Posted: 10 December 2010 at 3:23am | IP Logged

Does anyone know of a cheap NAS solution to share a USB external hard drive on a home network?

I don't want to run a second PC and can't really justify buying a NAS enclosure. I'm also not really parched about RAID either. I would just like a non power hungry device which will share my USB hard drive on my network 24/7 so I can access it from the PC when the PC is on, and access media on it from the TV.

It seems it should be a simple solution but the nearest appears to be buying a Buffalo Linkstation or similar with built in storage and limited capacity to add extra USB drives which is quite an expense given I don't need the extra storage at present.

ps ignore the guff at the top, I don't know why it is appearing, something to do with the proxy I'm using I think

Posted: 10 December 2010 at 10:22pm | IP Logged

If you already have the ext HDD, then this should work a treat:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/sharkoon-lanport-400-add-upto-4-usb-devices-to-your-wired-network

I fancy buying one myself for my USB HDDs and my USB printer. Maybe even my USB scanner too...

Posted: 10 December 2010 at 11:14pm | IP Logged

Bartaggio wrote: Well, if your PC with the external hard drive attached is always on, you could just share it over the network?

I'm currently doing that but I don't use it much to be honest and don't leave it on all the time.

Posted: 10 December 2010 at 11:22pm | IP Logged

Looks perfect, nice one. I have seen a few similar devices, but mostly they are out of stock and there is a distinct lack of reviews available, which is never a great sign imo. The reviews suggest this is fine. Is there any way to reliably tell if my WD HD TV Live will be able to see my HD shared using this device? It will see Windows shares no problem.

Posted: 12 December 2010 at 2:41am | IP Logged

I can connect the external drive directly to it ...  and it will even share the drive over the network for me ... but apparently it's very slow and if the WD is turned off without ejecting the drive it will corrupt the HD (this is the main worry).

But yeah it could be a plan.

I already stream 1080p bluray x264 rips from the PC no problems over the network.

Posted: 17 December 2010 at 3:18am | IP Logged

I def don't phil - more expensive than an external NAS!

Edited by Nhumrod on 20 December 2010 at 9:57pm

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"You're not drunk if you can lie on the floor without holding on"

Posted: 14 January 2011 at 8:00am | IP Logged

Nhumrod wrote: sweet, let us know how you get on!

A mini update. whilst I was back at christmas I found chance to update the firmware to WDlxTV, the most popular custom firmware going. aside from improving various functions, and adding lots more custom functionality, as hoped it keeps power on to the USB when the device is in standby and continues to share any attached USB hard drive on the network. unfortunately didn't have any time to try out what else it will do.

so, when I am back in the UK in feb, I am going to set up my external HDD in the lounge attached to the WDTV Live. I will then use that to store my music/tv/films so they can be accessed in the lounge without needing the pc on, and then when the pc is on, I will get it to auto backup the contents of the USB HDD. just the solution I needed without having to buy a dedicated NAS.

the custom firmware also has a built in torrent client too. i haven't played with it yet but will hopefully check it out, then i can leave the WDTV downloading films/tv/music during the night without needing to leave power hungry pc on.

Posted: 08 Febuary 2011 at 1:06pm | IP Logged

At xmas time I bought an AC Ryan Playon!HD Mini:

http://www.playonhd.com/en/?upn=products&subpage=playonhdmini

For £70 it boots in about 10 seconds, will play every media format you can think of, and has no HDDs or active cooling so is completely silent. I havent had my media PC on in the living room since!

Also replaced my drives in my server with 2TB seagate 5900RPM ones. Theyre pretty decent, and the spin speed reduction makes no noticeable difference as the files I store on there are all media, so large blocks of contiguous storage.

Finally, I am also replacing the HDDs on my server machine with a mirrored pair of 60GB OCZ Vertex 2E SSDs, and upgrading it to Windows Server 2008 R2:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/s60gb-ocz-technology-vertex-2e-25-sandforce-ssd-mlc-flash-read-285mb-s-write-275mb-s

Completely silent and fast as f*ck. Should temper the noise from my server a bit, now that I will have gone from 10x 7200 RPM drives to just 5 much newer ones, plus a couple of silent SSDs!