General NAS questions

Faux

Faux

Faux

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Joined
16 Jan 2010
Posts
24
I'm looking to purchase (Or build?) a NAS/Home Server for storing films, photos and other files, and streaming said films (Generally 720p) to our kit (Computer, Laptops, HTPC and PS3) that's ideally small/quiet, has 4 3.5' bays (For expandability later on) and preferably can be used to torrent.

I just have a few questions first!

  1. Are there any recommended enclosures/solutions?
  2. What should I be looking for with regards to specs? Seeing as it's just being used for storage and streaming, would I really need a 1.5GHz processor +8GB RAM over say 800MHz +2GB?
  3. RAID 1, RAID 5 or just a scheduled backup to the other disc/s?
  4. What OS? WHS 2011 or FreeNAS 7/8


Cheers for any help!
 
Plenty of cases out there for this purpose. It's more of a personal choice though. You may only want a small box if the server will be in plain sight and if you don't plan on expanding.

As you said, only being used for storing and streaming it won't require any high spec processor or a great deal of RAM.

Depending on how many films you're storing will depend whether you need a RAID set up or a normal backup solution. With RAID you can set it up and just leave the box to it, whereas with a backup solution you'd have to ensure that the backups are run and also stored separately.

I've not used either OS's mentioned however i would assume WHS would have more functionality than FreeNAS. If you can obtain free trials then i'd say try them both and see what you prefer.
 
I'm about to stick an Iomega StorCenter ix2 2TB NAS box on the members market this evening as soon as I can snap some pics. Worth a look if you are after a cheap solution as it'll do all you say above (but only has 2 bays and comes fitted with 2 x 1TB drives).
 
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