turning an old pc into a NAS

[trinislacker]

i got a es2l + e5200 i would like to turn into a NAS. Dont care about saving power. how exactly do you go about doing this. i would like the case to be atached to my network without monitor and peripherals. how do i go about doing this..whats the best OS. i dont care for RAID or automatic backups. I just want full access to files on the NAS via any pc on the network. keep in mind i have a WD Live TV so OS of choice must support that.

 

[gsaldivar]

Here are three linux-based options for you. Maybe someone can offer some feedback on these, or name a few others for you.

Good luck!

http://www.openfiler.com/

http://freenas.org/

http://www.turnkeylinux.org/fileserver

 

[Blain]

Use FreeNAS and build a RAID 5 configuration for storage with a compatible RAID card.

 

[trinislacker]

i am currently readling about this FreeNas but can WD Live Tv access it as well?

EDIT: i am not interested in RAID i prefer to manually backup files. reason being i had a power supply fail once and damaged every single attached sata device.

 

[gsaldivar]

I checked the WD Live TV manual for you and WD claims that their device is capable of playing media "from any PC or drive on your home network". They give the necessary steps for connecting to and playing shared media stored on a NAS device in Chapter 10 under "Network Services".

http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/UM/ENG/4779-705035.pdf

Hope this helps.

 

[MalVeauX]

i got a es2l + e5200 i would like to turn into a NAS. Dont care about saving power. how exactly do you go about doing this. i would like the case to be atached to my network without monitor and peripherals. how do i go about doing this..whats the best OS. i dont care for RAID or automatic backups. I just want full access to files on the NAS via any pc on the network. keep in mind i have a WD Live TV so OS of choice must support that.

Heya,

FreeNAS would do it.

Or, you could literally install any Linux distro and do it.
Or, you could literally install any Windows version and do it.

Everyone with old XP keys laying around can turn those into little network operating systems. Control it with UltraVNC so that it runs headless. And put it on a UPS.

Very best,

 

[gsaldivar]

Or, you could literally install any Windows version and do it.
Everyone with old XP keys laying around can turn those into little network operating systems.

I have nothing against Microsoft, but mainly because of the file sharing connection limits on their Desktop OSs (10-connection limit on XP Pro, 5-connection limit on XP & Vista Home), I would strongly recommend against using those for a NAS OS.

A single PC can open multiple connections to a file server simply by traversing directories and opening/moving/printing files. Add a couple users + the WD Live TV device, and it's quite conceivable that users would start encountering network errors.

Stick to a server OS - I would recommend any of the free Linux-based servers that do NOT impose arbitrary file sharing limits.

 

[jae]

Cant the 10 connection limit be increased, or am I thinking of something else?

 

[JackMDS]

Windows Home Server with Media Ad-Ins.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2029756

.

 

[gsaldivar]

Cant the 10 connection limit be increased, or am I thinking of something else?

I've heard of several tweaks that can mitigate the effects of the limit (changing timeout periods, "optimizing" network parameters), but short of some serious hacking, I don't know of any way to actually change it.

Many people confuse this issue with Internet Explorer or TCP sockets, and suggest system changes which would have no impact on the file sharing connection limit.

 

[BTA]

With decent processing power like that...I'd build a WHS box or just a random linux/windows based server and do more than just a simple NAS.

But, if you really just want a NAS type of setup:

FreeNAS worked okay for me, it's easy to setup and lightweight.

There's also unRAID if you have a bunch of hard drives of different sizes and want some sort of data integrity and for all your drives to work as a single networked drive. I never got around to trying it but I've read it works well. Transfer speeds are supposedly crappy but plenty for media serving which is what it sounds like you're doing.

I've personally been using WHS and like it a lot. You don't HAVE to use the PC backup feature but as just a server it works fine as well. I use it to serve music (Squeezebox and otherwise), DVD rips using MyMovies, and various other applications. Along with the PC backups.

WD Live should be able to work with any shared network folder.

 

[nyfirefly11]

Check out Amahi...It's a linux home server platform built on top of Fedora...just starting to play around with it myself...

 

[BTA]

Check out Amahi...It's a linux home server platform built on top of Fedora...just starting to play around with it myself...

That looks really impressive. Might have to play around with it.

 

[coolVariable]

Is that really smart.
I did the math when I upgraded my HTPC.
Even with suspend on ... it came out that the watts the PC uses is approx equal to the $/year it costs in energy.

E.g. 200W PC = $200/year

i.e. usually, you will be able to finance a dedicated NAS within 1 year in energy savings.

 

[JackMDS]

How many devices you have on your Network?

 

[gsaldivar]

Is that really smart.
I did the math when I upgraded my HTPC.
Even with suspend on ... it came out that the watts the PC uses is approx equal to the $/year it costs in energy.

E.g. 200W PC = $200/year

i.e. usually, you will be able to finance a dedicated NAS within 1 year in energy savings.

It's pretty easy to configure automatic power-on/power-off, or simply use WOL to wake the NAS server when its needed. You could even wake the NAS over a VPN if you ever wanted to retrieve files by remote access. There isn't much sense to leaving it on 24/7 if its not in use.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wake-on-LAN

Also, a NAS requires considerably less resources than a HTPC, so its may be possible to use one of the many ultra-tiny Linux based PCs to do the task:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDyM6SKLt24

 

[TJCS]

This is a nice discussion. I have always thought about making NAS out of old but usuable PC parts.

 

[trinislacker]

I still can't confirm if linux based NAS supports networked video streamers so i'm guessing i'll go with WHS.Thanks Jack and all others.

FYI on my network i have

Wired slingbox
Wired WD Live TV
4 wired PCs ( will be converting one to a NAS)

All networked together via a D-Link DGS-2208

various wireless (laptops/cells) via a DIR-655


EDIT: Haven't setup a network per say. only internet is shared. still have to do some research on setting up a basic file shared network. Networking isn't something I'm familiar or verse with.

 

[gsaldivar]

I still can't confirm if linux based NAS supports networked video streamers so i'm guessing i'll go with WHS.

The WD Live TV device is simply opening the file across the network and playing it back on your TV. Any type of file server will work fine for this purpose, including WHS or Linux. This device can even stream off your Windows or Mac desktop or laptop, if you create a share point where the WD Live TV can see the media files.

"Streaming" is a term that is used for viewing videos over the web, where your browser is running some type of thin-client (Java, Flash...) that allows you to play media across the internet. This doesn't really apply to viewing media across a LAN within your house.

Hope this helps!