What do I need?

[andyp]

Ok well I've currently got just over 700gb of hard drive space, split into a 3x74gb disk striped array, one 200GB IDE and 2x160GB IDE.

I run my OS + games etc. off the array, and the rest is used for storage of photos, videos and game and dvd iso's.

And now things are starting to get a little tight space wise, between all the drives there's still a reasonable amount of space left but it's getting to the point where I'm having to start thinking about moving things about, deleting and compressing to fit what I want into where it belongs.

Now I've just set myself up with a wireless network so I'd like another PC on the network to store all these things so I can finally get rid of my old tired IDE drives and declutter my case.

I'd imagine my other half will be getting a laptop in the near future so she'll be wanting to watch films and stuff on that too.

So let yourself loose fellas - spec me a box to fill up and keep all my gubbins organised, safe and sound

 

[andyp]

No-one?

 

[Andrew G]

If you just want a "file server" then any old PC with free NAS would work well as long as the mobo has the connections you require. Or you could splash the cash on a NAS that could sit connected to the wireless router.

 

[wowfood]

best bet? buy a cheap mobo (onboard graphics) a low end CPU (because right now even low end is fast enough for a file server) and a fair amount of RAM (i'd say 2gb if your on Vista, 1gb if you on xp)

After that just spend the rest of your budget on HD's, you can probably fit your old IDE's into the new case, just make sure that

a: the case has enough drive bays
b: the mobo has enough SATA slots
c: you don't forget something important.

 

[PhoenixUK]

What for the server, just buy new drive, connect it , copy files and get rid of your old drives... I dont see any need of getting a server for it o_O.

If you badly want just system for storage then you might get something like this:
Your basket
Product Name Qty Price Line Total
Asus TA-863 Black Midi Tower Case - No PSU Asus TA-863 Black Midi Tower Case - No PSU £16.99
(£19.96) £16.99
(£19.96)
Enermax EG285-SX-VB(G) 285W Micro ATX Power Supply Enermax EG285-SX-VB(G) 285W Micro ATX Power Supply £24.99
(£29.36) £24.99
(£29.36)
OcUK 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C5 800MHz DDR2 Dual Channel Kit OcUK 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C5 800MHz DDR2 Dual Channel Kit £23.99
(£28.19) £23.99
(£28.19)
Asus M3N78-EMH HDMI nForce 8200 Micro-ATX (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard Asus M3N78-EMH HDMI nForce 8200 Micro-ATX (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £49.99
(£58.74) £49.99
(£58.74)
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ 2.20GHz (Socket AM2) - Retail AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ 2.20GHz (Socket AM2) - Retail £34.99
(£41.11) £34.99
(£41.11)
Sub Total : £150.95
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £28.16
Total : £189.06

I don't think we can make it any cheaper.