Best setup for using my Mac and PC (2024)

Dear all,

Since a couple of years I have started to use Mac laptops (currently MacbookAir) alongside a windows laptop. Apart from the shared use of dropbox/google drive I have always used the both computers and their content separated from each other. With the proud purchase of my first NAS (the TS-251) I hope to create a setup in which I can use the storage capacity on my TS-251 for a shared workspace/backups on both laptops (and soon a PC).

Can you advise me how to best do this? I have tried to read up on the basics of the different file systems of windows and OSX, however i can't say i now know what to do and what settings to keep in mind. How would you go about doing this?

FYI my setup:
QNAP TS-251, 2x Desktop SSHD 4 TB
RAID 1
MacBook Air (OS X El Capitan 10.11.2)
ASUS N551JKCN13 (Windows

Thanks!
Harold

Hello Harold,

Could your please explain a bit better what do you wish to do? As I am trying to understand if you need to use something other then a SMB or AFP file server. If so all you need to do it activate SMB file sharing on the NAS and on OSX press connect as of finder once you click on the share.
On the backup side on the NAS just turn on Timemachine backup and it works like a charm.
If im missing the point on what you are trying to accomplish let me know, if not then later i can put some screenshots to explain myself better and help you do this.
+
Hope it helps

ROP

LGNDRY wrote:Dear all,

Since a couple of years I have started to use Mac laptops (currently MacbookAir) alongside a windows laptop. Apart from the shared use of dropbox/google drive I have always used the both computers and their content separated from each other. With the proud purchase of my first NAS (the TS-251) I hope to create a setup in which I can use the storage capacity on my TS-251 for a shared workspace/backups on both laptops (and soon a PC).

Can you advise me how to best do this? I have tried to read up on the basics of the different file systems of windows and OSX, however i can't say i now know what to do and what settings to keep in mind. How would you go about doing this?

FYI my setup:
QNAP TS-251, 2x Desktop SSHD 4 TB
RAID 1
MacBook Air (OS X El Capitan 10.11.2)
ASUS N551JKCN13 (Windows

Thanks!
Harold

Hi Rop,

thanks for you reply, and sorry for not being more specific. That's the problem of a novice isn't it...

Let me try to summarize my thoughts:
1. Is there one filesystem i can use on my NAS to store Mac and PC files?

(Background: On my Mac i see two network disks one named AFP and the other SMB. However SMB is the only one that seems to work (AFP I can't connect to). And my PC I only see one disk without specification whether it's AFP/SMB.)

2. Or can I better make use of two separate partitions on my disks: one for Mac (SMB?) and one for PC (AFP?) ?

Thanks

1. Is there one filesystem i can use on my NAS to store Mac and PC files?

The file system (how your files are physically stored on the disk) doesn't matter when the files are accessed over network file sharing. The file system the NAS uses actually will be ext4, otherwise used by Linux. You are confused because you are thinking about external drives. It would matter there, but a NAS acts as a file server and abstracts all that from its clients.

On my Mac i see two network disks one named AFP and the other SMB. However SMB is the only one that seems to work (AFP I can't connect to). And my PC I only see one disk without specification whether it's AFP/SMB.

AFP and SMB are network file sharing protocols. AFP is native to Apple and not supported by Windows. SMB is native to Windows, but widely supported by others, including Apple. Your simplest setup would be to use SMB only, as that will work with both of your clients. If for some reason you wanted to, you should also be able to use AFP on the Mac and SMB on Windows, and still have both systems see the same files.

Can I better make use of two separate partitions on my disks: one for Mac (SMB?) and one for PC (AFP?) ?

No. The protocols don't have anything to do with partitions (called volumes on the NAS) and that would be unnecessary even if you wanted to keep things separate.

This is good stuff Idlewizard! Thanks, and most of all thanks for taking the time to educate me along the way. I now have a good idea of how i want to set things up. I think I will make a simple dual structure in terms of folders instead of volumes/partitions: one for all Mac stuff, one for all Windows stuff.

Thanks again for your help!

I am confused. I also wanted my QNAP NAS to work as a way of sharing files between PC and Mac's. Or, at least, to share all of my files on my Mac machines. As part of having my QNAP NAS, I wanted to sync and access my files on several machines using an app such as QSync. Then I could eliminate the need for DropBox, iCloud Drive, and keep my "cloud service" completely under my own direction and whatever physical location I wanted.

How come I am limited to certain characters using QSync such as filenames with characters such as ": \ / : * ? " < > |" all because they only use a ext4 file system but then you say the file system matter when accessing over a network file sharing system such as AFB or SMB? Is this because I am not copying these files to my QNAP, but merely accessing them?

The problem with this is some apps don't like to access files remotely in that manner - I guess it has something to do with the delayed access speed versus using a file that is on the main system (not remotely).