NAS Help

[MeatWallet]

I am a total noob when it comes to anything NAS so I could use some help. I just purchased a Lenovo Thinkserver TS140 and a single WD Red 3TB drive. I'm looking to set it up to stream all of my movies to my Chromebox with Openelec(Kodi). I currently have a portable HD hooked up my my main computer that I'm using to store all my media and stream to the Chromebox. I only had enough money to get one of the WD Red's but plan on adding more later on. I was reading about Freenas but I was wondering if it would be best for my situation? I see people recommending Limetech as well. Given my situation what would you recommend?

Thanks

 

[steakman1971]

I've recently evaluated a few solutions do to a problem that occurred on my Drobo.
I tested out UnRAID and SnapRaid. UnRAID was pretty simple to get working - and is free if you use 3 or less drives. It was a little bit on the slow side for writes. (Keeping in mind that my system was a dual-core AMD Athlon with 4 gb of ram). From what I've read, it works well and is easy to manage.
SnapRaid is a bit different. It is installed on top of your existing OS. I set it up on Ubuntu 12.04. I'm somewhat comfortable with Linux - so installation was not too complicated. If you are not, I'd read over an installation guide or two on it to see what is involved. (I think it supports Windows as well, but I have not tried it.)
I'm having some performance issues with SnapRAID. I think the problem is more likely my hardware than their software. I've been using it about a week, so the verdict is out for me on this technology. So far, it works and lets me use disks of varying sizes. I can also change the pool size easily.
FreeNAS is another option. However, not sure you want to use this yet as you only have 1 drive. You can use it - but if you want to created a RAID array later, you'll need additional drives. Some people recommend using ZFS for the file system to help stop bit rot (as well as other benefits). I'd read up on ZFS and see if you need/want this. You might not for what you needs are.
What are you using as the stream server? Guessing Plex or maybe XMBC (can't remember the new name they are using). Do you even need a new OS at this point?

 

[jlbenedict]

Simple solution since your client is a Chromebox.. boot it up using the native Chrome OS, and use the Plex app..

PMS on the Thinkserver to serve it out to the Chromebox, Plex client..