[Tfug] Cheap NAS with NFS!

[Jeff Breadner]

> If you can tear yourself away from Linux and use FreeBSD, here's a distro that 
> will run on most generic x86 boxes:
>
>     FreeNAS: The Free NAS Server - Home
>     Home of Network-Attached Storage server, supports: CIFS (samba), FTP, 
>     NFS, RSYNC protocols, local user authentication, software RAID 
>     (0,1,5) with full Web ...
>     http://www.freenas.org/
>
> I have several FreeNAS boxes on my networks as backup servers.
>   
I've played with NetBSD and FreeBSD in the past, but never stuck with 
it.  I'm certainly open to running any UNIX-like OS though.

In my case, I'm just looking for a reasonably priced 2-5 drive NAS box, 
that either natively supports NFS or can be flashed with any alternate 
OS that supports NFS.  I've been told that I should get over it and just 
put together a Micro ITX / Intel Atom box dedicated to file sharing, but 
with two young kids I don't have time for side projects like this that I 
used to have.  It's probably a lot less work than I think though.

For now, I've just bought an extra SATA controller card and have stuck a 
5th drive into my old file server, with room for a few more before I 
start stressing the power supply.

cheers
  Jeff