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Beginners Guide to NAS

TheRidDler

TheRidDler

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I've been researching the past few weeks and wondered what are some of your suggestions for a good starting point one, nothing major, maybe 1 or 2 drives to get started and explore if its the way to go for files in a simple home LAN - movies, docs, series, etc. I see UGreen is coming out with some, yet slightly leaning toward Synology, maybe just due to the software and interface. Also not against building a type of DIY version with a small rackmount. Appreciate it.
 
TBH the easiest and cheapest may be to just leave your existing pc on 24/7?

For what its worth id personally avoid Synology
 
TheRidDler said:
I've been researching the past few weeks and wondered what are some of your suggestions for a good starting point one, nothing major, maybe 1 or 2 drives to get started and explore if its the way to go for files in a simple home LAN - movies, docs, series, etc. I see UGreen is coming out with some, yet slightly leaning toward Synology, maybe just due to the software and interface. Also not against building a type of DIY version with a small rackmount. Appreciate it.
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Get an old pc or something that is fairly power enough like an i5 or something in that line. You can use TrueNas.

Setup in a RAID 1 or something in that line but generally TrueNAS is quite good and supports SMB for Windows.


Im currently running a Dell Server with normal Windows 10 Pro on it with 2TB Storage (Yes I know I need more storage). I use it as a NAS and as a Steam Cache (Install a bunch of games onto it and when I want to play a game but it is 40GB download, it just transfers from my Server to my PC in a few mins)
 
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Billabomb75 said:
Get an old pc or something that is fairly power enough like an i5 or something in that line. You can use TrueNas.

Setup in a RAID 1 or something in that line but generally TrueNAS is quite good and supports SMB for Windows.
Click to expand...
Instead of spending R30k on a NAS you can do a 4TB and a pc for around R4k/5K
 
TRINITRON said:
TBH the easiest and cheapest may be to just leave your existing pc on 24/7?

For what its worth id personally avoid Synology
Click to expand...
Thanks! The only real reason I want to look into one is for movies and series. In the evenings we always watch stuff that's mainly on the SO's machine, then when she falls asleep I switch to stuff on my machine haha. Having 2 PCs all the time for that is just kinda wasting power, not to mention when they eventually do their sleep routine and its in the middle of a movie its super annoying
 
Billabomb75 said:
Yeahh well i have a mid-level pc and it draws about 150w idling. When Gaming shoots up to 240W
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Yea this is kinda my issue also. Between my gaming machine and the SO PC its a good 300-400W running over the evenings until it eventually goes to sleep. I think some of the million tabs of vids ive been wanting to 'get to' for the past few months also uses up GPU for no reason during that time, but that might not be always be case
 
TheRidDler said:
Specs on this? Ideally would be cool if i could pop something into my server rack in the garage. All the switches are there
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Its a i3 2nd gen but looking for a Xeon CPU with 16GB RAM. But even with a Xeon CPU it shouldnt draw more than 40-50W
 
TheRidDler said:
Yea this is kinda my issue also. Between my gaming machine and the SO PC its a good 300-400W running over the evenings until it eventually goes to sleep. I think some of the million tabs of vids ive been wanting to 'get to' for the past few months also uses up GPU for no reason during that time, but that might not be always be case
Click to expand...
For that case maybe look at setting up a Plex server on top of your NAS that way you can basically watch from anywhere and download the movies/series straight to the NAS.
 
I bought a NUC for around 1.8k from carb and a 4tb external drive. Loaded ubuntu, and maintain a comprehensive docker stack running +30 services. Also serves movies via Emby rather nicely.

Critical files sync to my home server via Nextcloud and Syncthing. And I sync photos to onedrive, or use duplicati to encrypt and upload files to onedrive.

Here's a list of selfhosted services I look at: GitHub - awesome-selfhosted/awesome-selfhosted: A list of Free Software network services and web applications which can be hosted on your own servers
 
Billabomb75 said:
For that case maybe look at setting up a Plex server on top of your NAS that way you can basically watch from anywhere and download the movies/series straight to the NAS.
Click to expand...
100%. That's the main goal at the moment, so it can be always on and then at the same time give the current PC storages a bit of breathing room
 
Zyetta said:
I bought a NUC for around 1.8k from carb and a 4tb external drive. Loaded ubuntu, and maintain a comprehensive docker stack running +30 services. Also serves movies via Emby rather nicely.
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Thanks, ill keep an eye out for one of these as a possibility - not adverse to out of the box thinking type solutions
 
Openmediavault

Currently on V7, have been using it since V4. Free, open source, easy to set up, even easier to use. Stable. Has never crashed or borked (other than through my user error when mucking about in docker).

I run a huge 750D case with 12 x 3,5" drives, containing a mix of movies, series, music. OMV allows docker installs & so as self hosted I currently run Wireguard, Adguard Home, Photosync, Shlink, Speedtest Tracker & then use Heimdal as a dashboard.
 
Trompie67 said:
Openmediavault

Currently on V7, have been using it since V4. Free, open source, easy to set up, even easier to use. Stable. Has never crashed or borked (other than through my user error when mucking about in docker).

I run a huge 750D case with 12 x 3,5" drives, containing a mix of movies, series, music. OMV allows docker installs & so as self hosted I currently run Wireguard, Adguard Home, Photosync, Shlink, Speedtest Tracker & then use Heimdal as a dashboard.
Click to expand...
Thanks for this! Grab a pic when you get a chance!
 
I have an Enthoo 719 with 16x 3.5 drives and 4 SSDs, but I am moving to a 24 bay very soon and will sell th 719. This whole thing gets out of hand and I suggest looking at https://www.reddit.com/r/homelab/.

It depends how hands on you want to go, I suggest playing around with something easy and moving up from there, so either unraid or truenas. Both provide software raid, docker, "k8s", and a gui. Unraid is paid but provides a better way to manage your storage for the average homelab where you add a drive at a time.

Go have a look at both. #ZFS4LYF
 
TheRidDler said:
Thanks! The only real reason I want to look into one is for movies and series. In the evenings we always watch stuff that's mainly on the SO's machine, then when she falls asleep I switch to stuff on my machine haha. Having 2 PCs all the time for that is just kinda wasting power, not to mention when they eventually do their sleep routine and its in the middle of a movie its super annoying
Click to expand...
docs.google.com

-Die sparsamsten Systeme (<30W Idle)-

docs.google.com docs.google.com

To get an idea on what you are looking for power wise 8/9 gen best People are talkin under 15 idle and less if you go pico power supply route.
 

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Something like this might be a good starting point might just struggle with multiple 4K Plex stream.
 
ultimate said:

[For Sale] - DELL PC FOR A LEKKER PRICE FOR SALE!!! | Combo (multi-item) sales & full systems

Item: Dell Vostro 3670 Specs: *4GB ddr4 ram *I3 8100 cpu *512GB Rogueware ssd (Health 98%) Age: Not sure Price: R2200 Payment Method Accepted: Cash/Eft Warranty: Nope Packaging: Will pack it nicely Condition: Good Location: Upington Reason: Not using it Shipping: Yes on you Collection: Yes...
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Something like this might be a good starting point might just struggle with multiple 4K Plex stream.
Click to expand...
Thank you very much. I rarely do 4K, and its always just a single stream
 
Another benefit of the prebuild are they usually have high efficiency power supplies and lost of sata power plugs.

and usually lots of space for hard drives.
TheRidDler said:
Thank you very much. I rarely do 4K, and its always just a single stream
Click to expand...
 
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