WD My Cloud EX4100 4-Bay Expert Series 16TB NAS Review

Setup – There is more, Add-Ons & External Devices

Cloud Access

Pairing your new My Cloud NAS with your mobile devices is a piece of cake and only involves a few steps.

You’ll need to set up your MDMyCloud.com login and that’s it.

Backup

As previously mentioned, there are a variety of backup methods. The main one will probably be the USB backup where you can create both manual and scheduled backups to your local USB based drives. Copy and synchronize are both available as options.

Remote backup adds the extra security if something should happen to the physical location, this could be theft, fire, or water damages for example. Having your files backed up to a remote location can give a big advantage and the whole thing can be automated.

The Internal Backups could also be called folder backup, as that is what it does. Create backup or synchronize folders on the same NAS unit.

If you don’t want to have another NAS located offsite but still want the benefits of having a remote backup, then the public cloud would be an obvious answer. When we say public, it doesn’t mean that your files are public, but that it’s a commercially available service that might or might not have a free option.

In this case, we have ElephantDrive and Amazon S3 as options, which you pick is your choice.

The Final backup solution is meant for cameras. You can set it to automatically detect when you connect your digital cameras and copy the files onto your NAS.

Apps and Add-Ons

There is a list of pre-installed apps on the server and you can also install more if the function you need isn’t there already. But let us have a look at what is there first.

The first three apps could be considered as one, a download manager. You can let your NAS handle HTTP, FTP, and P2P itself without the need to have your PC running.

You can also schedule when the downloads should be active so you they don’t hog the bandwidth when you need it otherwise.

The fourth pre-installed app is the Web File Viewer that allows you to manage the stored files directly from the admin interface and thereby any browser.

You can add a list of apps directly from the WD My Cloud system or manually add a third party app that you downloaded another place. You can also create your own apps.

The available apps at the time of writing where aMule – peer to peer file sharing application, Icecast – media streaming app, phpBB – Internet forum application, Joomla! – content management system, SqueezeCenter – streaming audio server, phpMyAdmin – My SQL administration tool, WordPress – blogging tool and content management system, and Transmission – BitTorrent client.