USB drive attached to router

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Liver

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Anyone use a USB drive directly attached to a router as a network storage device?

I am looking at the Linksys 610n. It has several features that I really like, especially the ability to add a USB drive and use it as a NAS.

I'd like to put my iTunes media on the drive.

If it works well, it is quite a bit cheaper than a stand alone NAS, less features, but all I need it to access the drive from the home network.

Any tips or alternatives?
 
i have a wrt54slg... it has a usb port on it for network access... but my problem is Tomato firmware disables this usb port so unless i run stock firmware i cant use it anyway. it never effects me though since i already have a 24/7 server running in the basement. sorry i was of no help to you.
 
It does work, but performance will be terrible. Probably acceptable for streaming music (though copying it over will be slow) or maybe simple office documents; I wouldn't use it for anything else.
 
keenan said:
It does work, but performance will be terrible. Probably acceptable for streaming music (though copying it over will be slow) or maybe simple office documents; I wouldn't use it for anything else.
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Would it be slower than an NAS? Meaning, streaming or copying files from a laptop connected to the network wirelessly?

I understand that it would be slower than the drive directly to the computer, but would it be slower than a NAS?

edit: Do you know if DDWRT also disables the USB port? That is one of the reasons I would like the 610n and the USB network storage.
 
Liver said:
Would it be slower than an NAS? Meaning, streaming or copying files from a laptop connected to the network wirelessly?

I understand that it would be slower than the drive directly to the computer, but would it be slower than a NAS?
Click to expand...
Absolutely. My understanding is that these platforms generally perform significantly worse than 10MB/s, about the limit you can expect from a 100mbit network. My homebuilt NAS regularly performs in the 80-90MB/s range (prebuilt commercial GigE units seem to generally be somewhere in the 20-50MB/s range), not far from the practical limits of GigE. Most reports I've seen quote performance at 3-5MB/s, but you might want to look for reviews of the particular software/hardware platform you're considering. If you're using it over 802.11g though it might not be too far away from the practical limit of the wireless network. Pathetically slow for a modern wired network though, and even 802.11n can probably outperform it by a wide margin.

There may be some hardware that can perform a bit better. Perhaps the Ubiquiti RouterStation board with its 680MHz more modern CPU would perform a bit better - but you're still limited to 100mbit here.



edit: Do you know if DDWRT also disables the USB port? That is one of the reasons I would like the 610n and the USB network storage.
Click to expand...

I think this depends on the particular hardware platform. The 610n is not supported at all in dd-wrt (test releases available though) so you'll probably want to find something else. Perhaps the ASUS WL-500g Premium or WRT600n or WRT350n. There seems to be plenty of documentation out there on how to set this up.
 
If I'm going to leave something on 24/7, I'd like it to use the least electrical. Looking for ideas for a NAS and router (open source) in one package.

Think about it. The router has to be on for the NAS to work. There are very potent open source NAS sources and equally potent router programs (PFSense, Untangle). Would be nice if they were in the same machine.

Use an older router as a wireless AP.
 
Just build it yourself... install Debian, Samba and Shorewall on an Atom or 35W Celeron box and you're done.
 
krupted said:
i have a wrt54slg... it has a usb port on it for network access... but my problem is Tomato firmware disables this usb port so unless i run stock firmware i cant use it anyway. it never effects me though since i already have a 24/7 server running in the basement. sorry i was of no help to you.
Click to expand...

There is a Tomato firmware with USB support....
http://www.linksysinfo.org/forums/showthread.php?t=60185

DD-WRT can support USB, but it is more of a rough hack...the tomato USB version is already hacked and works with very little effort.

I use an ASUS 520gU Router w/400gb SATA drive attached via USB. It works well for backups, but is sloooooowwww. 2-3mb/s. The problem is these routers do not have a ton of processor power to deal with the transfers.

A dedicated NAS will get much better speeds, even the cheap ones can usually do 6-8mb/s.
 
I have a DIR655, and up to this date never had a chance to play with the USB Port till last night, Connected my HDD to it and i gotta say it worked pretty good, only bad thing you could only connect to it one user at a time
 
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