Can Linux do this for me? Suse or Redhat??

[Tarrant64]

I've got a couple things to get done this weekend, and one of them is to setup a new box with all my extra HD's in it. What I want to do with it is kind of run a file server? I want to be able to store my music and video files in there. I believe Linux is very efficient and was wondering whether I'll be able to set up a kind of network at home in which I can access my music and video files from the Linux box over the network. Should I use gigabit networking for this to ensure better transfer speeds?

This is my first 'full' Linux attempt at doing something like this. I will dual boot linux once in awhile but I really wanted to wait until I had a need for it. I want a PC that sits in the corner of my room that I can access the drives from a network and store my audio/video files to it.

I have2x200gb HD's for the linux box, and one 36.7gb raptor to put in there(OS/APPs).
Am I thinking this through right? Any quick guides or step-by-step guides?

Summary:
Looking for way to setup Linux box to share audio/video files to WinXP machines at home.

Thanks a lot.

 

[n0cmonkey]

It should work. Just use samba to share the files. No step-by-step guides necessary.

 

[silverpig]

yeah it should be fairly straightforward. Just google for a samba faq or something if you get stuck.

 

[Red and black]

Note that you do *not* need a powerful machine to be the file server. Anything from 1998 or later should be enough.

 

[Tarrant64]

Yeah, I have an old PII sitting at my house. maybe i'll give that a shot then. Does linux need drivers for large storage hd's(you know, like windows needed).

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Tarrant64
Yeah, I have an old PII sitting at my house. maybe i'll give that a shot then. Does linux need drivers for large storage hd's(you know, like windows needed).

No, as long as the hardware supports them any recent release should be fine. And be recent I mean the last few years.

 

[Tarrant64]

Awesome, thanks.

 

[Red and black]

The BIOS of older motherboards may not like booting off a large disk, at least off a later part of it.

To be safe, boot off of a small disk or a smallish partition at the beginning of a large disk. Or, track down the specs for your mobo and find out for sure.

Some oldish motherboards have BIOS updates available to fix this problem. Note that this is not a "linux" issue, this is a BIOS issue.

 

[timswim78]

I would reccommend Fedora because it has a nice interface for setting up SAMBA. I am a linux noobie and setup a fileserver that is very similar to yours. During the Fedora Install, set up the computer as a server.