File Server - 24/7 Running Required

Associate
Joined
9 Nov 2004
Posts
1,691
Location
West Midlands
I couldn't find a specific area below to post this so General it is.

I have been looking at my desktop PC today after a format and fresh install of Vista 32 and I am tired of all the junk that I collect in the form of photos, downloads, documents etc.

My system is currently setup as follows, I have 2 SATA HDD's one is a Seagate 200Gb SATA1 drive and the other is a Seagate 400Gb Sata2 drive.

My 200Gb drive houses my OS and program files, my 400Gb drive is split into 2x200Gb partitions, the 1st partition is where I install all of my games and the 2nd partition is where I store all of my backups of My Documents, Pictures, internet downloads and so on.

What I want to be able to do is move my 400Gb drive out of my PC into a server and place this on my home network so I can acces it with my Desktop PC, my Laptop and so I can share media files from there with my XBox 360 as well, keep all of my backups, downloads, and allowing other uses of my network to access it, downloading/saving to it and reading data from it.

An external HDD is out of the question as it will not offer the functionality I need and I also eventually want to be able to setup a webserver as I have a new website in development that I want to be able to host, including mail server etc.

Guys whats the best way for me to tackle this, can anyone spec me something that is reasonable in price, uses as little electricity as possible and also is as quiet and as cool as can be.

What OS would be best to run on it as well, has anyone got any recommendations?

Cheers

:)

Stu
 
Associate
Joined
19 Feb 2005
Posts
1,233
Location
Docklands, London
We run a 1.8Tb 7 disk software RAID5 for storage, and a 2 disk 400Gb JBOD for temp/incoming files on a AMD64 3000+ with 1.5GB of RAM.

Origionally it ran Fedora, but we recently switched to Server 2003 Enterprise when we discovered we had a load of liscenses not in use. It's also connected to the TV and surround set, so does a fair bit more than just a simple NAS would.
 
Man of Honour
Joined
19 Oct 2002
Posts
29,509
Location
Surrey
Take a look at a NAS. Some of them also offer webserver functionailty (e.,g. the Synology range although lots of them do now).
 
Associate
Joined
19 Feb 2005
Posts
1,233
Location
Docklands, London
What exactly does this do then and what purpose does it serve?

Well, it lets us watch downloaded/ripped video files straight from the storage array without having to mess around writing DVD's all the time.
All the video, music and software is then also shared around the house from it, and it runs a usenet and bittorrent client in a terminal session.
 
Soldato
Joined
28 Nov 2004
Posts
16,024
Location
9th Inner Circle
You need some Network Attached Storage. No need to bother running a full fileserver unless you want extra functionality.

You can get NAS boxes fairly cheap (ish!) and stuff a load of drives in them.

Or you could get a PC, bang Linux on it and have a file-server, mail-server, web-server, and so on. Or get a better PC and put Windows Server 2003 on it and then Exchange 2003 for "a bit of laugh" :p
 
Back
Top Bottom