Need help with network storage

[Brotein]

I need something to store my steam backups, 4K videos and pictures. I would like to keep it about $250.

[Windows7ge]

I'm not sure you're going to find something within that budget. A low end Sinology NAS maybe?

 

Alternately if you have a old computer laying around you could install FreeNAS on it and run it as your NAS. Not ideal because you should really be using ECC memory and ZFS relies on a battery backup in case there's a sudden power loss but other than that it'd be cheap and you could easily upgrade to those components down the road. I find FreeNAS is very easily transferable between different motherboards, CPU's, Memory. It doesn't care like Windows does. So long as the CPU is strong enough and you have a few GB of RAM in the machine.

[Nikolithebear]

Get an old Dell or HP machine off ebay and throw 2 2tb hdds in it and put it in raid 1.  Then file share it on the network.  Should be about 200-ish dollars at the end of the day if you shop right. 

[DrJones]

Look at WD (Western Digital), they have some decent consumer grade options depending on how much space you need. Most options utilize USB 3.0, but if you want to go with a true NAS setup capable of ethernet and built in processing, it will set you back a pretty penny.

[GDRRiley]

On 8/8/2017 at 0:49 PM, Windows7ge said:

Not ideal because you should really be using ECC memory and ZFS relies on a battery backup in case there's a sudden power loss but other than that it'd be cheap and you could easily upgrade to those components down the road

zfs is better than most file systems with sudden power losses due to copy on write. ecc is nice but not need for a home nas. 

[GDRRiley]

look around you area and find an old core 2 duo system with 2+ gb of ram. grab a 16gb flash drive and install freenas on it and get 3x3tb drives. toshibas p300 drives are 75$ each and would do fine. run a raid 5 and you are set. 

[GDRRiley]

On 8/8/2017 at 2:15 PM, Nikolithebear said:

Get an old Dell or HP machine off ebay and throw 2 2tb hdds in it and put it in raid 1.  Then file share it on the network.  Should be about 200-ish dollars at the end of the day if you shop right. 

getting 3 drives is much more efficent. what are you paying 100$ for the pc? you can find core 2 duo machines on newegg for 40-60$. and 3tb hdd are very cost effective. 

[Nikolithebear]

On 8/9/2017 at 5:06 PM, GDRRiley said:

getting 3 drives is much more efficent. what are you paying 100$ for the pc? you can find core 2 duo machines on newegg for 40-60$. and 3tb hdd are very cost effective. 

It was more of a quick ballpark estimation plus if you get a nicer machine you can do plex transcoding or other things on the side as well as being a file server. But you are right you can get it for cheaper. 

[Minbari]

Depending on your location, you might be able to find a decommissioned server rack, or old tower workstation from an office for cheap. Often they would come with small-ish capacity hard drives for 1-2TB total in the $250 range. Going this route will likely end you up with a fairly capable rig with decent CPU power and likely quality network ports to connect into your network. Most wholesale used enterprise equipment places would offer you discounted rates if you purchase without drives, or without other components that you would rather source yourself. A bit of searching for obscure local places often ends up with the best deals!

[SG14_96]

Honestly for that price point, I would suggest something from synology.

Make sure you get a two bay machine as a minimum so that you can use RAID 1 for redundancy.

[PARisboring]

You could get a cheap 2 bay NAS without any drives for that price. You might be able to piece together some old server hardware for that price as well. If you are willing to deal with rackmount server stuff, Dell R410s and r710s are really cheap.

[Gerr]

Your best bet is find a used low end 2-bay NAS and then add the HDD's you can afford.  Either Raid-0, Raid-1, or JOBD is up to you.