Linksys NSLU2 for network storage

[funkymatt]

I was thinking about getting this router Newegg Link
combined with 2-250Gb drives in enclosures.


what are your opinions on this? would you do it differenly? Also, the network storage has to be mac and PC compatible.

 

[nweaver]

you could build NAS out of an old machine, but you would be hard pressed to beat the cost. I havn't used that, but I think it looks good. I might get one!

 

[ktwebb]

The link you provided is not a router. So I am not sure if you just don't know what a router is or your link was pasted from the wrong page or something. If you want to get that NAS that is not a bad price for the enclosure. Then adding a couple of the drives you mentioned would certainly be alot of room for data. The only problem, if I remember correctly is the file system it uses. Proprietary or perhaps *nix ext2 so no NTFS permissions. It doesnt say if you can mirror the drives. I'd be a bit scared to put drives as big as you say you want to without having a way to do good backups.

 

[JackMDS]

May be this can Help: Network Attached Storage (NAS) for Home/SOHO Networks.

:sun:

 

[networkman]

ktwebb is correct, it is a proprietary file system., ie. once you've formatted with the utility of the Linksys NAS device, you cannot then take the drive out and have it be readable on a PC for instance. You can of course re-format the drive for use with the PC, but not to transfer the data.

I have one of these same exact devices at home operating with a pair of external drives, one an 80 Gig, the other a 120 Gig. At the time I purchased it, it seemed like a good deal.. certainly cheaper than other NAS type devices, however, the old caveat that "you get what you pay for" is certainly true here. Support is practically non-existent. Lord help you if you forget the Administrator password to the device. 😱

It works fine for the purpose that I bought it for - to use for storing maps and patches for games at LAN parties, so others can get to it with ease, but I'm investing in a true rackmount NAS device for my home network PCs and servers.

 

[phatmaster]

The filesystem isn't proprietary, it uses Linux ext2. You should be able to read the disks on any linux macine. This doesn't help if you dont tho.

The performance is a bit slow (see here)

There is an active community hacking these things. They are just a small linux computer in a neat little case. You can compile and run any program you want on it, including web servers, e-mail, multimedia servers, etc. See here.