So I can’t get on the openfiler forums so I thought I would pose the question here.

Linux home NAS for a media/file server. How would you do it?

Right now I’m leaning toward Openfiler.

I currently have Openfiler 2.3 on an old Athlon 1.3Ghz processor with 768Mb DDR-2100 and 2x 500gb IDE drives in a software RAID 1. This setup is being used ONLY so I can get comfortable with openfiler and to try and determine the best path.

I would LIKE to try and put it on something like this:

Acer Aspire Easystore H340
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16859321013

In a RAID 10. It would have 4x 7200 RPM SATA drives and 2gb DDR2 667, but an Atom 230. I don't think the processing will be that big of a problem though. It comes with a 10/100/1000 nic. Right now the test system hiccups, but the only thing that maxes out is the RAM. It's not really being pushed though.

The goal is to have a reliable (minimum of 2TB RAID 1, but I would prefer a RAID 10) NAS that I can use. SMALL form factor and power footprint as possible. Money is an issue of course. I could probably spend $500 on this system. Don’t count HDD’s cost in that.

I have some linux experience, but I’m very much a newb. When I use linux my primary OS is Fedora 10, but I’m not sure this would be a good solution for this. The *nix admins at my work think there no reason that I shouldn’t use CentOS and Samba. However if I think that XFS is the file system to use with this and I don’t think it works with RHEL at least so I would assume not on CentOS either.

I have read that Ubuntu has been loaded on the Acer with success.

Also for a home file server is a HW RAID card a must, or just a nice to have? Openfiler does software RAID’s 0, 1, 5, 6, & 10.

Feel free to suggest other solutions.

I am doing something similar, and have been contemplating Free NAS and openfiler. Free NAS has a very small foot print, though some people out there claim better performance from openfiler.

Also, a company called Logic Supply offers a VIA Artigo 2000 barebones Nas kit with a modified freenas. SolidLogic A2000 NAS/Home Server Featuring FreeNAS

While I can't say I have any advice on your choice of distribution, your question about SW RAID vs HW RAID can be decided more simply: SW RAID is going to tax your CPU and you won't necessarily get the same performance as HW. Given that you're using this for a NAS and probably won't be running Crysis on it, I think your CPU would be able to handle it as it's one of the few things it will be doing while serving your data. I would try it out and see what kind of performance you get, and if it's too slow because the CPU is always crunching it may be time to find yourself a HW RAID controller.

Also, if you go with Openfiler, keep this thread posted with how it works out (setup wise as well as performance). I'm sure there are a few of us here who would like to see that feedback.

Cheers :-)

I think the real issue with those two is do you prefer Linux(OpenFiler) or BSD(FreeNas). But I'm not really knowledgeable to really compare the two.

If I remember correctly I think this was the article that made me want to go with OpenFiler

http://blog.patyuen.com/lessons/open...-your-own-nas/

But this one is good too.
http://linuxbsdos.com/2008/10/06/freenas-vs-openfiler/

A very appealing box indeed. I like the video included, but I'm not so sure about the C7.