Raspberry PI storage server

[Peter_The_Ent]

I have a Raspberry PI and am looking to turn it into a home storage server. How would I go about that? I want to use a HDD, but do not know how to connect one to my PI (I have the PI Zero w 2), and also do not have a hard drive and need to know where I can get one for cheap.

[Radium_Angel]

4 minutes ago, Peter_The_Ent said:

also do not have a hard drive and need to know where I can get one for cheap.

eBay!

Lots of 4TB (or lerger) server-grade HDDs for under 50$

[Peter_The_Ent]

1 minute ago, Radium_Angel said:

eBay!

Lots of 4TB (or lerger) server-grade HDDs for under 50$

Is there a way I can check how reliable and how much use they have before I buy them?

[Radium_Angel]

Just now, Peter_The_Ent said:

Is there a way I can check how reliable and how much use they have before I buy them?

If you buy new it's not an issue. As to reliability, google the drive, you'll find links.

If you buy used, ask the seller so show a CrystalDiskInfo screenshot of the health/hours on the drive. Good sellers will give this to you

[DrMacintosh]

What you would do is setup the Raspberry Pi as an SMB file server and connect your drives over USB. However, I did this with a Raspberry Pi4 which has a lot more chops than the Pi Zero (and USB 3.0). 

 

I can't think the performance from the Pi Zero would be stellar, so I'll mention an often overlooked feature of most consumer routers....does your router have a USB port? I have two Linksys AX4200 routers and I have a USB 3.0 HDD hooked up to one of them that acts as my Time Machine server for my Macs and an SMB file server. 

[Peter_The_Ent]

6 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

What you would do is setup the Raspberry Pi as an SMB file server and connect your drives over USB. However, I did this with a Raspberry Pi4 which has a lot more chops than the Pi Zero (and USB 3.0). 

 

I can't think the performance from the Pi Zero would be stellar, so I'll mention an often overlooked feature of most consumer routers....does your router have a USB port? I have two Linksys AX4200 routers and I have a USB 3.0 HDD hooked up to one of them that acts as my Time Machine server for my Macs and an SMB file server. 

I am not sure if my router does or not. I am busy and can not check now though.

I do have a few questions:

• What is a SMB file server.
• Can you connect multiple drives to it.
• Can you put a password on the drives.
• Also, can I hook the drives to my PI and then my PI to my router  to have multiple drives available through the router? (assuming my router has an USB port).

[DrMacintosh]

9 minutes ago, Peter_The_Ent said:

What is a SMB file server.

SMB is a network file sharing protocol. 

 

10 minutes ago, Peter_The_Ent said:

Can you connect multiple drives to it.

Theoretically yes. You either need multiple internal drive bays, multiple external USB HDD enclosures, or a multi bay HDD enclosure of some sort, either Thunderbolt or USB.

 

11 minutes ago, Peter_The_Ent said:

Can you put a password on the drives.

Yes

11 minutes ago, Peter_The_Ent said:

Also, can I hook the drives to my PI and then my PI to my router  to have multiple drives available through the router?

In this setup, the drives would be hooked up to your Pi and then you would connect the pi to your router via ethernet which would do the file transferring over the network. 

 

[Peter_The_Ent]

1 hour ago, DrMacintosh said:

SMB is a network file sharing protocol. 

 

Theoretically yes. You either need multiple internal drive bays, multiple external USB HDD enclosures, or a multi bay HDD enclosure of some sort, either Thunderbolt or USB.

 

Yes

In this setup, the drives would be hooked up to your Pi and then you would connect the pi to your router via ethernet which would do the file transferring over the network. 

 

How would I do this? What software would I need?

[Peter_The_Ent]

I have not had a response since Friday. Can you please tell me how I would do this and what software I would need?

On 1/13/2023 at 11:49 AM, DrMacintosh said:

SMB is a network file sharing protocol. 

 

Theoretically yes. You either need multiple internal drive bays, multiple external USB HDD enclosures, or a multi bay HDD enclosure of some sort, either Thunderbolt or USB.

 

Yes

In this setup, the drives would be hooked up to your Pi and then you would connect the pi to your router via ethernet which would do the file transferring over the network. 

 

 

[LIGISTX]

14 minutes ago, Peter_The_Ent said:

I have not had a response since Friday. Can you please tell me how I would do this and what software I would need?

 

Have you googled this at all? I assume not, because there are literally hundreds if not thousands of blog posts about people doing it, and hundreds of video guides on YouTube. 
 

Id do some more homework about it, try and learn as much as you can, then when you run into road blocks, ask those specific questions. Asking an overarching “how do I do this, from step 0 to fully implemented” when those guides already exist… people probably don’t want to type up everything you need to do and learn specifically just for you in this thread.

[Peter_The_Ent]

1 minute ago, LIGISTX said:

Have you googled this at all? I assume not, because there are literally hundreds if not thousands of blog posts about people doing it, and hundreds of video guides on YouTube. 
 

Id do some more homework about it, try and learn as much as you can, then when you run into road blocks, ask those specific questions. Asking an overarching “how do I do this, from step 0 to fully implemented” when those guides already exist… people probably don’t want to type up everything you need to do and learn specifically just for you in this thread.

Do you happen to know a good guide?

[LIGISTX]

2 hours ago, Peter_The_Ent said:

Do you happen to know a good guide?

Off hand, no. But I guarantee you if you type “raspberry pi NAS” into YouTube, you will have plenty of great resources. 
 

I have not watched this, but I know this YouTube is pretty solid… I have used his video for a few other homelab things. Looks like raid owl (another YouTuber) has a video on pi NAS’s as well.

 

Again, the reason I advise looking into it yourself, is because getting into this WILL require research. Continual research. Something will go wrong, and you will need to figure out how to fix it. If trying to find out the basics is to much of a struggle… you may want to just buy a pre-made solution. I am an avid homlaber and help out on this forum a ton with providing people advice and lessons learned, but you have to be able to do some of your own research and come in with questions that are a little further along than “I have no idea how to do any of this, but I want it to work, what do I do”.

Give that video a watch, and if there are things you don’t understand, try and google them to find out answers. Then if your get stuck or just can’t quite understand something, that’s when we as the hive mind of the forum will be more eager to help. 

 

[steelo]

On 1/13/2023 at 12:06 PM, Peter_The_Ent said:

I have a Raspberry PI and am looking to turn it into a home storage server. How would I go about that? I want to use a HDD, but do not know how to connect one to my PI (I have the PI Zero w 2), and also do not have a hard drive and need to know where I can get one for cheap.

I'm using a pi zero w (1) right now as a SMB file server. You really are bottlenecked by the pi's slow usb and 2.4 ghz wifi (not sure about pi zero 2w's specs, but I'm sure it's better) I find the performance to be 'good enough' for my purposes. I mainly back up family photos and stream tv shows and movies from it. Streaming a move or tv episode to a roku device takes about 5-10 seconds to initially load, but no stuttering issues so far.