making a NAS out of random drives?

[Orni]

I have several different hard drives lying around - most in between 500GB and 2TB capacity.

However, some are 2,5" 5400rpm while others are 3,5" 7200rpm drives and almost all of them are consumer grade.

 

I don't really have a use for them - since backing up data onto them is a hassle and then there's the risk of drive failure.

 

So - I'm looking for a way to bundle them together into a "frankenstein-nas" that would allow more or less reliable and convenient data backup, but it seems there aren't many solutions that fit this scenario.

In fact, 'Windows Home Server' is the only thing I found allowing for such a 'drive pool', though it seems that feature got removed in later versions.

 

Do you guys have any recommendations or ideas?

 

/edit:

I also found this: https://stablebit.com/

(but I have zero experience with it)

[Guest]

Storage Spaces in 2012/Win 8 would be an option.

[Orni]

Storage Spaces in 2012/Win 8 would be an option.

that looks nice

 

I'm looking for a solution that uses a dedicated machine though, so StableBit also doesn't seem to work for me

[ChineseChef]

You could get a drobo.  They are not the fastest by any means, but can handle drives of different size and speeds quite easily, and they are extremely user friendly.  Plus you can get the 8 bay one on ebay for like 300-450.

[TheGeekster]

Seems a bit of a waste to get something like an expensive drobo for some odd disks.

 

Best bet as said is a drive pool on a windows machine, just remember to keep checking disk health often. Might be easier to simply find two of the biggest drives, do a check on them to make sure they are healthy, and use them in a raid 1 config in freenas or something similar, the mixed sizes and speeds really would mess with any raid or drive pool.

[Captain_WD]

I have several different hard drives lying around - most in between 500GB and 2TB capacity.

However, some are 2,5" 5400rpm while others are 3,5" 7200rpm drives and almost all of them are consumer grade.

 

I don't really have a use for them - since backing up data onto them is a hassle and then there's the risk of drive failure.

 

So - I'm looking for a way to bundle them together into a "frankenstein-nas" that would allow more or less reliable and convenient data backup, but it seems there aren't many solutions that fit this scenario.

In fact, 'Windows Home Server' is the only thing I found allowing for such a 'drive pool', though it seems that feature got removed in later versions.

 

Do you guys have any recommendations or ideas?

 

/edit:

I also found this: https://stablebit.com/

(but I have zero experience with it)

 

 

Hey Orni,

 

What drives do you have?

I wouldn't bother using all those drives in a RAID configuration as they will be limited to the size and speed of the smallest and the slowest of drives. You could do a JBOD or JBOD SPAN configuration or simply use them separately. 

I believe the easiest, cheapest solution that would bring you least problems would be to make a simple home server build with all those drives. 

 

Happy Holidays!

 

Captain_WD.