Ideas for a Home Grown Network Attached Storage?

Ken asks: "It seems that consumer level 1TB+ NAS boxes are all the rage right now. Being a digital packrat, with several computers/entertainment devices on my home network, I am becoming more interested in getting one of these for my home. Unwilling to dish out 1K or more up front, and possessing a little of the DIY spirit, I would like to build my own NAS and am interested in hardware/software ideas. While the small form factor PC cases are attractive, my NAS will dwell in the basement so I am thinking of a cheap/roomy ATX case with lots of power. I think that integrated gigabit Ethernet capabilities and PCI-Express on the motherboard are a must, as well as Serial ATA HDDs, but what processor/RAM? How strong does a computer really need to be to serve files? What about the OS? Win2K3 server edition? WinXP Pro? Linux?" "I have been using Red Hat and then Fedora Core since it came out but only in a workstation role, and I have little experience with other flavors. What file system should I use for maximum compatibility? I will need it to work with Windows, Linux and several UPnP devices. I am planning on starting out with two or three HDDs in a RAID 5 config. and I would like to be able to add more HDDs as space is needed without any major changes. Thanks for any ideas."

Comments

Re:Samba has the best performance.

[JabberWokky]

Why would I use Samba? I don't have a single Windows machine, nor do any of my roommates.

When building your own, you're looking at unique specs. If you were buying something for a corporate environment I would highly recommend getting something with Samba, even if you don't use any Windows at the moment (for when the marketing consultant with a laptop needs to upload the large video file or whatever).

But for home use? "Look at your needs" is better than "here's the best".

--
Evan