Ask Slashdot: Easiest Way To Consolidate Household Media?

First time accepted submitter Lordfly writes "The wife and I have started looking to buy a house. In the spirit of that, I've been giving away books, CDs, and DVDs to 'downsize' the pile of crap I'll have to lug around when we do find the right place. That got me thinking about digital files. I'm perfectly okay with giving up (most) books, CDs, and DVD cases. The only music I buy are MP3s anyway, and we stream most everything else if we wanted to watch a show or movie. That being said, I have a desktop, my wife has an old Macbook, we both have tablets, and I also have an Android smartphone. I'd like to set up something on an extra Windows box shoved in a closet that lets me dump every digital file we have (photos, music, ebooks, movies) and then doles it out as necessary to all of our devices. Unfortunately my best computer geek days are likely behind me (photography and cooking have consumed me since), so while I CAN schlep around a command line, I've lost most of my knowledge, so go easy on the 'just apt-get FubarPackageInstaller.gzip and rd -m Arglebargle' stuff. Something easy enough for my wife to use would be a major plus. So: What's the best way to make your own personal 'cloud'?"

Comments

The OP needs a NAS with ZFS!

[synthespian]

C'mon! Anyone who's promoting some shitty Linux-based tech with no ZFS is actually NOT HELPING the OP!

This is Linux-based old tech because there's no support for ZFS (Zettabyte File System), which is today's standard for this type of thing. How lame. the OP doesn't know it, but he wants a ZFS filesystem because, in the long haul, it can counterweight - amongst other things - silent data corruption (it's going on, but your hardware diagnostics says everything's OK).

Besides, the OP said he and his wife had Macs, and since Snow Leopard (10.6), Macs support ZFS. The old Mac just needs a memory upgrade to support Snow Leopard, probably.

Get a NAS box with FreeBSD inside (check out: www.freenas.org)

Since the OP is not one of the typical /. nerds, here's a nice You Tube video, by the nice msknight5, that explains why you need ZFS: ZFS - Home server - Why? (NB: she goes on a little rant about DVD, DRM, etc., but just bear with it).

Don't settle for less. Too bad for users of the lame Linux that their beloved GPL does not allow it on their kernel.

Re:Eureka! I found the source of Background Radiat

[synthespian]

Also, a NAS that isn't Linux-based, because that sucks too, since it doesn't have support for ZFS. Which is crazy and lame, just lame.