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"Home" based nas solution.. any ideas?

L

Laforge

2[H]4U
Joined
Jun 29, 2003
Messages
3,132
Hey all.. I'm looking to try and come up with a home based nas solution, and don't want to build a "real computer" to do it.. looking for something that will support 8 drives, external, and connects via ethernet to the network.

NOt looking to spend 1000s of dollars for the device itself, hence the question.

I mean, I can get

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=us&cs=04&kc=6W300&l=en&oc=PV22XS&s=bsd

from dell, but that's scsi.


but was hoping for something that just has an integrated controller rather than a cpu, and the rest.
 
i have recently been searching, and hate to tell you i came up empty handed. there are plenty of solutions, but the cheapest seem to be upwards of $1200. these are IDE or SATA devices.
 
Laforge said:
Hey all.. I'm looking to try and come up with a home based nas solution, and don't want to build a "real computer" to do it.. looking for something that will support 8 drives, external, and connects via ethernet to the network.

NOt looking to spend 1000s of dollars for the device itself, hence the question.

I mean, I can get

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=us&cs=04&kc=6W300&l=en&oc=PV22XS&s=bsd

from dell, but that's scsi.


but was hoping for something that just has an integrated controller rather than a cpu, and the rest.
Click to expand...

Buy cheap ass $300 PC from dell + 8 PORT USB-PCI 2.0HS card. Attach an external USB based HD's for storage and map as a single drive. Replace the main drive with a CF version w/ disc write access turned off. Direct, cheap, quiet, reliable (since no HD failure), and expandable (8 external USB ports...maybe 6 more with onboard USB). May not be screaming fast access...but you said CHEAP!

-tReP
 
unhappy_mage said:
Of course, 2x that + this = $580. You might be better off getting a real PC. I've looked at doing this on a slightly larger scale, and so far nothing beats the PC, unfortunately.
Click to expand...

Well, sure this would be cheaper, but that's not what he asked for....

 
Why not? It'd make a decent file server. Put a couple of ata cards in there, upgrade power supply, and put in the 8 drives he wants. I'd guess you could get it going for under $400. Software raid-5 them if that's the way you want it. Cheap =/= bad.

I realize you're looking for a non-pc based thing, but I don't think you're going to find it, unfortunately.
 
unhappy_mage said:
Why not? It'd make a decent file server. Put a couple of ata cards in there, upgrade power supply, and put in the 8 drives he wants. I'd guess you could get it going for under $400. Software raid-5 them if that's the way you want it. Cheap =/= bad.

I realize you're looking for a non-pc based thing, but I don't think you're going to find it, unfortunately.
Click to expand...


Well, the non pc based things exist.. I just don't want to spend $1000s for them.


Cooldrives looks like my best approach, still.. but I really wanted NAS, not firewire/usb.
 
big daddy fatsacks said:
i have recently been searching, and hate to tell you i came up empty handed. there are plenty of solutions, but the cheapest seem to be upwards of $1200. these are IDE or SATA devices.
Click to expand...

Well, I want to use IDE or SATA inside the device - But I want it to be "one big box" that attaches to my network switch at 1 Gigabit over copper RJ45 ethernet
 
unhappy_mage said:
Why not? It'd make a decent file server. Put a couple of ata cards in there, upgrade power supply, and put in the 8 drives he wants. I'd guess you could get it going for under $400. Software raid-5 them if that's the way you want it. Cheap =/= bad.

I realize you're looking for a non-pc based thing, but I don't think you're going to find it, unfortunately.
Click to expand...


Because I'm not looking for a file server. I don't want an operating system. Of *any* sort. No Linux, No Windows.

Just one big huge drive that I can map as a share and connect via a specific IP address.

I don't want any celerons, xeons, opterons.. no onboard video controllers, no integrated sound cards..

Basically, I want an external raid card with the drives attached to the card that isn't in my computer with a native I/O -> ETHERNET conversion


Think this.. but empty.

http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?pid=10587
but even that has windows xp embedded version.

or this but wide enough to store 8 drives, instead of the two it has.
http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?pid=10594
 
You're deadset on an impossible solution due to your budget constraints. Seriously, what's your beef with an x86 PC running your NAS server?
 
Your constraint against PCs is .. *flame deleted*

You can build a far cheaper PC than any of the solutions that have been linked to do a far better job.
 
Hey....we tried to help. We tried to offer some alternative solutions that might work better. If he doesn't want to listen, fine. He's not required to. However, neither are we required to sit here and listen to how our alternatives all suck...

...uzor out

 
no matter what you HAVE to have an OS. Even dedicated nas boxes have dedicated OS's in firmware, Many are based off linux/unix. There are plenty good responses here. NO MATTER WHAT A NAS SOLUTION IS GOING TO HAVE A CPU OF SOME TYPE.

Quit being a baby and look at a dedicated nix based service like http://www.openfiler.org/about/

If you want ANY kind of real storage you'll need a real solution. And sub 1k your going ot have to go with a PC. Hell my firewall is a PC. Cost me thirty bucks in parts and I love it. Runs a nix based firewall and is faster and better than any Sub 500 dollar solution out there.

You're only other choice is the linksys + external drives and I can tell you, it wont be nice or efficiant.

Hell you could get a mATX board or via Epia. Make a case for it, and over a terabyte of storage for cheaper than that.
 
Ruffy said:
no matter what you HAVE to have an OS. Even dedicated nas boxes have dedicated OS's in firmware, Many are based off linux/unix. There are plenty good responses here. NO MATTER WHAT A NAS SOLUTION IS GOING TO HAVE A CPU OF SOME TYPE.

Quit being a baby and look at a dedicated nix based service like http://www.openfiler.org/about/

If you want ANY kind of real storage you'll need a real solution. And sub 1k your going ot have to go with a PC. Hell my firewall is a PC. Cost me thirty bucks in parts and I love it. Runs a nix based firewall and is faster and better than any Sub 500 dollar solution out there.

You're only other choice is the linksys + external drives and I can tell you, it wont be nice or efficiant.

Hell you could get a mATX board or via Epia. Make a case for it, and over a terabyte of storage for cheaper than that.
Click to expand...


Ya know, instead of arguing with him, why don't you either leave the thread, or find a solution that is what he is actually asking for.
Buffalo makes 1.6 terabyte network attached storage devices (yeah, they are actually on ethernet) and they don't look to have an operating system to me. They aren't in his budget, and they aren't 8 drive, but they are awfully close to the lacie product he mentioned. The buffalo systems already come with drives, so, it's obvious that there is a potential solution out there that is driveless. Maybe nobody has built it yet, but that could be the answer to his question. "Sorry, doesn't exist yet" .. But telling him he HAS to have an operating system when there are obviously non operating system based devices in existence already, is pretty narrow minded.
I seriously think some of you people need to either get the sticks out of your asses, or, stop posting. Laforge : I saw your sig, so I bet you aren't going to read this, but, Buffalo technology makes something close to what you are looking for. Price is higher than you want to pay, but that is because they already include the HDD's . If you factor in the cost of 4 400gb harddrives into the price of the 1.6 terabyte solution (and you can just buy 2) it might serve your purposes. I'm betting you want a solution where you can bring a few terabytes to a someones location, without having to cart an entire server with you everywhere. Something that is ethernet plug&play, right? But basically, it looks like nobody makes an empty 8 drive version of what you want. There are prefilled 4 drive versions. Possibly 8 drive prefilled versions.
 
Those mini ITX mobos are great for file servers.
-quiet
-cool
-not much power needed for the file server itself
-small (more room for HDD's in the case, neater wiring as well)

only downside is some only have 1 PCI slot.
I have the Via Ezra (933mhz) with 384mb ram and its running fanless for my server
- Windows 2003 Server
- add in ATA133 card
-- 1 x 250gb WD
-- 3 x 200gb Maxtors
IDE1 is the 40gb OS drive
IDE2 is the CDRom
 
Malogato said:
Ya know, instead of arguing with him, why don't you either leave the thread, or find a solution that is what he is actually asking for.
Buffalo makes 1.6 terabyte network attached storage devices (yeah, they are actually on ethernet) and they don't look to have an operating system to me.
Click to expand...

Hate to burst your bubble, but any type of NAS product on the market today has some type of OS even if it is an embedded OS.

Somewhere along the line *something* has to facilitate communications between the storage and the network communications. That something is the embedded OS.

In fact, a closer look at their documentation reveals the following information:

"The following terms are not allowed to be used as names when creating TeraStation:
root,bin,daemon,sys,adm,tty,disk,lp,sync,shutdown,halt,operator, em,utmp,shadow,users,nogroup,all,none,hdusers,admin,guest"

The only reason for the above is because the "firmware" on the Terastation is running a varient of linux. Linux is an OS.

'nuff said. :p
 
wow. flamewar over NAS. what a great thread this turned out to be. anyway, steering us back onto an actual productive discussion here are a few points which are no longer to be debated since you are wrong if you disagree.
1) people who say that a NAS is going to have some sort of OS are correct. if you disagree go argue with yourself in a closet somewhere because you are wrong. a lot of these things are *nix based, but i've actually seen a lot of the ones from dell and hp and the like have a special windows version called windows storage server running on them.
2) since these things all have an OS (even if it as basic as the OS running on your netgear router/FW) they have some sort of memory and processor (even if it's as basic as your PDA).
3) the OP wants something that will behave like a NAS. NOT usb connectable drives. a box that will hold hard drives and connect directly to the network. NOT a PC running windows server as a file server.

now there is a grey area in between not a pc running as a file server and some sort of miniITX system running something akin to openfiler. let's get back to posting about cost-effective NAS solutions. this is a topic important to me and probably many others who are amassing GB after GB of data.

i have recently been looking at the fastora NAS-T4 and the buffalo terastation. they are both $1000 and provide ~750GB of storage in RAID5 mode. the buffalo is useless to me for 1 simple reason- it only supports NT4 domains. how a product making it's debut at this time could have this condition seems beyond reason to me yet there it is. anyway, the fastora seems like a great unit.

now the cost is still not great, but i doubt we're ever going to find anything cheaper and still this good. so the other option is to basically build on of these yourself as some have suggested. the problem i see there is that unless you get a high-end mobo you're going to be using a normal pci bus. you are limited to pushing 133MBps over that bus and both the network card and drives have to share it. you could run into some congestion there (on reads, not writes really).

then again, who said the pre-fabbed units have any better bandwidth accomodations.

anyway, can the DIY crowd post some more details on how they'd go about building a NAS? no USB external drives please. i want to see some suggestions for a real DIY NAS. also, has anyone used openfiler? it sounds great, but i'd hate to lay out for a lot of HW and find out that software is buggy or something.
 
Since my Linux skills are lacking ... I've snagged a copy of Windows XP Embedded with the intent of developing a NAS solution as time permits ... along the lines of the Lacie products mentioned earlier.

big daddy fatsacks said:
the problem i see there is that unless you get a high-end mobo you're going to be using a normal pci bus. you are limited to pushing 133MBps over that bus and both the network card and drives have to share it. you could run into some congestion there (on reads, not writes really).
Click to expand...

Agree ... unless you are aware of a SFF mobo with a PCI-X/PCI-E slot? :D That said the fastora form factor is sweet! Perhaps a SFF mobo in an old CDROM/Drive tower ... hmm
 
An old computer with a bunch of drives, running headless in a closet works the best and cheapest.
 
Luggage said:
http://www.ximeta.com/products/network_drives/netdisk/index.html

$ 199.99 á piece for 120GB ones, $ 249.99 for 160GB
Click to expand...
The external Ximeta cases are $85 each (capable of RAID-1 over the network). If you need more jacks to plug into, the Office model ($220 for 120GB) has an 8-port switch on the back, and the other cases can just stack on top. I have the several of these drives at home and at work as small file servers.

Iomega sells a version of this, but doesn't offer an 8-port version.
 
Do a google for Mashies UDAT machine.

There are a number of clones out there now, all based around mITX boards...
 
i took a look at that openfiler sourceforge project this weekend that was listed earlier. i thought it might be a good sharepoint alternative for my GF who needed this for work. anyway, long story short. i go to load it up and i get the usual linux GUI install screeen. i was a little confused so i went to the openfiler website and the instructions for installing it are basically:
1) make sure you have a disk with 16GB of free space. (whaaaa???)
2) load up fedora and select the "everything" option. (ahh, yes. 16GB. i see.)
3) install openfiler on top of that.

talk about bloatware. i'll wait till they get their own installer going with only the necessary pieces being installed before i use that. 16GB for that is just a total waste of drive space.

http://www.openfiler.org/download/installation.html
 
erm....i actually tried to install it not knowing you needed all of that....just got a bunch of errors.

how can they call it a distro when its just an add on to fedora? anyone want to check out devil-linux and see if its any different? supposed to be a linux router but they say there is added server functions. http://www.devil-linux.org/home/index.php
 
Oooooh! This looks like it would do the job. (And not overly bloated) The samba share is the /tmp directory by default.
 
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