Until recently, I had been managing my data using large HDD’s in my desktop and external usb drives. I should say that I’m mostly using this storage to backup personal data (photos/code/other data). I’ve gotten to a point where external drives probably aren’t the best option, and I’m looking to convert an old mini-itx home-theater computer into a NAS on a tight budget. Because the PC has no 3.5" bays, I’m left with a few options:
(1) Fill the 2.5" bay with 4 tb SSDs over time (~$180-$720)
(2) Buy an appropriate ATX case and get some enterprise/NAS large spinning drives ($100 case, ~$100-$500 in drives)
(3) Use a USB 3.5" sata dock/enclosure
(4) Just buy a NAS
I realize this is small beans to this community, but I would be okay with an additional 4-12 tb of storage at this point, but realize I will want more in the future. I like option (1) based on the small footprint and simplicity, though I’m obviously overpaying for the storage. Options (2) and (4) are probably the most future proof and would have the most storage. Option (3) is likely the easiest/cheapest and could be used to expand option (1) in the future. Thanks for your thoughts.
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You can get HDDs at under $15/TB while SSDs can be over $50/TB. Option 1 is more than just overpaying; it is a waste of money. SSDs are great, but they are not for bulk data storage. With that said I do own a few 4TB SSDs and a few 2TB NVMes, but none are for bulk data storage. They mostly hold the OS and my installed games and the working set of files I’m actively using.
Option 2 is good, but can probably be improved upon.
Option 3 is what I do and recommend to you. I’ll explain next.
Option 4 is the same as Option 2, but you pay more for the out-of-the-box convenience. It isn’t for me, but plenty of people like Synology, so no judgement here if that is for you.
Your two real options represent a dilemma so many people encounter: Do I want an external enclosure, or do I want a NAS?
I use a 5 bay external enclosure plugged into my desktop PC. I use DrivePool to pool the 5 drives together and I use its duplication feature for redundancy. It has 5x12TB refurbished Seagate Exos in it. If I need more space I’ll probably replace some 12TB drives with larger 18 or 20TB drives. I keep it powered off when not in use and I am the only user. I may never need more space than 5x20TB drives can offer and I think it is the best option for my use case. It sounds like your needs are similar to mine.
I’m also interested in network storage and server services, but I don’t need all of my storage available on my network. I have a small mini pc with 6TB of storage on it and it is all I need for a NAS or home server. 6TB is plenty for temporary storage and streaming videos.
So, my external enclosure was $200 and the mini pc was $200 (but $337 for both today, Cyber Monday). You could build a NAS for $400 with the same N100 processor and a case with enough space for the drives. The difference between that and my setup is I can turn the external enclosure off while the mini continues to run 24/7 and it uses very little electricity. However, only a small subset of my data is available on my network. There are tradeoffs either way. I can wipe and reinstall Linux on my mini without impacting my bulk storage, for example. My mini is silent and small enough to take with me on a vacation to stream movies; it would be too big for that if it had a bunch of HDDs in it, however I can stream videos from it from anywhere in the world using Tailscale already, so no good reason to bring it anyways.
You’ll have to decide which you’d prefer, but I’m happy with my external enclosure and mini combo. I doubt I’ll ever build a tower desktop full of HDDs ever again.
This sounds like exactly what I’m looking for to extend my laptop video editing rig. What kind of software are you running on the NUC to turn it into a NAS? Also, how extendable is that NUC in terms of storage?
I don’t have a NUC. I have the BeeLink Mini S12 I linked. It has room for the 2TB NVMe and the 4TB SSD I have in it. It doesn’t have any space for any more internal drives. You could plug a USB enclosure into it but I wouldn’t because I want to keep most of my storage attached to my desktop and not on my network so I don’t intend of ever adding any more storage to it. If you want more network storage you should consider a physically larger machine.
It runs Alpine Linux and several Docker services. I use a samba network share for NAS features, but I also have Seafile running.
On a tight budget id go with 2. A even cheaper case and drives that can be used in a NAS in the future.
I went with (2). 8 bay mATX case with a PCIx1 SATA card.
Mobo has 3x nvme and 4xSATA, so I use:
- 2x nvme for system mirrored, fast mirrored storage (monero node), and fast unmirrored storage (Jellyfin transcoding). Mirroring and partitioning done with LVM.
- 1x nvme for LVM cache.
- Mixed drives in mirrored LVM configuration using the cache. Currently have 2x6Tb, 2x18Tb direct to mobo, and a couple other older drives I replace when I find a good deal connected to the PCI card.
- 1x 6Tb NVR drive for cameras in a separate LVM configuration to the PCI card.
I also got an ARC GPU for Jellyfin transcoding to the PCIx16 slot.
I’m coming from a QNAP NAS which I personally don’t like their software and wanted a GPU for transcoding.
Thanks everyone, because I’m exceedingly cheap and lazy (and this is a backup solution), I ended up getting a sabrent usb dock and 4 tb HDD for now. This will also allow me to use all of the smaller drives I’ve been accumulating over the years. Also picked up some nice plastic drive cases to organize all of it. This is definitely the lowest tech solution, but I’m happy with it.
