Here i go again, Linux what flavour For a NAS?

LeperousDust

LeperousDust

LeperousDust

Soldato
Joined
4 Nov 2003
Posts
5,738
Location
Edinburgh
I've got a PC sat behind me now with specs:
P4C800-E Deluxe
2.8ghz P4C
512mb General 400mz DDR
4 * 400gb hard drives (2 cconnected to motherboard, 2 connected to RocketRAID 1540)
2 * 40gb hard drives (mirrored on the motherboard)
Random samsung (possible intermittantly faulty) DVD
Geforce 3 ti something AGP

Now i need this to serve first and formost as a NAS, i want that space RAIDed and to used for good measure, generally storing media and more importantly backups. If something goes wrong i'd like it recoverable.

I also need this PC to server as a print server, we've got one printer throughout the flat and this is the only PC (everyone uses laptops over wireless) so being able to print from anyones laptop is crucial too, thats all it serves atm running windows with sharing enabled. What linux shizzle should i be looking at?

I want it simple and easy, with a HTTP or some kind of remote interface. Looked at FreeNAS Perfect for the NAS doesn't really seem to do anything with printers? Same for Openfiler. Then i found eBox great as a server but RAID kinda NAS stuff seems thin on the ground there. Apart from installing Ubuntu and doing this the hard way (i'd really don't think i want to do this) what else could i do?
 
Printer sharing is usually done with CUPS, but I've no idea how you would get it on FreeNAS (cut-down BSD, I think). Most of the NAS-specific distributions are designed to run on much slower hardware and make sacrifices to achieve that.

You mention it as 'the hard way', but setting up your distribution of choice with file and print sharing etc. is usually pretty straightforward and should cover your needs. I use an old machine as my home server built on CentOS to do much the same, minus RAID.

CUPS come with a web interface and I'm sure there are similar things for Samba (file sharing and printer sharing for Windows).
 
Rightyho, well i got impatient, Ubuntu is on it for the time being, on the mirrored RAID array although i'm not sure if its actually mirrored yet, i'll check that later i guess...

So i'm looking at CUPS and Samba, and i've got to get some kind of RAID5 Array set up. I've heard CUP's can be a PITA in respect to losing the print driver options windows machines have? For instance if i set the printer to always print greyscale, i can't override it to colour from within print preferences in windows?
 
I'm already having the usual linux problems, this is why i just can't be arsed...

Installed Ubuntu to one of the sammy drives, but the sammy drives are mirrored with the intel motherboard RAID, Ubuntu won't boot after installing. I've tried swapping both drives over the the promise fasktrak controller mirrored and installing again yet linux still falls over. When i install linux it still sees both drives as separate drives rather than one entitiy. How the hell do i get around that? Thats just for starters, i can get linux installed on one drive without RAID1 but since i have two 40gb (three in fact) i'd like the extra sescurity since there isn't much else i can do with them!

I'm thinking it would be easier to install windows back on here, use the rocketraid card for hardware raid 5 stuff and use the onboard intel or fasktrak as mirrored windows install. Printers will be set up in literally 5 seconds, shared folders will be seen by all with no setup and all still RAID5 (albeit hardware) and that'll do me for now...

//Edit: The sammy drives being one of the two 40gb drives sorry
 
We use plain ol' Debian here.

SAMBA - Windows file shares. Can be configured via web interface (SWAT)
CUPS - shares printer via SAMBA and has a web interface to admin printer
VSFTPD - FTP server
Apache2 - Web server
rTorrent - Torrent app we use via SSH (using Screen to keep it going when logged out)

All that was very easy to set up - file sharing and printer especially. We're just running disks on their own though, no RAID so can't help you with anything on those lines.
 
BillytheImpaler said:
Wait, are you trying to use your motherboard's "RAID" controller or are you using the inbuilt software RAID function?
Click to expand...

Yeah i've read about the bad fakeraid stuff now, was trying to use what i thought was raid... Anyways if i could set the whole OS so it was mirrored to the other drive that would be fabulous, don't seem to be finding much apart from manual backup and restores (which i could use automated but is it the same thing?)
 
Phil99 said:
We use plain ol' Debian here.

SAMBA - Windows file shares. Can be configured via web interface (SWAT)
CUPS - shares printer via SAMBA and has a web interface to admin printer
VSFTPD - FTP server
Apache2 - Web server
rTorrent - Torrent app we use via SSH (using Screen to keep it going when logged out)

All that was very easy to set up - file sharing and printer especially. We're just running disks on their own though, no RAID so can't help you with anything on those lines.
Click to expand...

Yeah thats what i'm looking at, as i go i may install the FTP server and web server for my own benifit when i'm away and need things i've left at home. Also using it as a download box could be fairly helpful overnight if i can get it to work helpfully with newsgroups... Theres a lot of potential here i guess...
 
Looking at LVM now actually, having a slight problem setting it up though. PVcreate is only working on one of my formatted hard drive partitions.

I've set it up as so:
Four HD's each formatted as one partitions filling the entire disk. Giving me sda1, sdb1, hda1, and hde1.
Now i guess i want to run pvcreate on each, then make a volume group, then add logical volumes, right? I'm just getting a little stuck at pvcreate here as i said, its saying it can get an entire lock on the drive as if it's mounted (it's not in mtab or fstab for that matter) so i'm not too sure where to go from here just yet. But i'm not entirely sure if thats correct either just yet...

Also having a problem VNCing into this, i want it run headless, and i have webmin set up which is great for the odd task, but i would like a VNC for when i'm working properly on it, at present i've got to physically use the machine. I'm using realvnc and i'm getting an authetication error no matter what i do? In remote desktop preferences i have ticked: allow others to view your computer, allow others to control your desktop, and require the user to enter a password (which i've set and know). What else can go wrong! :P?
 
I've only set drives up with LVM in the installer, but pvcreate's man page suggests that if you're using the whole drive it needs the partition table wiped first.

Any firewalls in the way of VNC? (Unlikely if it's an auth error, I guess) For remote admin of a server box I've never needed anything more than ssh :).
 
True, but i'd like the option since i'm not a terminal monkey, and although i'd get by it would be a little easier if i could "see" what i was doing in some cases :p

No firewalls in the way, i'm starting to believe moreso it may be a bug in Gutsy...
 
i've only ever setup LVM's during install with centos and suse, this makes it quite straight forward.
I'd suggest using a previous version of ubuntu if thats what you would like to run, as gibbon is a bit bleeding edge. For servers they do a LTS (long term support) distro.
 
Right apart from me reinstalling with the LTS which will run out next year anyway so that wouldn't help :p. I've found if i set the remote desktop options to not ask for a password it works fine, i don't like the idea of not having a password on VNC connections though, there isn't any way anyone from outside my router can abuse this is there?
 
As long as your router isn't letting through the VNC port(s), usually 5800 or 5900, you'll be fine, or you could tweak RealVNC to only accept connections from your local network.
 
Rich43 said:
The Server LTS is 2011



Next LTS release is in 2008 but 6.06 will still be supported.. aint Ubuntu nice?
Click to expand...

Oh that is very nice of them! Anyways i can't be bothered to re-install, so until i come accross something else that definately won't work i'll stick with what i've got...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom