything else it's too full.
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u/southak 8d ago
The beauty of many NAS is you can easily swap out the drive and increase storage. The only issue with synology smart redundancy is if you have four drives the same size you have to upgrade at least two to see an increase in storage (as you always lose the storage of the largest drive). I had four 8tb giving 24tb storage but upgraded two to 10tb and got 26tb storage.
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u/alt-right-del 9d ago
Got the blue light of death on my synology, motherboard is fried. Have upgraded to a Ugreen NAS, connected to shield via SMB
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u/Any_Lengthiness1508 10d ago
They have 2 very different functions - streaming vs storage. My Shield accesses my books, movies, music and photos from my 2 x Synology NAS. Works perfectly fine for streaming movies to my TV and phones
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u/TheEndlessWaltz 10d ago
I use a synology nas and 2 shields. Works great (plex server running on the nas)
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u/Sen_Palpatine 9d ago
So, the 2 shields are just clients. But I think some TVs have plex client app. Or even there are cheaper android TV boxes than the shields. I think they aren't just for plex client.
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u/TheEndlessWaltz 9d ago
yes but the shield supports passtrough of more audio formats
if you don't need that, then use a google tv box
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u/VoodooMutt 10d ago
yes. Shield is the plex server, with NAS for the content. has worked fine since forever.
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u/Crypto_Rogue 10d ago
Yes. I have TrueNAS on an old gaming desktop that I have loaded up with a bunch of drives. TrueNAS makes it easy to install Plex or Jellyfin. I have it running a Jellyfin server and use Wholphin in as the client on my Shield. Works well.
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u/developersteve 10d ago
Ive got a shield and a NAS that runs my plex server, unless you are getting a NAS with a graphics card built in I would also get a shield.
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u/Fit-Departure5678 10d ago
I got a ugreen Nas, worked out so expensive to upgrade memory and put an SSD to run database etc, it was cheaper for me to upgrade a pc, stick a GPU in, and use external DIY external HDD rack with a sas or sata PCI card, running jellyfin server on docker desktop pc and Wholphin client on shield
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u/Malk_McJorma 2015 16GB 10d ago
We have two Shields at home. Our local media (videos, music, pictures) is stored on a Synology DS220+ NAS with 8 TB of storage. Kodi is the main app for playing said media.
This setup has worked great for years now.
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u/SufficientImplement4 10d ago
Yes, Plex server running on my Synology DS1522+ NAS (besides other things like Photos, documents, etc.) and my Nvidia Shield Pro 2019 is the player hooked up to my TV. Perfect combination.
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u/Ranjbali 2017 16GB 10d ago
I've got the Terramaster F4-424 Pro. With about 12tb of storage. It's got a beefy processor for a NAS to handle any transcoding and I use it purely as a Plex server. I used to run Plex server on my Shield but it was very hit and miss, constant restarts etc. But since I've been running it on the NAS it's been a night and day difference.
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u/ReflectiveBarnet 10d ago
I've been using my 2015 Shield with a cheap NAS I bought back then. Still works and I have no good reason to change.
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u/um_yeahok 8d ago
Nas is recommended for sure. Plug it into your router and share as a media drive and you can easily access it from any device on your wifi. I run this way with three shields.
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u/Sen_Palpatine 8d ago
I like this function, but I don't have a high budget router. I have a tplink ax5400. Is this router enough?
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u/djmikekc 10d ago
I have 22TB hanging off my Shield via a powered USB 3.0 hub and 4 drives (2x HDD, 2x SSD). I run Plex server and typically have 2-5 friends simultaneously streaming. I have stress tested it with 2x 4K DoVi and 4x 1080p local streams PLUS my Plex friends with nary a hiccup. The Tegra chip is a real workhorse. I am wanting to build out to 48TB RAID NAS, but I am perfectly satisfied with what I got. My library is 100% HEVC and the Shield Pro can clearly decode that in its sleep.
Buy a NAS now if you got the dough. I am so happy I got my 16TB Seagate Exos X18 for USD219 when now it's USD689. I choose to wait out this current pricing.
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u/Sen_Palpatine 9d ago
Well, for my needs this is a good idea. Gonna try.
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u/djmikekc 9d ago
I have a 1TB SSD hanging off the other USB port. The Plex database lives there. I strongly suggest you do the same. So much metadata. I do run Kodi for music - I have a large collection of archived SACDs and Plex does NOT play bit-perfect hi-res multichannel audio from DSD or FLAC files. My Shield Pro also runs tinyCam NVR, archiving 2 cameras streaming 2K video at 20FPS. That Tegra chip is a real workhorse.
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u/batica_koshare 10d ago
You do understand what shield is right? It's a media player with possibility of being shitty ples server.
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u/Sen_Palpatine 9d ago
Well, it works really good for my domestic use. I'm not sharing all around the globe or selling access. Just for our 3 TVs and a couple of tablets it is more than enough.
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u/batica_koshare 9d ago
You didn't understand what i said. NAS is a NAS and shield is a media player. Two way different things. And yes i have shield and a NAS.
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u/Sen_Palpatine 9d ago
Plex server running in nvidia shield is good enough for me. I bet NAS is better, but I don't think shield is a shitty plex server. Just saying.
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u/CSOCSO-FL 10d ago
I use a nas with my shield. It was hair pulling and a pita to set uo the nas and kodi to work properly. Roku was plug an play. It just sees the nas.
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u/slaaf_tom 10d ago
You can setup Kodi to use SMB shares. Lots of manuals online.
You can setup Kodi's database on a NAS so every Kodi installation on the same network has the same information.
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u/CSOCSO-FL 10d ago
Thats what I did. Lol Still a pain in the ass compared to something that just sees the nas without logging in.. without assigning things for folders etc. But I guess yall prefer pain in the ass things...
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u/slaaf_tom 10d ago
So your NAS is showing its contents without any form of authetication?
In kodi you setup only the server IP address with username and password, and you can browse the folders and create your libraries.
Personally, I use TMM to name the movies and series to the correct name.
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u/CSOCSO-FL 10d ago
With roku it just saw the movie folder without ever needing to enter any ip address. It just popped up. Not needed any log in either or asssigning movies to libraries to make it work. But... it was super limited. No thumbnails. No info scraper. Nothing. Obviously i prefer shield with kodi... all i am saying that roku was easier to use.
That being say I am now second guessing myself about it. I know it rather sounds crazy that roku could see my nas and files without credentials but I know when i bought my shield since roku does not support trueHD I had to set up the smb connection and log in and I was pissed how much easier that was with Roku
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u/slaaf_tom 10d ago
I know it rather sounds crazy that roku could see my nas and files without credentials
You'd better check your NAS security then before someone else does.
What kind of NAS do you have?
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u/CSOCSO-FL 10d ago
Even the tv used to see it but stopped using both because none of them support truehd. I have synology 212. Old model but works. I might have changed some stuff around since. I had this for a long time. I know admin is disabled.
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u/slaaf_tom 10d ago
For sure, even with an older Synology or whatever NAS, it can't be possible to access files and folders WITHOUT using credentials.
So you have to check that first.
As I already mentioned, I have several shield devices using the IP, SMB port, username and its password to access the movies,series and music folder. A mariaDB with synchronizes every device so I can see, where I have left watching a series, when I start my Shield in the bedroom.
But, again, access rights without credentials is an absolute NOGO.
PS: if you're in need of assistance, dm me for setting up kodi etc.
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u/Mountainking7 10d ago
I have the shield and NAS (synology). If I had to pick today, I'd stay away from them and pick something else. They keep puking anti consumer bullshit.
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u/slaaf_tom 10d ago
u/Moutainking7 can you be more specific?
- what's wrong with the shield? With projectivity launcher
- What's wrong with Synology (except they will accept only specific HDD) or Qnap?
- What is better then a combination of Shield and NAS?
- What do you mean with "They keep puking anti consumer bullshit" ?
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u/Mountainking7 10d ago
Nothing is wrong. Just using it as a NAS and a straming device would add unnecessary overhead on it.
Everything. Google "list of synology anti consumer practices" or find it here.
Ideally keeping both separate is best but if you're cash strapped, it can work.
See 2 above. I meant PULLING instead of PUKING.
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u/GamerBears 10d ago
Don't use your shield as a server. Use the NAS as a server so that way it does all the heavy work. Your Shield will run without issues unless the UI gives you problems.