In a previous blog post, I spoke about our plan to back up travel footage while exploring Asia. The solution? A NAS (Network-Attached Storage) server—a specialized device that connects to the internet and acts like a personal cloud storage system. Our NAS has 9TB of storage, which is enough to hold thousands of video clips, especially since our average clip is less than 1GB. This makes it an ideal backup solution—at least in theory. We figured this would solve our biggest problems: memory cards and portable hard drives are expensive, easy to lose, and prone to failure. With the size of modern memory cards, we risk losing thousands of video clips—wiping out months of travel footage in an instant.
The Plan: High-Speed Uploads, Easy Backups
When we arrived in Asia, we started recording as planned. Everything was going well. From South Korea, we connected to our NAS back home. Beforehand, we checked the internet speeds and were told it had close to 500MB/s upload and download speeds—which sounded too good to be true.
Then we started transferring files.
And we got... 1.7MB/s.
Not only that, but the speed fluctuated wildly, sometimes dropping to 800KB/s. For reference, many of our 4K 60fps clips are 2–3GB each, so at this rate, a single file took forever to upload. Just a week into our travels, we already had hundreds of clips stacking up. This was a huge problem.
The Reality: Slow, Unreliable Uploads
At first, I thought it was just the hotel’s internet. No big deal—we’d find a better connection elsewhere. Maybe a co-working space? Surely, at some point, we’d hit that perfect high-speed spot and catch up on our backups.
Jump ahead 2.5 months, and things are getting critical. We have filled 5 of our 6 memory cards with over 5,000 clips waiting to be backed up. I have spent months trying to upload files, but no matter where I go, I run into the same problem. Even when I find locations that start at 2MB/s, the speed drops to 100KB/s after an hour—a 20x slowdown.
The Breakthrough: Understanding the Problem
Now, I’m sitting in a coffee shop in Ninh Binh, almost three months into our trip, and I’ve FINALLY figured out what is going wrong.
Here’s the thing: I’m not a networking expert. When I first set up our NAS, I go with the simplest option—QuickConnect. This feature makes setup easy because the NAS handles all the connections itself. But here’s the catch: instead of directly connecting my laptop to the NAS, all data is routed through a separate server first.
Why does it do this? Because QuickConnect is designed for ease of use, not speed. It acts as a middleman, relaying data through Synology’s servers so that users don’t have to configure their network settings manually. This avoids issues like firewall restrictions and port forwarding but comes at the cost of much slower transfer speeds.
Think of it like mailing a letter across town but, instead of sending it directly, the post office forwards it through a distribution center in another country. It works, but it's way slower than a direct delivery.
The Fix: A Smarter Workflow
After digging through forums and troubleshooting, I find a workaround: Instead of transferring files directly to the NAS, I upload them to Dropbox first and then let Dropbox sync them to the NAS.
For those unfamiliar, Dropbox is a cloud storage service that lets you upload files to its servers and access them from anywhere. Think of it as a virtual storage locker that you can open from any device, no matter where you are. The key advantage is that Dropbox has high-speed, global infrastructure, making uploads far more efficient than trying to send files directly to a personal NAS across the world.
Why is this so much faster? Because Dropbox uses a network of optimized servers strategically placed worldwide. Instead of struggling with unpredictable internet connections and slow, long-distance transfers, Dropbox quickly finds the fastest route to store your files. Our NAS, using QuickConnect, doesn’t have this advantage and relies on a slower, indirect path.
Think of it like this: Imagine you're trying to send a huge package home while traveling. You have two options: You could send it through a slow, unreliable shipping service with a complicated routing system, or you could use a major courier like FedEx with optimized logistics and distribution centers worldwide. The second option is far more efficient—that’s Dropbox.
Once the files are on Dropbox, the NAS downloads them at full speed back home. With QuickConnect, our upload speeds averaged 300KB/s, meaning a 1GB file took almost an hour to transfer. Dropbox, on the other hand, consistently hit 1000MB/s, allowing us to upload the same file in just one second. Instead of waiting hours or days for a single clip to upload, we are suddenly able to upload entire batches of files in minutes. This changed everything and finally solved our backup issue.
The Lesson: a Simple Setup Isn’t Always the Best Setup
At this point, we decide to try Dropbox’s one-month free trial to see if it can help. I am expecting to be able to back up over 2TB of video clips today alone, something that would have been impossible with our previous setup. The speed difference is staggering.
Looking ahead, I plan to cancel the trial before it renews to avoid unnecessary costs. If we ever find ourselves in a similar situation, paying for just one month of Dropbox every 3–4 months is an incredible value, as it allows us to clear out our backlog quickly without a long-term commitment. Given how fast the transfers are, a full subscription doesn’t make much sense for us, but paying for a single month as needed? Absolutely worth it.
I started this journey thinking a NAS would be the perfect travel backup solution and it still is. However, as it turns out, the default setup wasn’t built for what we needed. By understanding how data actually moves across networks, I finally found a workflow that works for us.
If you’re planning something similar, don’t assume that the easiest solution is always the best one. Sometimes, re-evaluating your approach can save you months of frustration—and from a whole lot of lost footage.
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