Would a Raspberry Pi 4 work well as a NAS?

[I Need a Drink]

My Windows Home Server has kicked the bucket. I used it to stream full Blu-Ray rips to several Dune players throughout my house. I asked a question about using a Raspberry Pi the other day and got some advice about how to set it up to replace my Home Server but I am not sure if this is the best “cheap” option.

Would a Raspberry Pi 4 with a 4 bay Mediasonic Pro Box hooked up via USB 3, streaming over a gigabit network and using Samba file share and no transcoding, be fast enough to stream full Blu-Ray rips without stuttering?

 

[jrichards1408]

Yes it should be fine

 

[phillytim]

I wouldn't depend on the Pi for your heavyweight NAS needs. My Pi 3B+ seems to have died (won't even boot to the color/bios screen), after 1.5 years of always-on light duty; and I was using the decent Raspberry case.

Take that for what it's worth.

 

[ActionableMango]

My Windows Home Server has kicked the bucket. I used it to stream full Blu-Ray rips to several Dune players throughout my house.

I hate to ask a dumb question, but can't you just plug the storage into one of the Dune players and enable SMB on that Dune so that the other Dunes can use them? In other words, use the Dune as both media player and NAS?

This is what I do with my Zidoo media player. There are several benefits to doing it this way. It reduces the rat's nest of devices and cables that you have store somewhere, power, connect to LAN, and administer/maintain. And there is nothing cheaper than using what you already have on hand.

 

[I Need a Drink]

I hate to ask a dumb question, but can't you just plug the storage into one of the Dune players and enable SMB on that Dune so that the other Dunes can use them? In other words, use the Dune as both media player and NAS?

This is what I do with my Zidoo media player. There are several benefits to doing it this way. It reduces the rat's nest of devices and cables that you have store somewhere, power, connect to LAN, and administer/maintain. And there is nothing cheaper than using what you already have on hand.

Not a dumb question. I guess I could do that, but since my Dune's are older models, they don't have gigabit ethernet. This means making large file transfers of multiple new rips is really slow to the drives. Additionally, and more importantly, the Dunes are in my Living Room and Bedrooms and the ProBox is kinda loud and I don't want the fan noise in any of those rooms. I had the WHS in a closet, which is where I plan on putting the Pi, so I don't have to hear the fans running.
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I wouldn't depend on the Pi for your heavyweight NAS needs. My Pi 3B+ seems to have died (won't even boot to the color/bios screen), after 1.5 years of always-on light duty; and I was using the decent Raspberry case.

Take that for what it's worth.

Yeah but a Synology is pretty expensive and if I have to replace the Pi a couple years down the road, that should only be $35-$50 vs $500+ for the Synology with more than 2 Bays.

 

[ActionableMango]

Not a dumb question. I guess I could do that, but since my Dune's are older models, they don't have gigabit ethernet. This means making large file transfers of multiple new rips is really slow to the drives. Additionally, and more importantly, the Dunes are in my Living Room and Bedrooms and the ProBox is kinda loud and I don't want the fan noise in any of those rooms. I had the WHS in a closet, which is where I plan on putting the Pi, so I don't have to hear the fans running.

I see, yes that all makes sense.

I hate that so many enclosures use cheap, loud fans. The cost difference between a crappy fan and a quiet fan of the same size and airflow is not that much. But a crappy, loud fan sure wrecks the user experience and brand impression.

Good luck with your Pi project! Maybe post an update here after you are done.

 

[I Need a Drink]

Thanks.

I ordered a Pi 4 and should have it tomorrow. Got another question though. I've been reading about setting up Samba on the Pi and feel pretty comfortable about getting that done, but I'm not sure about the file system. I've read that EXT4 would be the best choice to use for the drives in terms of speed and reliability, but I know Windows can't read and write to EXT4. However, what I don't know is whether that will matter over the Samba share or not. I use Windows 10 to rip my movies since AnyDVD doesn't work on Macs. Do I have to make the external HDD's file system something that is compatible with Windows and Macs like ExFAT? I'm not really a file system expert and I don't know if, since the drives go through the Pi first, Samba or the Pi do some type of magic to make them available to other devices. If it helps, the drives would never be hooked up directly to my Macs or Windows machines. I hope that makes sense.

 

[jrichards1408]

Thanks.

I ordered a Pi 4 and should have it tomorrow. Got another question though. I've been reading about setting up Samba on the Pi and feel pretty comfortable about getting that done, but I'm not sure about the file system. I've read that EXT4 would be the best choice to use for the drives in terms of speed and reliability, but I know Windows can't read and write to EXT4. However, what I don't know is whether that will matter over the Samba share or not. I use Windows 10 to rip my movies since AnyDVD doesn't work on Macs. Do I have to make the external HDD's file system something that is compatible with Windows and Macs like ExFAT? I'm not really a file system expert and I don't know if, since the drives go through the Pi first, Samba or the Pi do some type of magic to make them available to other devices. If it helps, the drives would never be hooked up directly to my Macs or Windows machines. I hope that makes sense.

Use ext4. Works faster under the pi. Samba can mount any file type hdd you wish and there is programs in Windows that allow you to read on ext4

 

[2984839]

Low end boards like the Pi and its competitors tend to have a short lifespan under heavy use. I'd get a spare or two and configure them identically so you can swap them in when needed.

 

[I Need a Drink]

Low end boards like the Pi and its competitors tend to have a short lifespan under heavy use. I'd get a spare or two and configure them identically so you can swap them in when needed.

I think it’s moot at this point. Just realized that my ProBox is only esata and USB 2.0. I thought it was USB 3.0 but I never had to use it because it was hooked up to my WHS through esata so it never was an issue. At any rate buying a newer 4Bay enclosure plus the Pi is only $100 cheaper than just getting a Synology so I’m thinking about sending the Pi back.

I did find an esata to USB 3.0 adapter that supposedly supports port multiplication on Amazon for about $30 but I don’t know if it would really work and once I set up the Pi I can’t return it so if it didn’t work I still have to buy a Synology and then I’m out the money for the Pi.

 

[jerryk]

Get the Synology. There are designed to be a NAS and have proper power supplies, drive backplane connectors, management software, etc. Plus a large customer base that is happy to assist with other customers.

I used to build my NASes but after going with a Synology realized that was largely a waste of time to try to save a few bucks. And one NAS outage can be a big problem if causes the loses of some precious data.

 

[Stella]

I used OpenMediaVault on my 3B+. It worked well enough as a media player connected up to TV before I bought a dedicated NAS device. Raspberry PI 4 will work well - no shared IO bus and USB3, unlike the previous Pis before.

If you can avoid it, try not to write too much to the memory card, it will shorten the life of the card and will need to replace it sooner rather than later. I attached an external hard disk to store content and hdparm for power saving so the HD wasn't on 24/7.

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I wouldn't depend on the Pi for your heavyweight NAS needs. My Pi 3B+ seems to have died (won't even boot to the color/bios screen), after 1.5 years of always-on light duty; and I was using the decent Raspberry case.

Take that for what it's worth.

Have you tried replacing the memory card? I've been using a few 3B+ since they launched, and a Pi2 for over 3 years, always on. The SD Card died in one of them, but that's all. No issues otherwise.