Accessibility of Network Storage Device Software

I use the Western Digital 4 TB drive for my desktop computer. It's very simple. Just plug it in and and/remove files with normal Windows commands. Love it. I really use that space.

I use the Patriot Aero wireless drive 1 TB with my iPhone. Just download the iOS app, pair the drive and then you can access anything previously added to the drive through the computer. Just remember that you have to disable the home network and enable the drive network under Settings in order to access the drive. This drive is quite small and travels well.

Both investment options have worked well to meet my needs. Both were purchased on the US Amazon.com site.

HTH

Hello,

I have a My Book World white light Edition from WD. I have been running it for a long time now and it’s very reliable and quiet.

The bundled software, discovery, is not accessable. That software was used one time to find the NAS on the network. Once I got the IP, I logged into the NAS using Firefox. I set the IP from dynamic to Static and configured it to my liking. It’s a HTML format so your screen reader will work. I had the option of RAID 0, 1 or JBOD. Using the NAS’s web interface, I was able to set it to RAID 1, provide user access control, setup drop box amongst other things.

So in short, the only accessable issue I ran into was using the Discovery tool to find the NAS. After that, everything was screen reader friendly.

HTH and good luck.

Hello,

I use a QNap NAS. The web interface is accessible but I prefer to use the iOS apps. You have qFile: to view and stream files. QQemote: to make changes in the settings and manage torrent downloads. etc....

I use the NAS to stream videos from my NAS to my apple tv 4.

Hi All

Thanks for the posts that I am just starting to work my way through !!!,

Like many, I have similar questions and not too many answers yet!! So any advice would be much appreciated.

AS many of us want to create and store our music, photos, dvds and docs in both a digital and mobile environment, I have been challenged with what is out there that is accessible.

I have found a range of External drives such as the Seagate personal cloud drive or the Western Digital MyCloud external network drive, NAS units and units like the Audio Vault or cocktail audio. Many of these devices also use iOS or android apps for controlling the drives or accessing files remotely or only manage one type of format.

For example for me, I started looking for something that I could wrip and then store my CDS music collection, DVDs, family photos, documents and backup connected devices to.

I then wanted a drive unit that would then connect to our router which our TV, Denon AV receiver and apple TV are also all connected to. Note, the AV receiver has AirPlay and Bluetooth and is connected to the router. So I could stream music, or DVDs from.

Many of the drives had apps and the home screens appeared to work not too bad with voiceover.

What I couldn’t get any answers to, was, once files were on one of these drives, how well would the iOS app work, would one be able to read the folder and names of files or tracks, would one be able to play and stream music, and stream DVDS to the AV receiver and TV, or access and play files when away from home?

I couldn’t find any information about accessibility on line, I couldn’t get any answers from suppliers, and no stores that I tried had units that were set up and connected that one could try using the app with.

So if anyone has purchased a drive and it works well with the app etc, would be really kean to know more.

I did look at a couple of NAS units, but I didn't really want a unit that was quite that large, more something that would sit on a shelf or fit in to the unit that the TV and AV receiver sits on.

Many thanks

I have both the WD MyBook Live and the newer MyCloud NAS drives. These both came with software, but I never ran it. I just plugged the drives into ports on my router and connected to them through the network section of Windows Explorer. I think I would have had to run the software if I had wanted to set up accounts to access the drives from the Internet, but I only need to access them from my local network.

WD provides a free iOS app which can be used to access these drives. Actually, they provide 2 apps: one gives general access to the entire drive, the other is specific for photos. I've never used the photo app, so I cannot speak to its accessibility, but the general app, simply named MyCloud, is accessible. Just run the app on your device that's connected to the same network as the drive and it will automatically look for the drive. I've accessed my music on the drive and my wife has watched videos on her iPad using the app.

I've also connected my Sonos speakers to my music folder on the drive so I can play any of my music on my Sonos speakers from the WD MyCloud drive.

I'm very satisfied with these drives and have all of my important data stored on them.

Hi everyone
Models by sinology appear to be accessible both in web interface and IOS app. Jonothan Mosen has written an excellent blog post about his experiences. I am looking for one myself in the future, just don't know how much it'll cost yet. It appears for the unit, it is recommended to purchase specific NAS drives that are designed to for example run 24/7 inside a NAS device. I think the ones by western digital are called something like WD Red NAS drives and come in various varieties from 2tb and higher. From the research I have done, some websites like B and H video offer units with drives already installed and ready to go. I would prefer that myself but perhaps it would be cheaper to go somewhere like amazon and buy the unit and drives separately. The specific NAS drives by various companies also appear to come with decent 1 or 2 year warranties. Here is Jonothans post:

http://mosen.org/synology-diskstation-manager-now-significantly-more-accessible/

Any other thoughts on this would be appreciated.