Hackable Linux NAS box

[Tim Watts]

Hi,

Looking for a small portable 1-2TB backup box, ethernet, internal disk, appliance form factor and most importantly, replaceable linux - I want a proper filesystem (no VFAT) and direct access to rsync and ssh on this.

Wifi would be cool - but optional.

Buffalo would have been my choice 2-3 years ago, but all the wiki's on hacking the LinkStation (Pro) seem seriously out of date.

I don't want a cobbled together solution (too busy) but just a little self contained box...

Any ideas for 2010?

Cheers

Tim

[Peter Watson]

Netgear ReadyNas Duo? Not completely hackable but supports NFS and SSH

[Adrian]

Tim Watts gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

Synology's kit looks interesting, but no direct experience yet.

[John Rumm]

I was about to say, I have been impressed with the synology kit I have used so far, but did not investigate the options for swapping out the software.

[Gordon Henderson]

Well, this is uk.d-i-y ... So build your own - which, if you're up to doing an Linux install really shouldn't be hard.

Suggested shopping list:

Case:

(you'll need some RAM for it too)

Lots of choice here - that's a VIA processor, but Intel Atoms are cheaper.

Drives - big choice, but I'd probably look at 2 1.5TB WDC 'green' drives or something similar - although a quick check shows the 2TB ones are cheaper than the 1.5TB ones:

off you go..

Gordon

[Tim Watts]

Peter Watson wibbled on Friday 25 June 2010 09:15

That would be workable (but not optimal) - partly because NFS is slower than rsync for loads of little files and I don't expect it can support ACLs over NFS.

But I have a workaround for the latter (cron dumps ACLS to file for all filesystems periodically) so it *is* of interest - I shall look it up.

Many thanks

Tim

[Tim Watts]

Adrian wibbled on Friday 25 June 2010 09:16

- 800MHz processor. Decent - not sure on the hackability...

[Tim Watts]

Gordon Henderson wibbled on Friday 25 June 2010 09:48

The DIY will be the software setup :)

I really want an off the shelf Linkstation type bit of kit (small, and ready to run bar reloading and tweaking the software). ITX is too lumpy and I really don't have the time.

I'll do some more research and see if the Linkstation is still hackable - the problem is the name covers a plethora of actual models so knowing what you're dealing with is tricky.

[Peter Watson]

Having just had a look, there is an rsync service available on the ReadyNas as standard as well...

Cheers,

Peter

[Huge]

[tinnews]

I have a WD Mybook World Edition, a neat little NAS which consumes only 6 watts but with the big plus of having proper ssh access built in so you can get into it, add programs (I've added rdiff-backup) etc.

Much cheaper than Synology plus a big disk, much lower power than a d-i-y Linux box (unless you go very esoteric).

There's quite an active user community and they have developed a proper repository of software and installation/upgrade facilities.

[Tim Watts]

[e-mail] wibbled on Friday 25 June 2010 12:17

Thanks! That's spot on the sort of thing I was looking for. 150 quid fro

1.5TB and 180 odd for 2TB.

I see it supports NFS natively. I'm trawling around now for the hacking groups :) Looks very promising.

Cheers

Tim

[Sidney Endon-Lee]

The Excito Bubba 2

good.

Sid.

[Tim Watts]

Sidney Endon-Lee wibbled on Friday 25 June 2010 22:30

Yes - that is cool, very very cool.

Out of budget though :( SWMBO has granted permission to spend 150 odd after I pointed out we have 60GB of photos and I only have a 20GB quota at a university I used to work at ;->

[Tim Watts]

[e-mail] wibbled on Friday 25 June 2010 12:17

Could I just check Chris: is this the user community you are talking of:

do you remember which version you have? I'm looking at the WDH1NC15000E

- I'm just cautious about finding that was a big design jump and none of the hacks work anymore!

I'm looking at putting rsnapshot on mine.

Cheers

Tim

[John Stumbles]

I'm using a (hand-rolled) rsnapshot-type system but it seems that copy-on-write deduplication filesystems (of which there seem to be one or

2 operating in userspace via fuse, plus sun's zfs if that's still viable for linux) do snapshotting as a byproduct of their modus operandus anyway.

[Tim Watts]

[e-mail] wibbled on Friday 25 June 2010 12:17

Just got one (2TB MyBook World Edition "Whitelight").

Very impressive. Added the Optware ipkg stuff documented at

a few UID/GIDs around to match my main systems and installed a few bits including rsnapshot.

Long story short, it's sync'd up 645GB of 538,000 files in a couple of days (that's good BTW). Now, an rsnapshot run over the same domain takes about 35 minutes which is bloody good for a device in its class.

A very good machine indeed :)

Thanks for the tip!

Cheers

Tim