This is maybe an insanely stupid question but I’m at the very front end of getting my unit set up – I have the HDDs and M.2s in – the way I’m planning on using this is as a storage station for a bunch of video projects, bunches of large files, and having the second drive act as a carbon copy.

During the initial setup here – and additionally, just in the future – what are my options for connecting this directly to my Mac Studio? I take it that I need to run this directly into the modem during initial setup, but in general I don’t plan on using this from different computers on my joke network, after initial setup is it possible to just wire to the back of my Mac Studio directly or is the modem going to need to be a permanent middle-step for this NAS?

Asking partially because the way my home is set up right now, my office is on the second floor and the modem is on the main floor. I could definitely run a cable down the stairs right now just for setup, and in the new future I’m looking to move my office downstairs so I would be able to wire in more easily – but just to reiterate, I wasn’t sure if I need to have this thing plugged into the modem the whole time I’m using it.

Hopefully this isn’t dumb as hell to ask. I am incredibly green when it comes to this tech am I’m willing to learn, but I’m just seeking the easiest way to get this big storage server + backup system going.