Explain a network hard drive to me please

james.miller · 6 Mar 2009 at 22:22

like i said, the cheapest option is a usb enclosure. it will not connect to your router but to the ps3 directly. you will have to connect it to the pc to transfer files to it.

its that, or spend around £60 minimum on a slow nas enclosure that will connect to the router. i mentioned we dont know your budget and we still dont. what is it?

james.miller said:
What you denied was the cost of doing so. Without knowing the OPs budget or willingness to get dirty, its open game as to what we can recommend

Magic_x_uk · 6 Mar 2009 at 22:31

Budget, well whatever really. Dont really want to spend a lot.

I have a squeezebox that wirelessly talks to my computer where all my MP3 files are stores which in turn plays in my lounge.

I just thought it would be easier to get a (or use my external 1TB HD) HD that could do all my music, videos and photos without having to have the main computer turned on.

I guess what I thought was, that there was some magical kind of external hard drive/caddy that would fit onto my router that my PS3 and squeezebox could then use for the files.

ca9phoenix · 6 Mar 2009 at 22:34

I just bought a Lacie internet space 500gb nas drive.... pluged it into one of the gigabit ethernet ports in my router and as long as the files are placed into the family library section my ps3 can see them.

Job done

james.miller · 6 Mar 2009 at 22:35

ok the squeezebox needs access as well. that gives you less options. its either a nas enclosure or build one yourself.

unfortunately the cheapest nas enclosure OCUK sell is £95. although strangely enough you can get an enclosure with a drive for less - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-057-BF&groupid=701&catid=1240&subcat=707 for example.

you can probably take the 500gb drive out and relace it with your TB drive, invalidating the warranty though obviously. just beware:

Performance is limited too, with just a single Ethernet port at the rear. In our speed tests, the Buffalo took a sluggish 11mins to write 3GB of large files and the same time to write 3GB of small files. Reading those files back to the originating PC wasn't much more impressive either: 8mins 22secs was the time for the large files and 9mins 43secs for the small ones.

The DriveStation does have one interesting trick up its sleeve. Not only is it a basic NAS drive, but it can act as an external USB disk. Hit a small button at the base of its attractively curved front panel and it switches mode offering improved performance but no extra features to speak of. In this mode the drive will turn off whenever the PC shuts down, thus saving power, but it's hardly groundbreaking stuff.

All of this we could forgive if this drive was dirt cheap; alas, it isn't. The 500GB DriveStation 2Share costs roughly double what a normal non-NAS desktop USB drive would and it's no cheaper than other 500TB NAS drives on the market either (the LaCie Network Space, for instance), many of which boast more impressive vital statistics. We'd advise steering well clear.

Skidilliplop · 6 Mar 2009 at 22:53

You can get a Networked SATA enclosure (without drives in as you have one already) for £35-40. It's not going to be disk speed but your router only supports 100Mbps (which in real life equates to about 10-11MB/s max) so it'll work as fast as your network does. Wirelessly 4MB/s is more realistic.
You could build one but you're looking at more money and no performance gain without first upgrading your network to gigabit.

errata · 7 Mar 2009 at 08:54

james.miller said:
Then leave it to the people who do know. we're here to help

I think most readers would think your not helping the OP much in reccomended he build and configure an atom box. it may be faster and better in every way except cost and his time but its obviously inappropriate for his needs and budget

You only helping the OP when you stick to the point, the rest of the time you seem to be telling him to do what you can do which is built a NAS from scratch. If this was an exam you would be answering the question you know the answer too not the one on the exam paper

james.miller · 7 Mar 2009 at 09:10

errata said:
I think most readers would think your not helping the OP much in reccomended he build and configure an atom box. it may be faster and better in every way except cost and his time but its obviously inappropriate for his needs and budget

You only helping the OP when you stick to the point, the rest of the time you seem to be telling him to do what you can do which is built a NAS from scratch. If this was an exam you would be answering the question you know the answer too not the one on the exam paper

Dragging it off topic isnt helping either. at least ive given him 3 options as he never gave a budget, and i went looking for the cheapest of each. that gave him a nice choice, eh?

james.miller said:
errata said:

Can someone not reccomend a cheap NAS that would work with the PS3?

Click to expand...

sure. if you want the cheapest option get a usb enclosure. about £20 or so. if you want a nas drive, there are some very cheap 10MB enclosures around for £30 or so, but please just avoide them. Ive looked at a few major sites (inc overclockers) and i cant find a sata nas enclosure for less than £70 could you help out with that, without naming the retailers obviously

have you found any yet? if there's anything else please, get me on msn(email in trust)

Magic_x_uk · 7 Mar 2009 at 10:41

So basicall I have at the moment

A Netgear DG834 wireless router

Now I have a 1TB External USB 2.0 Buffalo DriveStation Hard Drive.

I guess I thought I could just somehow plug that hard drive into the router and things would see it.
It seems not so easy.

So I could buy something like this

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-057-BF

and plug that into my Router and then my PS3 and Squeezebox would see it ?

Problem is, My squeezebox needs the computer to run Squeezecentre?

iraiguana · 7 Mar 2009 at 10:41

If cost is no issue and you want something good and simplistic go for a drobo?

http://www.drobo.com/

james.miller · 7 Mar 2009 at 11:13

Magic_x_uk said:
So basicall I have at the moment

A Netgear DG834 wireless router

Now I have a 1TB External USB 2.0 Buffalo DriveStation Hard Drive.

I guess I thought I could just somehow plug that hard drive into the router and things would see it.
It seems not so easy.

So I could buy something like this

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-057-BF

and plug that into my Router and then my PS3 and Squeezebox would see it ?

Problem is, My squeezebox needs the computer to run Squeezecentre?

ah. i dont know anyway around that. you could leave your pc on but that defeats the point of buying the drive in the first place lol. short of build a nas server, i dont know of any other way of getting it to work with the squeezebox if squeezecenter is required to run.

wonko · 7 Mar 2009 at 12:09

If you want to be able to run SqueezeCenter on an off-the-shelf NAS then it limits your options significantly, and it probably won't be cheap! I suggest you have a look at the slimdevices forums for ideas on what other Squeezebox users use. IIUC the NASs that can run Squeezecenter (some qnap, buffalo, synology, etc. models) are all linux-based and have enough CPU and ram to run it properly.
Having SqueezeCenter running on a PC with the files on a NAS seems a bit pointless (as james.miller just pointed out) - you may as well just keep the files on a disk in your PC and accept you'll have to leave it switched on.
You can build your own low(ish)-power PC-based NAS cheaper than the commercial NAS units, but it's not trivial so I'd recommend against it unless you're confident in your abilities. I'm currently testing an Atom-based raid5 server I've put together before 'committing' to it, and it hasn't been as strightforward as I hoped (gave up on FreeNAS and now using ubuntu server...)
Hope this helps