Xu Hu Productions

DiskStation comes with large space for file storage and sharing. You also get to enjoy having it at an affordable price and the option to expand storage with its expansion units. All in all, it is a decent choice! Tora Yuan, Director

The Company

With 15 years of film-making experience, Director Yuan has accumulated over 200 pieces of commercials and music videos in his portfolio, which has gained high recognition across Taiwan, Hong Kong, and China. Some of the renowned works include TGI Friday's series, 7-11 Summer Light Diet series, MAX Cosmetics, HealthBanks, Sapporo Beer, the artist WuBai's music video "Tear Bridge," and the music video of the artist Faith Yang, etc.

The Challenge

It is absolutely crucial for Director Yuan, a devotee in his work and one who spends the majority of his time in the studio, to establish his own archive when it comes to storing film materials and managing all relevant files. As the amount of digital files increased, the previously purchased DiskStation DS509 was insufficient to deliver the storage capacity and performance required. Yuan said, "The nature of my job is about constant traveling and producing large amount of film materials, thus I definitely need a personal storage of my own. This way, I can access the files I need no matter where I am." After taking everything into consideration, Director Yuan realized that he needed a new storage solution that can deliver higher performance and larger storage volume.

The Solution

After a thorough research on the choices that's available on the market, Director Yuan, who had high demands for data storage and performance, decided to purchase a DiskStation DS1511+ along with its expansion unit, DX510, to store all film contents. Yuan has divided up the storage space based on different types of data and its various levels of importance. The dual Ethernet port design allows DS1511+ to carry out smooth and large file transfer between NAS server and the computer. By using two connectors at the same time, the transfer rate can deliver at a rate of 200MB/sec in reading.

Yuan's studio is currently equipped with a DiskStation DS1511+ and two DX510 expansion units. The storage is now empowered by RAID settings for data security and also turns into a personal archive and file center. Synology's solutions not only free Yuan from the worries of insufficient capacity and data protections, but also offer Yuan remote access at any time via the Internet.

High capacity of storage

Director Yuan explained that the scalability of DiskStation DS1511+ was one of the reasons why he chose it in the beginning. DiskStation DS1511+ can reach to a maximum of 45TB capacity by pairing with two sets of expansion units. According to Yuan, the size of a 30-second commercial shoot, including all the relevant materials, is around 200GB (ProRes 422 HQ format ) which is equivalent to one-fifth capacity of a 1TB hard drive. As for a standard feature film or documentary, it approximately takes up an average capacity of 4TB (Full HD ProRes 444). In other words, DiskStation DS1511+ is the top choice for Yuan as far as it is capable to provide sufficient storage space and the scalability for future demands.

RAID data protection

For Director Yuan, all the referencing data and film materials are very precious. Therefore, according to different data demands, he packed DS1511+ with five 2TB hard drives and RAID 6 fault-tolerance of data protection. In addition, he stores materials for film editing on DX510 and adopts RAID 5 with enterprise-level hard drives. These combinations greatly enhance data stability and security and further minimize the possibility of data loss.

Mac OS X complete support

Since Director Yuan is also a Mac user, he has a Mac Pro-centered set of film editing equipments in his studio. When it comes to Synology's solutions and support for Mac system, Yuan said, "Products in general only offer limited support for Mac, but Synology's solutions are highly compatible with Mac. I am very much satisfied." Besides the support for Mac OS X on file sharing and storage, DiskStation allows users to manage account and privilege settings easily. For instance, Yuan would assign accounts with basic privileges for production companies to access certain folders on the DiskStation. Yet, for staff that he works closely with, such as editors, Yuan would give them accounts with higher levels of privileges so the staff could have more access to film materials.

FTP file sharing

Besides on-site film shooting, Director Yuan's daily routine also includes post-processing the editing materials. Since both the director and the editor have a copy of the same film that need to be post-processed, the embedded FTP server on DiskStation makes it convenient to share their individual edited clips with each other. Or they can download the clips to their respective computers for comparisons and further revisions. What's more, editors and other staff can directly upload reference materials they found onto the FTP server. This way, it can save meeting time for both sides and Yuan can finish his work at the studio without trivial interruptions. To sum up, the overall efficiency of the studio is greatly improved.

Recommended Models

  • DS1511+
  • DX510

Recommended Features

  • Large storage capacity
  • Flexible RAID data protection
  • Mac environment support
  • FTP file sharing
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