Im currently using storage spaces on windows and im trying to move over to a real Storage solution need help.

[SomethingUnique22]

YES YES I KNOW windows is an unstable piece of shit i get that. But i needed to store my massive movie and tv show collection soon so i went with what i could do easily. 

ANYWAY i need to figure this out now im getting to worried windows will just randomly brick my storage spaces setup. I forget exactly which ones suit my needs as its been awhile since i've looked into it. I know flexRaid was something i was interested in but it seems the dev who made it abandoned it. Then i found snapRaid but its pretty old and isnt very user friendly so that was the two i remembered. 

So here is what i need it to do:
- I want to be able to add or remove drives easily not a ton of steps to do so.

- I want to power down the array and restart it days or weeks later when i go to add files to it. I dont like my hdds running all the time im to broke to be buying new ones that often. 
- Id ideally like it where i have the data cables connected and i just have to plug in power to start them up. Thats what i do currently with the array in storage spaces i really like it like that. (yes i know that isnt likely a possibility but if anyone can think of something similar that would work that would be awesome. If there is a better solution that would be great to but it seems i would have to have it connected to my home network to do anything like this so idk.)
- free ideally if not im not doing a subscription for it. 

- developers who care about the software as well as strong security and open source if possible.

- an easy tutorial to walk me through setting it up

 

- lastly i need to be able to migrate my current windows storage spaces raid 5 array to this new system somehow.
snapRaid says u can easily do so with them but i dont know if it is with the other solutions like unRaid or the others. 

 

Thanks for the help.

 

 

[Electronics Wizardy]

What is your current storage spaces setup? What are your issues? Storage spaces is pretty good, and a server grade solution, that is in use for many servers and clusters of systems. Theres not unreliable about it

 

4 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

I dont like my hdds running all the time im to broke to be buying new ones that often. 

HDDs don't really seem to fail when running all the time. I have many hdds with 50k+ hours that are still happily going strong

 

5 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

- Id ideally like it where i have the data cables connected and i just have to plug in power to start them up. Thats what i do currently with the array in storage spaces i really like it like that. (yes i know that isnt likely a possibility but if anyone can think of something similar that would work that would be awesome. If there is a better solution that would be great to but it seems i would have to have it connected to my home network to do anything like this so idk.)

Id just leave it plugged in. Hdds don't use much power, and won't affect hdd life much

 

 

Storage spaces seems to fit all your needs here, I don't see a reason to change.

 

Whats your backup plan? You should have a backup you can restore from if there are issues with the array.

[SomethingUnique22]

9 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

What is your current storage spaces setup? What are your issues? Storage spaces is pretty good, and a server grade solution, that is in use for many servers and clusters of systems. Theres not unreliable about it

Really?? From researching online everyone hates it pretty bad. They see it as a fake Raid array basically. 
Even if its so i want to move away from it especially so i can start to customize it alot more. 

Quote

HDDs don't really seem to fail when running all the time. I have many hdds with 50k+ hours that are still happily going strong

Guess im just paranoid since i only have the one array of HDDs i have backups of my other files since its under 500gbs but the 3-4tbs of movies and tv shows arent super important if lost. 
But I have the time to mess with this shit now so i wanna get it out of the way and set up for when i dont have the time anymore.

Quote

Storage spaces seems to fit all your needs here, I don't see a reason to change.

I want to advance i know u dont want to explain all the server stuff to someone who will take awhile to understand. I get that i wouldnt either its a lot of work. 
Again i have the time to look into this and possibly find a solution that is scalable and allows me to tinker when i get the time again.

Quote

Whats your backup plan? You should have a backup you can restore from if there are issues with the array.

I have MANY backups of my other files on the array but the tv shows and movies i dont only haveem on the storage spaces array. 


Lastly could u outline or link to a post here talking about what each storage solution is and what the pros and cons are of each. 

 

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Really?? From researching online everyone hates it pretty bad. They see it as a fake Raid array basically. 
Even if its so i want to move away from it especially so i can start to customize it alot more. 

Yea its a pretty solid software raid system. No big issues with it. Much better than fake raid on the board, and has lots of nice featuers.

 

What do you want to customize? Storage spaces is pretty flexable.

 

2 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

I want to advance i know u dont want to explain all the server stuff to someone who will take awhile to understand. I get that i wouldnt either its a lot of work. 
Again i have the time to look into this and possibly find a solution that is scalable and allows me to tinker when i get the time again.

What do you want to tinker with? Storage spaces lets you do a lot of that, and if you don't have any issues, Id keep storage spaces here.

[HanZie82]

Ah yeah there are some fake software raid's out there where people dont speak fondly of.
This windows storage isnt one of those. Its server grade software ported back to the consumer.

[LIGISTX]

Unraid is likely your best bet. But as others stated, it storage spaces is already setup and working for you… its not a bad solution. A fileserver is just that, it’s a server that holds data. There really isn’t much to get fancy with. What exactly are you looking to change?

 

I run FreeNAS virtualized under ESXi, so I have multiple virtual machines running all doing different fancy things. Home automation, Plex server, docker containers, etc etc. but Freenas is just freenas. It holds all my data and serves that data up over SMB shares to my other devices. The fancy-ness is done outside of freenas… I could just as easily have used storage spaces for the actual data storage. Freenas is more robust, it works incredibly hard to keep your data secure, but it doesn’t fit your needs at all; you can’t add storage to it easily or affordably.

 

Software RAID is better than hardware RAID these days. It’s much more robust, has tons more features, and doesn’t require “expensive” RAID cards. Freenas which uses ZFS is software RAID…. ZFS is quite possibly the most robust file system ever invented.

 

So, again, what exactly do you want to do different? If you want to add “fancy stuff”, your going to want to do that outside of the storage server. Storage server holds data, serves data up over the network, and controls access to said data via user accounts and group policy settings.

 

Also, fun fact. Technically leaving drives plugged in forever is “less wear” on them because the biggest strain on a hard drive is spin up; going from 0 rpm to spinning. Most folks in Freenas land recommend not letting your drives spin down for this reason. That said…. Your likely fine with turning them off and on as you do. These days consumers drives are obviously expected to turn off snd on multiple times a day as a normal use case. But I did just want to clear up the fact that leaving them spinning isn’t actually bad for them. 

[SomethingUnique22]

2 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Yea its a pretty solid software raid system. No big issues with it. Much better than fake raid on the board, and has lots of nice featuers.

What happens if my windows blue screens and i have to reinstall wont it get corrupted since its tied to the OS?
Or does it store files on the drives themself that can be read and recognized by a new windows no matter the computer?

2 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

What do you want to customize? Storage spaces is pretty flexable.

What do you want to tinker with? Storage spaces lets you do a lot of that, and if you don't have any issues, Id keep storage spaces here.

Alrit theres a few things:
- So my current pc i have im using all the available sata ports on it which is 6 one already died so i only have 4 left and i dont wanna replace the mobo.
- im running out of space on my main drive for storage so i had to get a second one. So now i have to swap between the arrays 5th drive and the ssd when i want to access either.

Yes i could get a new mobo but its a 4yr old gen 1 ryzen build and i dont wanna upgrade till next year. 

Anyways can u outline the other ones like unRaid, Zfs, freeNAS, etx etc

[HanZie82]

2 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

Also, fun fact. Technically leaving drives plugged in forever is “less wear” on them because the biggest strain on a hard drive is spin up; going from 0 rpm to spinning. Most folks in Freenas land recommend not letting your drives spin down for this reason. That said…. Your likely fine with turning them off and on as you do. These days consumers drives are obviously expected to turn off snd on multiple times a day as a normal use case. But I did just want to clear up the fact that leaving them spinning isn’t actually bad for them. 

Not just the physical stress of spinning up, but also the heat change. (More then just being warm).
But today's hardware is made so well running it 24/7/365 is about as harmful as turning it off and on.

[Electronics Wizardy]

2 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

What happens if my windows blue screens and i have to reinstall wont it get corrupted since its tied to the OS?
Or does it store files on the drives themself that can be read and recognized by a new windows no matter the computer?

You can move a storage spaces array to any windows system(as long as its compatible). Blue screens shoudln't break anything(about the same risk as normal.

 

The array data is on the drives, not on the os, so you can move disks between systems as needed

 

3 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Alrit theres a few things:
- So my current pc i have im using all the available sata ports on it which is 6 one already died so i only have 4 left and i dont wanna replace the mobo.
- im running out of space on my main drive for storage so i had to get a second one. So now i have to swap between the arrays 5th drive and the ssd when i want to access either.

Yes i could get a new mobo but its a 4yr old gen 1 ryzen build and i dont wanna upgrade till next year. 

Id really suggest against swapping arrays. Just get a get a sata pcie card, or get biger hdds to store more data(something like a 4tb or 8tb drive is pretty cheap now)

 

4 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Anyways can u outline the other ones like unRaid, Zfs, freeNAS, etx etc

Do you need to use windows on the host? If you do, you can't use any of these options. Also they will need to have a full backup of the data then restore it, you can migrate without deleting all the data.

[SomethingUnique22]

3 minutes ago, HanZie82 said:

Not just the physical stress of spinning up, but also the heat change. (More then just being warm).
But today's hardware is made so well running it 24/7/365 is about as harmful as turning it off and on.

I live in an apartment where there is either a train or someone above or below me jumps or does something that moves the HDDs i have them on bubble wrap but it still worries me. 
Good to know im doing more harm then good....

[SomethingUnique22]

9 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

Unraid is likely your best bet. But as others stated, it storage spaces is already setup and working for you… its not a bad solution. A fileserver is just that, it’s a server that holds data. There really isn’t much to get fancy with. What exactly are you looking to change?

 

I run FreeNAS virtualized under ESXi, so I have multiple virtual machines running all doing different fancy things. Home automation, Plex server, docker containers, etc etc. but Freenas is just freenas. It holds all my data and serves that data up over SMB shares to my other devices. The fancy-ness is done outside of freenas… I could just as easily have used storage spaces for the actual data storage. Freenas is more robust, it works incredibly hard to keep your data secure, but it doesn’t fit your needs at all; you can’t add storage to it easily or affordably.

Basically id like to do all that eventually when i have a proper place where i can have a server room and not have my shit just next to my pc on bubble wrap. 

9 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

Software RAID is better than hardware RAID these days. It’s much more robust, has tons more features, and doesn’t require “expensive” RAID cards. Freenas which uses ZFS is software RAID…. ZFS is quite possibly the most robust file system ever invented.

 

So, again, what exactly do you want to do different? If you want to add “fancy stuff”, your going to want to do that outside of the storage server. Storage server holds data, serves data up over the network, and controls access to said data via user accounts and group policy settings.

Ever since i've started watching Wendell talk about ZFS and how amazing it seems ive always wanted to set it up. Glad u brought that up i could remember it exactly. 
Also while i want to do all the cool things ppl like Wendel show, im not at that point in my life yet where im settled down. 

What i need is a scalable method to store data that can grow with me as i age and am able to do the things u talk about above. Plex servers, home automation, etc etc.

9 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

Also, fun fact. Technically leaving drives plugged in forever is “less wear” on them because the biggest strain on a hard drive is spin up; going from 0 rpm to spinning. Most folks in Freenas land recommend not letting your drives spin down for this reason. That said…. Your likely fine with turning them off and on as you do. These days consumers drives are obviously expected to turn off snd on multiple times a day as a normal use case. But I did just want to clear up the fact that leaving them spinning isn’t actually bad for them. 

yay im doing more harm cries a little...

[LIGISTX]

8 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Anyways can u outline the other ones like unRaid, Zfs, freeNAS, etx etc

Look at my first post. I give a decent description there. We are not going to be able to tell you everything there is to know, this will take time and research on your end to fully understand the systems and how they are implemented. You now have the tools to go do that learning; you know the right words to search such as Freenas, ZFS, unraid etc. Now you get to learn what’s different snd unique about them all   
 

They are all good, they just serve different purposes - windows storage spaces included.

 

If your running out of sata drives, you can either get a cheap PCIe SATA card which would work for storage spaces, but I would recommend getting a HBA. They do cost more, but you can find a used raid flashed to IT more (so it won’t work as a raid card, just as a HBA which stands for host bus adapter, basically just lots of sas which can be split out to SATA ports) and they are WAY more robust as they are actual enterprise grade gear. Look in my signature for my HBA, you can just google that name and find them on eBay for cheap. It’s a dell h310 or something. I forget off hand and I’m using my phone at the moment so I can’t see my own signature lol. 

[SomethingUnique22]

7 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

You can move a storage spaces array to any windows system(as long as its compatible). Blue screens shoudln't break anything(about the same risk as normal.

The array data is on the drives, not on the os, so you can move disks between systems as needed

Good to know thxs

7 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Id really suggest against swapping arrays.

is it due to the possible data loss if something goes wrong? Or whys that?

7 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Just get a get a sata pcie card, or get biger hdds to store more data(something like a 4tb or 8tb drive is pretty cheap now)

Can my Ryzen 1600 handle that tho? 

7 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Do you need to use windows on the host? If you do, you can't use any of these options. Also they will need to have a full backup of the data then restore it, you can migrate without deleting all the data.

If there isnt a way to connect the other pc to my main pc then i would yes. 

Is that possible like a local network between the pcs just not on the network so i can avoid all the networking stuff. 

[LIGISTX]

1 minute ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Basically id like to do all that eventually when i have a proper place where i can have a server room and not have my shit just next to my pc on bubble wrap. 

Ever since i've started watching Wendell talk about ZFS and how amazing it seems ive always wanted to set it up. Glad u brought that up i could remember it exactly. 
Also while i want to do all the cool things ppl like Wendel show, im not at that point in my life yet where im settled down. 

What i need is a scalable method to store data that can grow with me as i age and am able to do the things u talk about above. Plex servers, home automation, etc etc.

yay im doing more harm cries a little...

Storage spaces is plenty scalable and is fine. It is a fine solution for your current requirements. Even if the OS does Bork itself, yes, you can import the storage space pool into a new OS (as far as I know…). 
 

ZFS is not easily scalable. ZFS stores data in pools made or up vdevs. To grow the pool you have to add new vdevs. Each vdev holds its own redundancy…. So if I wanted to add storage to my pool, I would need to get a bunch of drives, create a new vdev, and add that to the pool, you can’t just add a drive here or a drive there. Again… google will be your friend here. Freenas forums details all of this very well, they have docs on the forum specifically explaining this for new folks

 

If you do anything, unraid likely is the answer. But for now, I don’t think your solution is a bad one. And I don’t know if I’d keep the drives on bubble wrap… you want then rigidly mounted. Turning on and off isn’t a big deal, but I wouldn’t let then sit on bubble wrap lol.

[LIGISTX]

1 minute ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Good to know thxs

is it due to the possible data loss if something goes wrong? Or whys that?

Can my Ryzen 1600 handle that tho? 

If there isnt a way to connect the other pc to my main pc then i would yes. 

Is that possible like a local network between the pcs just not on the network so i can avoid all the networking stuff. 

Pcie cards don’t care about the platform. Yes, your system can use a pcie sata card (but I’d really look into a HBA instead…)

 

Networking stuff isn’t hard. All you need to do is set up a user, and then share the data. This is incredibly easy and plenty of YouTube tutorials can show you how depending on the file server your using. So yes, your file server can run a different OS and sit in your closet. My entire homelab is in a closet, no monitor plugged in, no GUI to even look at. It’s all managed over the network. 

[Electronics Wizardy]

6 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Ever since i've started watching Wendell talk about ZFS and how amazing it seems ive always wanted to set it up. Glad u brought that up i could remember it exactly. 
Also while i want to do all the cool things ppl like Wendel show, im not at that point in my life yet where im settled down. 

Just saying, storage spaces can do basically all the same things as zfs, snapshots, checksumming, dedup, fast clones and more. And probalby more flexable as you can mix raid level and do tiering

 

 

2 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

is it due to the possible data loss if something goes wrong? Or whys that?

Quote

Its just a pain, its much easier to just have one array that has what you need on it.

 

2 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Can my Ryzen 1600 handle that tho? 

Quote

Yea, just put it in the spare pcie slot on your board. 

 

3 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

If there isnt a way to connect the other pc to my main pc then i would yes. 

Is that possible like a local network between the pcs just not on the network so i can avoid all the networking stuff. 

Yea you can make a nas, but you need a seperate pc for that. Do you have a spare pc to use as a nas?

 

 

[SomethingUnique22]

4 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

Look at my first post. I give a decent description there. We are not going to be able to tell you everything there is to know, this will take time and research on your end to fully understand the systems and how they are implemented. You now have the tools to go do that learning; you know the right words to search such as Freenas, ZFS, unraid etc. Now you get to learn what’s different snd unique about them all   
 

Sorry replying to everyone i have to repeat a few times.

yaaa i suppose your right.

 

 

4 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

If your running out of sata drives, you can either get a cheap PCIe SATA card which would work for storage spaces, but I would recommend getting a HBA. They do cost more, but you can find a used raid flashed to IT more (so it won’t work as a raid card, just as a HBA which stands for host bus adapter, basically just lots of sas which can be split out to SATA ports) and they are WAY more robust as they are actual enterprise grade gear. Look in my signature for my HBA, you can just google that name and find them on eBay for cheap. It’s a dell h310 or something. I forget off hand and I’m using my phone at the moment so I can’t see my own signature lol. 

I have heard of them i was always worried of not having enough PCIE lanes tho. I tried to figure out the current lanes i use with my gpu and wifi/bluetooth card plus my sata drives and i got very confused and gave up. 

Also wouldnt it have slower speeds then compared to using regular sata ports on the mobo?

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

I have heard of them i was always worried of not having enough PCIE lanes tho. I tried to figure out the current lanes i use with my gpu and wifi/bluetooth card plus my sata drives and i got very confused and gave up. 

Pcie lanes won't be a issue here, you chipset has extra pcie lanes for devices like a sata card.

 

2 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Also wouldnt it have slower speeds then compared to using regular sata ports on the mobo?

Won't affect performance. HDDs are slow, so they aren't even close to filling sata or the pcie 1x connection.

[SomethingUnique22]

5 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

Storage spaces is plenty scalable and is fine. It is a fine solution for your current requirements. Even if the OS does Bork itself, yes, you can import the storage space pool into a new OS (as far as I know…). 
 

yaa

5 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

ZFS is not easily scalable. ZFS stores data in pools made or up vdevs. To grow the pool you have to add new vdevs. Each vdev holds its own redundancy…. So if I wanted to add storage to my pool, I would need to get a bunch of drives, create a new vdev, and add that to the pool, you can’t just add a drive here or a drive there. Again… google will be your friend here. Freenas forums details all of this very well, they have docs on the forum specifically explaining this for new folks

i guess i dont really have a problem with that. When i made the array i have now i used 4 shucked 8tb wd desktop drives. I bought a 2tb seagate since it needed a 5th drive for some reason to do raid 5. So when this one fills up id like to just add another set of 4 8tb shucked drives since thats the cheapest way to get 8tb red drives. 

I guess the main issue is the whole separate computer part. I just wish i could have a little raspberry pie or something in my pc case that i can switch on and it auto connects to my main pc basically like what i have now just less ghetto. 

5 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

If you do anything, unraid likely is the answer. But for now, I don’t think your solution is a bad one. And I don’t know if I’d keep the drives on bubble wrap… you want then rigidly mounted. Turning on and off isn’t a big deal, but I wouldn’t let then sit on bubble wrap lol.

umm well to be more precise i have a printer paper on the ground then bubble wrap and another printer paper stack to set them on as a flat surface.
Is there another way to do it where i can keep them next to my pc since the sata cables are so short?

[LIGISTX]

3 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

Sorry replying to everyone i have to repeat a few times.

yaaa i suppose your right.

 

 

I have heard of them i was always worried of not having enough PCIE lanes tho. I tried to figure out the current lanes i use with my gpu and wifi/bluetooth card plus my sata drives and i got very confused and gave up. 

Also wouldnt it have slower speeds then compared to using regular sata ports on the mobo?

 

1 minute ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Won't affect performance. HDDs are slow, so they aren't even close to filling sata or the pcie 1x connection.

This. Also, OP, this is why a HBA is the best option. HBA's are SAS cards, SAS is high performance and you can split a single SAS port out into 4 SATA ports. Enterprise solutions use SAS... Don't worry about slow downs, if there are any, it won't be due to the HBA. 

 

 

Just need to flash it to IT mode which is not difficult, plenty of guides online show you how. But if you don't feel comfortable with that (which is fair) folks sell them already flashed to IT mode for like 50-60 bucks. This will last you forever, will not be flaky, and will grow with you when you eventually get a more robust solution like unRAID or FreeNAS. This is one of the cards of choice for FreeNAS. Just NEEDS to be in IT mode.

[SomethingUnique22]

6 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Pcie lanes won't be a issue here, you chipset has extra pcie lanes for devices like a sata card.

 

Won't affect performance. HDDs are slow, so they aren't even close to filling sata or the pcie 1x connection.

really sick good to know.

[LIGISTX]

1 minute ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

When i made the array i have now i used 4 shucked 8tb wd desktop drives. I bought a 2tb seagate since it needed a 5th drive for some reason to do raid 5.

How does this work,,,, are you sure your actually getting all your usable space? RAID (unless its not RAID.... like UnRAID, thats why its named that...) requires all drives to be the same size, if they are not, all drives will "drop down" to the lowest size in the array. So if you have a RAID 5 with 8 TB's and a 2 TB, they all will act as 2 TB.

 

3 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

I guess the main issue is the whole separate computer part. I just wish i could have a little raspberry pie or something in my pc case that i can switch on and it auto connects to my main pc basically like what i have now just less ghetto. 

What? What exactly do you want to do with the Pi? Why not just have the separate PC be a network attached storage (NAS)? You don't need anything on your main PC, you just add the server as a network share and thats that.

[SomethingUnique22]

27 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Just saying, storage spaces can do basically all the same things as zfs, snapshots, checksumming, dedup, fast clones and more. And probalby more flexable as you can mix raid level and do tiering

 

huh, guess i just havent looked at it enough maybe theres more settings i just cant see will look into that.

Quote

Its just a pain, its much easier to just have one array that has what you need on it.

Quote

Yea, just put it in the spare pcie slot on your board. 

gotcha

 

Quote

Yea you can make a nas, but you need a seperate pc for that. Do you have a spare pc to use as a nas?

no but i can get the parts if making my own NAS would work out.

[LIGISTX]

Oh, one more thing to add.... if you have an actual RAID array set up, you can't just turn one drive off at a time like you said your doing. If a drive is lost from an array it will degrade the array.

 

And again, to explain ZFS, if you want to add more drives, say you want to add 24 TB of space, you will need 5 drives if you want 1 drive redundancy. 4x8 = 24, 5th drive will be there for RAID Z1 redundancy (Z1 = RAID 5). This is why its not so easy, because you can't just add 1 drive at a time. You have to add an entire new vdev which needs its own redundancy.

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, LIGISTX said:

How does this work,,,, are you sure your actually getting all your usable space? RAID (unless its not RAID.... like UnRAID, thats why its named that...) requires all drives to be the same size, if they are not, all drives will "drop down" to the lowest size in the array. So if you have a RAID 5 with 8 TB's and a 2 TB, they all will act as 2 TB.

Storage spaces lets you mix drive sizes in parity raid and still get the full capacity. So this config will work fine in storage spaces.

 

6 minutes ago, SomethingUnique22 said:

I guess the main issue is the whole separate computer part. I just wish i could have a little raspberry pie or something in my pc case that i can switch on and it auto connects to my main pc basically like what i have now just less ghetto. 

Nothing wrong about having storage in the PC, I don't see a reason to have a nas here. Id just keep using storage spaces and add drives as needed.