Need a really cheap nas

[bobstone]

Hey all. I need to buy/put together a secondary NAS asap on the cheap ( HDD's not included )

My main goal is good longevity/reliability, my current build has had no problems cept for a freak PSU failure one time and it has been running almost non stop for 4 years.

I would like it to do basic windows shares on a domain with AD user access but that is not required

I can build one up my self but not sure on what are good reliable cheap parts right now, and my biggest sticking point is the OS, right now my current NAS in my sig is running windows server 2012 but I need the new one to support expansion better, with multi size drives in the mix, the ability to replace HDD with bigger newer ones, and also be dead simple to use. ( don't want to be experimenting, just something I can get operational asap ) lastly it does not need to be fast, it will mostly be a backup of my current NAS's critical files.

So with that said any recommendations on cheap parts you all had good luck with to build a 4-5 bay (raid 5 or 6 equivalent) DIY NAS and a simple, reliable OS to run on it?

Thanks!

edit: also don't care about case size, can be a mid tower, it will sit in a corner. 4-5 drives at start and does not need to be hot-swap-able, but would like room to grow it if needed.

 

[bobstone]

update, I forgot I had a unused esxi test box, c2q 9650 with 16gb of ram and has 6 sata ports on a GA-P43T-ES3G gigabyte mb ,in a thermaltake shark case, all new silent fans (well kinda new)... I know it would be overkill but...

So is there a free NAS software that can take advantage of that hardware, media reasons maybe? or any other thoughts? ( believe it or not, it also barely sips at power, at least when it was running esxi) or will it be overkill on an order that would make buying dedicated cheap hardware still the better route (I really want to spend less then 300 on the hardware excluding the HDD's) and I don't need it for esxi any more since I am working on CCNA stuff now for my job, and they already got to many esxi guys.

 

[TType85]

Check out FreeNAS or NAS4Free. They are easy to use NAS software. You may also want to check out Napp-it/OmniOS. It's a good system but I find the UI to be lacking. I have never had good luck with AD access on any of those systems though.