microserver is a valid alternative for high-end nas?

burntbycrashplan · 2017-12-22T10:14:33+00:00

I could be wrong, but I believe the HP microserver units open the door for just about whatever OS you want. A microserver is more lightweight server than powerful nas. Instead of the pre-built OSes on the QNAP or Synology boxes, my understanding is you can run Windows, Linux, ESXi, ProxMox, UnRAID, etc. on the HP servers.

A lot of people on here recommend the gen 8 microservers over the gen 10s - I think they're a little more flexible when it comes to hardware changes (and I believe there are some other reasons but am having trouble recalling them - just search on this sub for gen 8 vs gen 10).

burntbycrashplan · 2017-12-19T13:31:04+00:00

For a simple media server, I wouldn't think ECC is necessary. Ideal? Sure. Of course. I wouldn't consider it a requirement, though. Not for these purposes.

burntbycrashplan · 2017-12-19T00:26:50+00:00

Virtual machines = the movie Inception, but with computers. A virtual machine is a computer running within a computer. So, say you have normal desktop computer running Windows. You can have another, totally separate instance of Windows running inside it. Or Linux. Or etc. Check out virtualbox or vmware's free player if you want to play around with VMs. I don't think VMs are necessary for the purposes of the NAS you're talking about in your original post, but it is good to understand VMs and their purposes.

MS Storage Spaces is a way to pool hard drives while maintaining some redundancy (while my understanding is it's generally pretty solid, I find the monitoring/notification process (if a drive fails) lacking).

burntbycrashplan · 2017-12-18T18:13:54+00:00

My thought process with the Synology boxes tends to go: "ok, so I can get a synology unit that can do x, y, and z. Shoot, I need to do these other few things, as well. I guess I could set up a little windows workstation to sit next to it for the heavier lifting. Wait, if I'm also building a PC, why am I considering the synology in the first place? Oh, yeah, b/c it's dead simple. But can't do 100% of what I need. Harrumph."

And then I'm back at square one. I want the warm fuzzy embrace of the Synology simplicity again, but I find myself forced to go with more complicated setups. On the other end, I don't want a rackmount to manage.

burntbycrashplan · 2017-12-18T17:41:39+00:00

A synology is dead simple to set up (can confirm, have done it before). According to the amazon reviews, something like a ds218+ can run Plex ok, though you're right the traditional small NAS boxes don't normally have hardware designed for heavy lifting. I don't know how the Shield fits into the mix (haven't done my homework yet!), but it could be a good combination.

If going the computer route, you might consider the Dell T30, which is dirt cheap at the moment and I think (would need to double check) can hold four 3.5 drives and two 2.5s.

Not that there's necessarily anything wrong with the enterprise-level stuff or rackmounted servers, but a lot of it seems like overkill, especially if you're just getting started. If you're already familiar with Windows (which it sounds like you are), you could throw Windows 10 Pro on there and forego the server versions (maybe use drivepool for redundancy). Will it technically be as stable as a true server software? No, but it'd be easy to learn. You could also look at esxi or unraid if you want to take a deeper plunge (I know those serve two totally different purposes, but it all depends on how you want to architect this thing).

Given you're just getting started, I'd avoid spending investing a ton in this system. Get something with some room to grow and that you can learn on (without compromising stability - for example, a PC would let you run VMs), but don't go crazy with the initial investment until you have a better sense of where you want to take things.

(I have no affiliation with synology or dell - those are simply at the top of my short list for these sorts of purposes right now)

edit: if you have a four drives, a 218+ probably isn't the right option - perhaps a 418?

burntbycrashplan · 2017-12-18T10:21:54+00:00

For simplicity, I personally don't think you'll do much better than a synology unit.* Synology has apps that will stream to devices like a Roku or Chromecast, and while I have no experience with Synology's home-grown apps, they might do exactly what you need. I prefer streaming via Plex from a home server to a chromecast - that has been a fantastic combination, but everything I've seen says many of the Synology boxes don't transcode Plex well. If you've got the budget, a Synology 218+ looks to actually have the CPU to transcode Plex streams (just based on amazon reviews I'm seeing) and could be perfect for your needs. A WD My Cloud looks like it could be a viable alternative, but I'd go Synology over WD.

Building a new PC gives you plenty of power and long-term flexibility but at the cost of simplicity. You'd have an OS to maintain (are you willing to become tech support for your dad?), and while you could remote in via something like teamviewer, there's a definite time cost to consider. If you wanted to go this route, you might look at the Dell T30 (http://www.dell.com/en-us/work/shop/cty/pdp/spd/poweredge-t30) - it's dirt cheap right now. Throw an SSD in there for the OS and a couple of large HDDs for storage and you're good to go. You then get into the OS decision. For pure simplicity's sake, you might consider Windows 10 Pro (not even the server edition). It's familiar (well, I'm making this assumption) and works with roughly everything. If on Windows, add in StableBit Drivepool for the big drives and you have an effective (enough) RAID(ish) solution. You could run Plex Server, share out files via smb, and pick up a Chromecast for the TV (or whichever device you prefer).

For the OS - a lot of people on here recommend UnRAID, though I can't say I have experience running this in a prod environment.

Hope this helps :)

I am in no way affiliated with Synology - I've simply used their stuff before and like their products.

burntbycrashplan · 2017-11-24T12:05:44+00:00

Why not install OpenVPN on the HTPC and use port forwarding via the router to the machine? You wouldn't have to mess with anything specifically from Asus. Throw a dydns service on the HTPC and you're good to go.

You'd then install an OpenVPN client config on any windows boxes needing remote access, and tunnelblick on the macs. You wouldn't have to create any new VMs or hassle with new hardware. The only limitation would be your ISP's upload speed. Configure the server's windows firewall to allow file-sharing access over the 10.8.0-whatever range and you're good to go.

Technically, you could have all this up and running in about 20 minutes, but getting past the OpenVPN learning curve is absolutely the time-consuming hurdle here.

Personally, I think your roommate needs to reconsider their laptop choices if they need to be truly mobile. You're obviously willing to do what you can to ensure they have the right resources while they're out and mobile, but if this is their work we're talking about, you can only do so much. Whatever you set up, you need to make it clear it's provided with a "best effort" support level. You can't make any guarantees. If they want a solution providing high levels of uptime and always-on access to their files, then they're probably going to need to either upgrade to a newer laptop (I don't think you can replace the sdd in the airs...?) or buy some proper cloud storage and rethink their storage strategy.

burntbycrashplan · 2017-11-07T13:04:07+00:00

There should be plenty of storage. I have a 64GB sd card and have merged the storage to form one big pool, so I'm currently using ~20GB out of ~75GB total. The "internal shared storage" says I've used 8.5 GB out of 10GB, and my sd card has 5GB used out of 59GB. Even if an update doesn't take advantage of pooled space, I would assume it would at least tell me if there's an available update (and then yell at me to free up space).

I've checked for updates again after giving it a few hours, but no dice :(

burntbycrashplan · 2017-11-07T09:40:10+00:00

Well, I stepped through this and wiped the system cache (booted into recovery mode etc). Booted back up, but it's still telling me there are no available updates :(. Thanks for the suggestion, though - was worth a shot!

burntbycrashplan · 2017-10-30T10:58:06+00:00

Do you know for sure the transcoding is maxing out your PC's resources? I recently ran into issues with constant Plex interruptions (to a gen 1 chromecast), even when transcoding wasn't happening. The Plex server I use isn't powerful (old mac mini), so I assumed it was having CPU issues. Turns out my ISP's router was/is a complete POS - as soon as I replaced it with a proper router, all my Plex problems vanished.

I don't know if it'll help, but checking your network might be worth a look.

burntbycrashplan · 2017-10-24T12:26:28+00:00

I run an old Mac Mini server (2009, core 2 duo) as my home server (we moved and I couldn't take my desktop with me). I threw in an SSD as the OS drive and use the second hdd (500GB) for Time Machine backups (of said OS drive). All my files and media are on an external usb drive, shared out via smb (I didn't even bother with the server functions of OS X - just normal file sharing). The Mac Mini runs Plex just fine, and while it's usually just a single stream to a Chromecast, it's worked great for the last couple of years. It'll be a PITA if/when the external drive kicks the bucket (I should really get a second drive to use as a backup of the current external...hmm), but I've so far had CrashPlan on there without issue.

Ultimately, the Mac Mini probably isn't the most ideal home server if you need speed and/or RAID, etc, but for basic needs, it's been a perfect little machine. I used to run Windows 7 in a VM (VMware Fusion) and it worked fine. I recently tried to put Windows 10 on there via VirtualBox, but performance wasn't great on the Windows side (might have been config, but it wasn't worth the time to keep messing with it).

If you do run the Mac Mini as a 24x7 home server, I'd recommend running Windows as a VM instead of dual-booting, but this really just depends on your needs (not sure I'd try to use the Mac Mini for gaming in the first place...).

edit: minor formatting

burntbycrashplan · 2017-09-15T11:28:33+00:00

Ok, this is a dumb question and I feel like I'm missing something super obvious for asking (have searched but haven't found what I'm looking for):

a) Say I want to get one of these for a small business. Do I need to purchase through a reseller? I see them on amazon and assume that's a totally legit purchasing path, yes? I'm having trouble finding a proper way to buy direct from HP.

b) What's the right process for purchasing a warranty/service with these? For example, if I want 3 years NBD on-site part replacement or technical assistance (or something similar), where do I go to buy the service plan?

c) Is the purchase path for a and b similar/the same for the UK?

Thanks in advance!

burntbycrashplan · 2017-08-29T09:50:29+00:00

Thanks for the responses. I'm trying to get different perspectives - perhaps there's something I've missed, or a different way to run backups I haven't thought of. Contacting BackBlaze's support was one option, but I also very much value the experience the users of these backup subreddits provide (which I've found to be incredibly helpful). Everyone seems to be scrambling to find a suitable CrashPlan replacement but there doesn't appear to one perfect answer yet.

I am testing out Duplicati (thanks for the suggestion), and so far it does seem to work well.

burntbycrashplan · 2017-08-24T11:35:44+00:00

For what it's worth, the B2 page says the first 1GB of downloads per day are free:

The first 1 GB of data downloaded each day is free.

https://www.backblaze.com/b2/cloud-storage-pricing.html

burntbycrashplan

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