Can you suggest me an alternative cloud/file server solution with GUI?
I´m sick of trying mount a new HDD in it and I´m not comfortable with linux command line.
I did everything as explained twice, yet no luck. So I move on to next one.
Something simple to setup and easy to add new drives without lines of commands in terminal.
Thank you in advance

 

If you just need file syncing, then Syncthing is pretty painless to set up.

I'm using it on 2 Windows machines and 2 Android phones, but it works on MacOS, BSD and Linux too. Grab 'Base Syncthing' (not the 'integration' stuff) from the download page. Put the exe wherever you want (you can throw the other files away), start it. Go to your browser to continue setup.

You can skip the task scheduler stuff he mentions and just make a shortcut in your start-up folder on Windows.

-> C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

If you want Syncthing to run hidden, add this to the shortcut:
syncthing.exe -no-browser -no-console -no-restart

 

I think FreeNAS or Synology could work, but i'm not sure what your use case is

 

Synology Drive, without a doubt, having genuine Synology NAS gives you also ability to connect from internet with use of QuickConnect,
if you want just networked external HDD, simply use SMB filesharing service, that can be also done on Synology, or any other NAS solution, including free TrueNAS or Windows Server eventually

 

That TrueNAS looks like good alternative.
The use case would be storage for music, movies and backup. Also it would nice if it could even playback video and audio files, my computer is a bit overkill for only storage use(i5-2500k, 16Gb, GT1030), also if it could do torrenting, that would be nice.
My main concern is that adding SSD/HDDs is made difficult, I would like it to be just simple plug´n´play, I have PCIE 8xSATA card for future disks, so I hope this would be long term solution.
If anyone here is using TrueNAS, please tell me about your use case. Also what is the plugin system, is it like email, players, apps?
Again Thank you for helping me on this one

 

I'm running TrueNAS Scale for fun, testing Truechart apps mostly (PiHole, OpenSpeedTest, JDownloader2 etc..), as a virtual machine on my Proxmox server PC, nested virtualization is also possible, you can run Windows VM on a TrueNAS Scale (assuming you got enough system resources to allocate),
with TrueNAS, you need fairly lot of RAM, and separate SSD(s) for system (unlike Synology, where system is automatically mirrored across ALL drives),
HDDs are run in ZFS pool(s), in RAID-Z (fault tolerance of 1 drive) or RAID-Z2 (fault tolerance of 2 drives), data pools are expandable such way as well,
ideally you want mirrored SSDs for system, and separate storage controller for those ZFS data pools, in your use case make sure that PCIe SATA card is actually supported, and external HDD to serve as backup for your valuable data,
i5-2500K with 16GB ram is alright, I'm using i7-4770 with 32GB ram as aforementioned Proxmox server, with 4 cores(threads) and 8GB ram assigned to TrueNAS Scale VM which imo is bare minimum for snappy performance, bigger HDD pools need more RAM, for reliable use people use server-grade ECC RAM and server-grade CPUs designed for 24/7 operation, but from my experience, consumer PC made into a TrueNAS works good enough for casual home use

 

I went to the Synology website. they are based in Taiwan. Does all this mean you tracks are safe in Taiwan? Do you use it in collaboration with others? I guess I'm old-fashioned as I prefer to keep my data in Jamaica, Kingston to be precise. let's say 480 gb?

 

ah you get this totally wrong,
Synology NAS is a box you have on your own, Synology Drive (Server) is an application running on your NAS which you access using Synology Drive (client) apps,
your data is not stored/mirrored on Synology servers somewhere else, only thing which goes through Synology servers is relay service to provide QuickConnect connection which is handy for users that don't have static IP address provided by their ISP,
and there's also possibility to use Synology Drive through own VPN server (OpenVPN for ex., which can be also hosted on your own Synology NAS as an app), completely avoiding Synology's QuickConnect feature if you wish

 

Does the bit torrent support IP filtering?
Also I was looking to see if True NAS has something like Q File to back up my phone to.

 

Last edited: Apr 20, 2023

I have several QNaps, If you are new to NAS I would suggest maybe buying a QNap or syslogy. They are easy to setup since are consumer based NAS. Now I am not saying you can't use TrueNAs or other free NAS OS's. but for your first NAS it might be easier on you.

 

no idea, I don't use torrents, and I don't need to backup phone when I can access networked Drive from phone instead

 

Thanks for the info. I was looking for a alternate to Q File.
Do you thing a old core quad will be ok for only file sharing no transcending, Also can it use Ext 3 or ext 4 not ZFS. I really don't need the over head of zfs since it will be raid 5.

 

I don't use Q File so don't take my words for granted, but I'm pretty sure there are handful of Docker-based apps to do that, something like this maybe: https://github.com/immich-app/immich
I think old Core2Quad should work okay, you could use some simple casual Linux distro, no need for specific NAS operating system,
file sharing via SMB, and apps/services via Docker (containers there are easy to manage with something like Portainer too)

 

Would this work out for you? I've starting using it since last month and is working great for me.
https://cloudmounter.net/

 

Thanks for the info I will give it a check. I though about just using a Linux distro but I think a true NAS OS would be better.
The box will be just a NAS anyway and the OS being totally dedicated / built for the NAS is most likely a better build. Only NAS Apps installed lean and mean as they say. I could be wrong but that is what I am thinking.

 

Take a look at Unraid. It's a software NAS I use for backup and as an application server. You can run Docker apps (like NextCloud, and hundreds more), VMs, etc. It uses a single (or double) parity drive, and about any other combination of hard drives. They can all be different sizes, you can add drives without rebuilding the whole array. If you lose a drive, rebuild it from parity. If you lose the parity drive, your other drives are still readable as normal. There's a lot more great about it, and one of those is that it's very easy to use, no command lines (unless you want to). It's only $59 USD, and well worth it. For me it's my backup, Plex server, LAN controler, Jellyfin, Kali Linux VM, soon to be NextCloud server, MacOS VM, and a bunch of utilities. Check out unraid.net. Also check out Spaceinvaderd One YouTube channel, with excellent videos walking you through how to do about anything with Unraid (includiing NextCloud).

 

Last edited: Apr 21, 2023

A little update. I went the TrueNAS route, really easy to setup. Already got it working as file vault and Plex server. The only thing that´s bugging me is Calibre-web, when I first installed it, I got it running in browser, BUT after I updated it and added my books and mags, it won´t simple connect. It´s most likely user error, but even uninstalling and reinstalling it, it won´t connect.
Next step is to install qbittorrent and another drive to it and of course get calibre running.
How you guys upgrade your hardware on TrueNAS? I mean can you just simply shut down, add memory and graphic card and you´re good to go. Or do I have to do something on system level or even re-install everything?
Thanks again for being super helpful on this subject.

 

make a full backup of configuration and all the stuff, that way you can even migrate it on completely new hardware, ZFS pools can be also moved from one system to another (but always make backup on external storage if you don't want loose any data in case things go wrong)

 

Did you set a static IP or use DHCP?
Your ip might have changed on the box.

 

There are many alternatives, but I found a very good one for myself - CloudMounter.