As I guessed might happen, Radxa has just released a new Penta SATA Hat that can be used on their Rock Pi 4 and Rock Pi 5, and on a Raspberry Pi 5. This provides 4 conventional SATA connectors (including power), plus an eSATA connector, all running off of the M.2 PCIe available on those various SBCs. See Penta SATA Hat. $49.
Oh wow... So in theory I could run 4no 2.5" USB connected HDD's and 5no 2.5" SATA HDD's at the same time!
Out of interest... What file systems are supported? Currently all my 2.5" USB connected HDD's are formatted to NTFS. This is useful because I often unplug them from my Synology NAS and plug them into other devices USB ports, such as TV's, my OPPO's and my Windows computers (to transfer media files more quickly).
Oh wow... So in theory I could run 4no 2.5" USB connected HDD's and 5no 2.5" SATA HDD's at the same time!
Out of interest... What file systems are supported? Currently all my 2.5" USB connected HDD's are formatted to NTFS. This is useful because I often unplug them from my Synology NAS and plug them into other devices USB ports, such as TV's, my OPPO's and my Windows computers (to transfer media files more quickly).
Yes, you could connect 4 disks via USB and 5 via SATA (4 internal-style SATA + 1 eSATA). I've never used more than 1 USB disk but there should be no issue with 4.
The supported SBCs all run Linux (various options available), so really whatever file system you like that Linux supports (nearly all) is available, including NTFS if you interchange with Windows. I use ZFS across 5 disks, although on my music NAS the 5th large disk is partitioned with 1 partition for ZFS and the other for XFS (where I store my stereo FLACs and Apple Music+TV library).
Agreed, they should provide links. Allnet does sell suitable supplies. On one of my NAS boxes using this hat (the prior version), I used a SATA chassis which had a conventional PC power supply with ATX connectors, and I plugged one of those directly into the hat to power the SBC and the drives. The other 4 units all used one of the SATA RAID kits from Allnet, which included this 12V DC power supply (Allnet 12V DC supply) which plugs into the Rock Pi 4 and Rock Pi 5 board female barrel connector jack (EDIT - oops, after checking, this plugs into a female barrel connector on the hat). I’m not sure about power options for the RPI 5 - I assume like prior RPI’s you can power via the connectors on a hat, so the ATX or 12V barrel options should work there.
I neglected to note that with SATA (with power) extension cables you can, as I have done, connect 3.5” SATA drives. That’s handy if you want very large capacity drives or drives that are non-SMR (and so have much higher write performance). OTOH if you just want to stack 4 drives on top of the SATA hat you’d need to use 2.5” drives, and you’d need to make sure they are thin enough. I wouldn’t recommend doing that without thinking about cooling (for spinning disks, that is - SSD would be OK).
If you can get your hands on an old multi-disk PC chassis with hot swap bays pretty much all you need are the SATA extension cables and an eSATA to SATA cable. The SBC and SATA hat are tiny and can be stashed away in a spare corner of the chassis (or you can probably figure out how to mount them so that you have easy access to the 4 USB ports for the other 4 disks). The aggregate read/write throughput will be better with the 5 SATA ports (which share 2 PCIe lanes) than with the 4 USB ports (which likely share a single PCIe lane with the network).
I don't really know where to put this post, but I'll try here, it seems vaguely relevant, I have recently acquired a Synology DS215J NAS to replace a D-Link which started to play up (caused the whole internet to slow down).
I have in it 1TB & a 2TB drives a default "music" folder is created (also "photo" & "video"), it seems to have been created on the smaller drive which is not big enough for all my music files, surround included, only files in that folder are seen by my Blu-ray players. I can't work out how to get that folder on to the bigger drive. Does anyone know?
I don't really know where to put this post, but I'll try here, it seems vaguely relevant, I have recently acquired a Synology DS215J NAS to replace a D-Link which started to play up (caused the whole internet to slow down).
I have in it 1TB & a 2TB drives a default "music" folder is created (also "photo" & "video"), it seems to have been created on the smaller drive which is not big enough for all my music files, surround included, only files in that folder are seen by my Blu-ray players. I can't work out how to get that folder on to the bigger drive. Does anyone know?
I use a ChinOPPO 203 which is a Chinese knockoff of an OPPO 203 Blu Ray player without the disc drawer. I use it to access .iso, .mp4 and .mkv files on the video folder of my Synology NAS drive for playback on my system. I enjoy accessing the menus from the DVD.iso and SACD.iso files on my flat screen TV. I have red book stereo and multichannel FLAC files in the music folder. The ChinOPPO essentially functions in the place of a PC.
Otherwise, I should point out that external drives have significantly come down in price over the years. If you have the discretionary income I would suggest that you consider upgrading the internal drives in your NAS for more data storage.
I currently have a 12tb external drive connected to my Vero 4K+ via usb. Periodically, as I add music and video files to my PC in another room, I physically connect the external drive to my PC and use a program called SyncBackFree to add the new files and delete files that have been deleted on the PC.
This process has worked well enough, but I’ve often wondered if I could just play the files from my PC via my LAN. Part of what has prevented me from doing so is my rudimentary knowledge of Kodi and streaming files over a LAN. I tried a test where I allowed streaming in the Windows Media Player on my Windows 11 PC. I successfully played 5.1 FLAC files on two blu-ray players (Oppo 103D and Sony X-800) in two different A/V systems in my house, but I was less successful playing M4A (Atmos) files or MKV video files. That makes sense for the Sony because those file types are not supported, but I have played both file types on the Oppo before from a usb drive, so I don’t know why it won’t play them over the LAN.
I would like to be able to play all these files on both A/V systems. To do so, I assume I’d have to have a media player in each system that can play all those file types. I already have the Vero 4K+ in one system. In the other system, I have a Fire Stick 4K Max and a Windows 10 PC, either of which I could set up Kodi on. If I can’t get either of those to work, I might get another media player.
Another approach that might improve and/or simplify my streaming on the LAN is to set up a NAS. The drive where my audio and video files reside on my Windows 11 PC is a QNAP 2-bay external drive enclosure with two 12tb drives in a RAID1 configuration. I recently bought a QNAP TS-262. If I keep it and set it up, I would back up the existing folders and files on my QNAP DAS, remove the two drives, and use them in the NAS.
Another concern I have is that folder names and structures are slightly different on my DAS and on the drive I connect to the Vero 4K+, and I don’t know if one is better than the other. On my DAS:
*I don’t have any album folders in the 3.Atmos folder, although they’re labeled as “Atmos” in the 1.Surround folder. Would it help to move them to the Atmos folder?
On my external drive:
*The video folders are in a “Video” folder on my DAS. From Kodi’s point of view, is it better to group music folders in an overall Music folder and video folders in an overall Video folder, or leave them separate?
I would like to be able to play all these files on both A/V systems. To do so, I assume I’d have to have a media player in each system that can play all those file types
Yes. You can play all the files from a NAS on any of your media players with Kodi. Of course you can also play them from your PC. No need to create a stream. Kodi will read the files directly off your NAS once you give permission for those devices to access the NAS.
For Kodi you will need separate root folders for music, concerts and/or music videos (and movies and TV Series) for it to organise its media databases.
With a NAS you should also set up a RAID to allow redundancy. One disc can fail in a RAID containing 3 discs and you won’t lose any data. If you use a Synology NAS that supports btfrs file systems the NAS will auto fix disc rot. (Recorded bits changing over time).
Yes. You can play all the files from a NAS on any of your media players with Kodi. Of course you can also play them from your PC. No need to create a stream. Kodi will read the files directly off your NAS once you give permission for those devices to access the NAS.
For Kodi you will need separate root folders for music, concerts and/or music videos (and movies and TV Series) for it to organise its media databases.
With a NAS you should also set up a RAID to allow redundancy. One disc can fail in a RAID containing 3 discs and you won’t lose any data. If you use a Synology NAS that supports btfrs file systems the NAS will auto fix disc rot. (Recorded bits changing over time).
When you say I need separate root folders for music, concerts, and or videos would this structure that exists on my DAS work for Kodi:
*Everything below 3.Atmos are "working" folders. Do you recommend putting Atmos albums in a separate folder from surround albums?
Or would I have to structure it like the external drive I connect to the Vero:
I plan on using a RAID 1 on the NAS as I do on the DAS. Later, I might buy two more 12tb drives, put them in the DAS, connect it to the NAS, increase the pool (I think it's called) and configure as RAID 10.
I think RAID 5 (3 discs) is the sweet spot with 33% of total disc capacity used for data redundancy and 67% usable storage. So 3 x 10TB drives gives you the equivalent of 2 usable drives. Also RAID 5 gives auto disc rot protection but RAID 1 does not (when using btfrs file system on the drives). Hence my recommendation. I know you need 3 drives but you get more storage space.
For Kodi you can have as many ‘Sources’ as you like. I have one for ‘Atmos’ as I can create a menu node that shows only ‘Atmos’ albums. Save for Concerts, Surround, Quad, Upmixes and Stereo.
But you should keep working folders under another root folder as you don’t want Kodi using those.
I have two 8TB shares, one for music (audio only albums etc), the other for Concerts and Music Videos. My movies and TV series have multiple shared folders over twos NAS due to their file sizes. (a 4K UHD movie can get to over 90GB) and a TV series can be over 200G
I work at a MSP and we have migrated to mostly Ubiquiti equipment (security/nvr, access controls, network and wireless) for our clients. They recently started selling a NAS, and if it's like any of their other solutions it's probably worthy of a closer look. They tend to be very price competitive at the tier of features, and work well with other brands/solutions and truly seamlessly with all of their own products. https://store.ui.com/us/en/products/unas-pro
I think RAID 5 (3 discs) is the sweet spot with 33% of total disc capacity used for data redundancy and 67% usable storage. So 3 x 10TB drives gives you the equivalent of 2 usable drives. Also RAID 5 gives auto disc rot protection but RAID 1 does not (when using btfrs file system on the drives). Hence my recommendation. I know you need 3 drives but you get more storage space.
For Kodi you can have as many ‘Sources’ as you like. I have one for ‘Atmos’ as I can create a menu node that shows only ‘Atmos’ albums. Save for Concerts, Surround, Quad, Upmixes and Stereo.
But you should keep working folders under another root folder as you don’t want Kodi using those.
I have two 8TB shares, one for music (audio only albums etc), the other for Concerts and Music Videos. My movies and TV series have multiple shared folders over twos NAS due to their file sizes. (a 4K UHD movie can get to over 90GB) and a TV series can be over 200G
This is very helpful while I'm grappling (again) with getting a NAS. Would love input from you and others. Every time I see someone's screen with full disc contents on their TV
Forgive the long-windedness. I'm not sure what to include/exclude here and this is my first time reaching out about this (in memory, anyway). Anxiety ain't helping!
My use-case: I'm pretty much focused on ripping my music Blu-rays (mostly audio but some concert videos) and -- if I can figure it out -- SACDs & DVD-As to a home server. All told, that's about 100-110 titles. If I can manage it, I'd rip disc images (using DVDFab, since I bought it ages ago) so that often means surround & stereo mixes and video.
Where I am on the decision tree now is:
Whether to go with Synology or QNAP (or...?)
How much storage I need. I know more is better. Same with number of bays.
Plex vs. Kodi (vs...?) I'm leaning towards Plex, in part because it can work with Home Assistant home automation (which probably means buying a lifetime license... another $100-$120).
... I don't even remember if there's a fourth thing to consider... and I assume there are maybe many more things to consider.
Regarding capacities, I suspect I own probably 90% of what I'll ever own considering how much is exclusive to streaming now.That ease of use is hard to resist vs. fetching discs since my budget 5.1 listening space (Oppo 93 & Apple TV) and my modest Atmos space (Oppo 203 & Apple TV) are in the attic and basement, respectively. I mean, I want to get my daily steps and flights in, but that ain't how to do it.
As to other music, everything is in iTunes... but I've also set up a separate, completely sequestered library in Jriver 33 since I don't trust Apple's tech not to mess with lossless files and unique mixes. Since I have a Windows setup and a Mac mini, I'm eager for cross-platform access.
I'm good enough with tech to manage more than many... but I'm very trial and error (for instance Home Assistant right now is only partly working) so I'm not up for anything too complex. Things are stressful already without complicating my hobby (trust me, Apple has done this twice... in 2017 and again in 2024).
With that, thanks in advance for any and all constructive tips.
I’d go with Synology; plenty of users here, nice UI, to ease learning and use, reliable etc. But you wouldn’t go wrong with QNAP.
You probably only need a 4 bay NAS with 3 drives. You don’t have too many releases (yet), but you may decide to keep all you discs backups on your NAS as well as all you music and backup your PC, Mac or other devices too.
Larger drives often transfer data a bit faster, so I’d budget for 3 x 10TB (Western Digital Red Pro is the only drives I’d recommend). So you’d have plenty of usable disc space and no need to go through a discs expansion anytime soon. In RAID. 5 that’s is a pretty safe set up as I mentioned above.
I’d recommend trying to run an Ethernet cable from basement to attic for most reliable connection, although now days wifi can be pretty reliable if you have your access point(s) in good a location(s) and you don’t have solid concrete floors. In your case an access point on ground level might be best (basement, ground, attic). In my home wifi is only used for hand held devices, all TVs (3), media players (6) and PCs (2) use Ethernet.
The playback choice is wide and can be low cost. I’m a Kodi fan (on a separate small player). I don’t like using Windows as a playback device, I like to use a remote control or iPad to control my media playback. I play while working around the house or lounging on the couch (never at my PC). I can even open my glass doors to my yard and play music on my surround system and control from the deck from my iPad (Kodi media player). A G&T in the sun + great music = heaven.
You could replace you Oppos with media players one you’ve ripped everything. (Those Oppos won’t last forever, one day they’ll need to be replaced)
In a four bay drive, go with four drives. Make it RAID-5, so you will have 75% efficiency. My NAS RAID5 all have WD Red 10TB drives. The USB connected RAID5 are driving 6TB WD Reds.
You can then go for a larger total storage than with just three drives, or just buy the same storage with four smaller drives.
Also, whatever you do, always buy a spare drive when you bring up your new storage. Have it always at hand. I keep mine on top of the enclosures.
I do like those five bay drives, you can do RAID6 in those.
But, knock on wood, I've been doing RAID5 since the 90s and I've never had a disk failure. Hmm.. take that back, in the 00s I was running home made hardware (PCI card) RAID5 in Dell towers and I did lose one drive once... but it was a Seagate.
Speaking of running those hardware PCI RAID cards... it was actually very powerful. At BIOS I could configure the disk arrays in ways that you can not do in a complete off the shelf system. At the time I configured the disks into two disk arrays so Windows saw them as two separate drives and with NFS I could export them with different user profiles. It was nice. My WDC RAID allows me to do something like that, but the USB RAID enclosures do not.
If you feel like truly learning how it works, a PCI RAID controller into a PC case is the way to do it still. You will have to do a lot of learning and the overall complexity and heat is likely overkill for a residential or small business application but it's the way the Big Boys all do it. I used to do it with NT, XP and later Windows 7. Ubuntu is indeed an option as well.
Further on, the Raspberry 4 (and 5) with their USB3 are doable with the USB3 RAID enclosures as well. As usual, export the array via Raspbian (SMB).
Now, lately I had a RAID1 array ( two 6TB Green drives in a local USB interface ) and one went. Oh well... I moved the data to one of the RAID5 arrays and all is well.
In my home, only the mobile devices use WiFi ( Android phones, iPhone, tablets, Chromebooks ). Everything else runs on wired drops. I did put in three access points throughout the house -same SSID, different channels- so roaming is easy. But the static machines ( PC, TVs, Rokus, Tablos, managed switches. Windows laptops ) don't roam so I gave them static IP addresses and wired them up.
Our TVs and HT stack all run wired, directly to the Plex servers. The Tablos and Rokus are also wired. All GigE. It works great, no interference, plenty of bandwidth.
I jave a drobo 5N, which is working well but I can’t recommend because they are out of business and they even closed their website. It’s set up for two drive failures, but if the chassis fails (and I’ve had that happen) I’m screwed.
I use it for backups, and as a local source for my streaming, which can be read by my Oppo 105, my Roku Plus, and my Marantz 7706 (audio only).
I have tried a Linux Ubuntu box with several hard drives, but it’s a bit unwieldy and it will take a while to make it all work. Unix is a different animal.
I’d go with Synology; plenty of users here, nice UI, to ease learning and use, reliable etc. But you wouldn’t go wrong with QNAP.
You probably only need a 4 bay NAS with 3 drives. You don’t have too many releases (yet), but you may decide to keep all you discs backups on your NAS as well as all you music and backup your PC, Mac or other devices too.
Larger drives often transfer data a bit faster, so I’d budget for 3 x 10TB (Western Digital Red Pro is the only drives I’d recommend). So you’d have plenty of usable disc space and no need to go through a discs expansion anytime soon. In RAID. 5 that’s is a pretty safe set up as I mentioned above.
I’d recommend trying to run an Ethernet cable from basement to attic for most reliable connection, although now days wifi can be pretty reliable if you have your access point(s) in good a location(s) and you don’t have solid concrete floors. In your case an access point on ground level might be best (basement, ground, attic). In my home wifi is only used for hand held devices, all TVs (3), media players (6) and PCs (2) use Ethernet.
The playback choice is wide and can be low cost. I’m a Kodi fan (on a separate small player). I don’t like using Windows as a playback device, I like to use a remote control or iPad to control my media playback. I play while working around the house or lounging on the couch (never at my PC). I can even open my glass doors to my yard and play music on my surround system and control from the deck from my iPad (Kodi media player). A G&T in the sun + great music = heaven.
You could replace you Oppos with media players one you’ve ripped everything. (Those Oppos won’t last forever, one day they’ll need to be replaced)
I can't thank you enough for this sound advice. It helps especially coming here where the tidy community shares my project's primary focus: easier instant access to surround music that's currently on discs. Your setup: tablet, yard, etc. is exactly my use case. Presently, I do that with stereo music, audiobooks, and podcasts using grouped AirPlay speakers. I just want my own surround music to be in the personal mix alongside Apple's.
ensues... My anxiety is more about health limitations. Without going into that, stress causes physiological issues that can make projects like this... fraught... if it gets too tangled. I need it the basics to function with relative ease in a short span. Optimizing, improving, fixing over months/years is fine... but if if the core doesn't work quickly I need to return stuff rather than get bogged down. Lord knows, copying discs will take ages!
Back on mission:
I've been leaning towards two Synology arrays. The four-bay 923+ (4 gb ram) and five-bay 1522+ (8 gb ram) with drives 8-12 TB... so your suggestions help me narrow that field. I've been using Seagate external drives for years but take well your WD Red recommendation for this project. (It'll be great to stop relying on insecure & never-as-tidy-as-I-want external drives on my desk!)
I'd seen you use Kodi. I know it and Plex tackle this differently. I'll play with both before deciding. Like you, I want to control via iOS devices. I already use Apple TV for most viewing so that feels more streamlined. I'd love this connected to smart home but that's not essential.
Running Ethernet
In this house that might be difficult, but not impossible. It's an old house. The previous owner ran speaker wire from the basement to the attic, so that might aid in fishing wire.
She was into whole-home audio before it got so easy. AVR in a pantry with cable running to her art studio in the basement, to some ceiling speakers in the dining room and her bedroom, plus two on her deck. All the wiring is still in place.
Anyhow, that'd wait until network problems. My network usually has an Airplay stream throughout the house but otherwise only one or two devices are concurrently streaming. 2 PCs, 1 Mac, iPad, iPhone, 2 Apple TVs, and some Sonos speakers as well as smart home sensors, etc. Fingers-crossed.
Everything below is... I'm too lazy to edit, so skippable.
Music and discs:
I suspect my audio disc buying is slowing to a crawl (of course this week I just bought the SDE Who set -- for which I already own the box -- and the Elton John disc -- which I'll probably mainly continue streaming) so it could also be denial! That said, more storage is always wiser. This is especially so since I'm also a film buff. I could see doing full backups of more obscure titles I own that aren't on streaming and/or discs with commentaries, etc. that will never stream. So that'll eat up space, too. Beyond that, most of my work-type files fit neatly in iCloud so they won't take up much on a NAS (or can stay where they are).
You're right about the Oppos and, while they don't get much use anymore, that doesn't keep them from aging. Hell, I don't get much use anymore either, but who the hell is that looking at me in the mirror and why does he look worse every day? I'm sure someday I'll buy another 4k player but it won't be capable of SACD, DVD-a, etc. so it's time to get them off of discs. And I haven't even learned how to rip those media yet! Oy.
As I don't require that much media storage I'm most likely going down the Raspberry Pi5 route.
Along with the Pi5's 4No USB-A (2No v2.0 and 2No v3.0) ports it's possible to fit a 4-port SATA drive hat to increase the number of HDD's you can connect to it...
In a four bay drive, go with four drives. Make it RAID-5, so you will have 75% efficiency. My NAS RAID5 all have WD Red 10TB drives. The USB connected RAID5 are driving 6TB WD Reds.
You can then go for a larger total storage than with just three drives, or just buy the same storage with four smaller drives.
Also, whatever you do, always buy a spare drive when you bring up your new storage. Have it always at hand. I keep mine on top of the enclosures.
I do like those five bay drives, you can do RAID6 in those.
But, knock on wood, I've been doing RAID5 since the 90s and I've never had a disk failure. Hmm.. take that back, in the 00s I was running home made hardware (PCI card) RAID5 in Dell towers and I did lose one drive once... but it was a Seagate.
Speaking of running those hardware PCI RAID cards... it was actually very powerful. At BIOS I could configure the disk arrays in ways that you can not do in a complete off the shelf system. At the time I configured the disks into two disk arrays so Windows saw them as two separate drives and with NFS I could export them with different user profiles. It was nice. My WDC RAID allows me to do something like that, but the USB RAID enclosures do not.
If you feel like truly learning how it works, a PCI RAID controller into a PC case is the way to do it still. You will have to do a lot of learning and the overall complexity and heat is likely overkill for a residential or small business application but it's the way the Big Boys all do it. I used to do it with NT, XP and later Windows 7. Ubuntu is indeed an option as well.
Further on, the Raspberry 4 (and 5) with their USB3 are doable with the USB3 RAID enclosures as well. As usual, export the array via Raspbian (SMB).
Now, lately I had a RAID1 array ( two 6TB Green drives in a local USB interface ) and one went. Oh well... I moved the data to one of the RAID5 arrays and all is well.
In my home, only the mobile devices use WiFi ( Android phones, iPhone, tablets, Chromebooks ). Everything else runs on wired drops. I did put in three access points throughout the house -same SSID, different channels- so roaming is easy. But the static machines ( PC, TVs, Rokus, Tablos, managed switches. Windows laptops ) don't roam so I gave them static IP addresses and wired them up.
Our TVs and HT stack all run wired, directly to the Plex servers. The Tablos and Rokus are also wired. All GigE. It works great, no interference, plenty of bandwidth.
May thanks! These two posts are more constructive than months of random reading and querying on the broader web.
I'll be hybridizing your suggestions and Homer's above. I'll be wireless at first. I'm leaning towards Synology's 923+ and 1522+ (four and five bays, respectively; 4gb ram and 8 gb ram, also respectively). I will buy drives in two batches of two. The first batch will be to get things running. If that can happen quickly then I'll order two more immediately; if not, I'll probably return everything and reconsider my path before investing more time or money into the software end and copying/transcoding.
My house has three mesh nodes and pretty steady speed at 100+ mpbs whenever needed. Only one or two devices is ever using significant bandwidth. I also have about 120+ smart home sensors, lights, etc. that use very little bandwidth and run 24/7 in the background. Fingers-crossed a NAS will not tax things much except when playing directly from the server, during which it'll be the only thing really needing the resources.
Regarding the more technical stuff: that's really impressive! But above my hobbyist level. I need it to pretty much work without having to dig into code, etc. That way lies madness for me. Having the flexibility to optimize and dig in the weeds after it's working would be great... but not if it's necessary to set up and maintain. I just don't have the mental RAM or enough TB of intra-skull storage for my brain's limited BIOS. Or something. English degree here, not Engineering! (That's meant as self-effacing!)
I do have Home Assistant running (a bit jankily) on a Raspberry Pi 4 but that software alone has taught me where my limits are. Short of having a like-minded nerd in the house to help, I need to stick to off-the-shelf solutions.
Again, these two posts have made it much easier to pull the trigger (either on Amazon or at a fairly local Micro Center) to give it a real try without worrying whether my first steps are in the wrong direction for my personal goals... and that's a huge thing.
As I don't require that much media storage I'm most likely going down the Raspberry Pi5 route.
Along with the Pi5's 4No USB-A (2No v2.0 and 2No v3.0) ports it's possible to fit a 4-port SATA drive hat to increase the number of HDD's you can connect to it...
Thank you! Until this morning, I didn't even know this is a thing! That thumbnail is The Dream (for me). Currently my media resides on one external 5tb drive connected to an always-on-Windows desktop, so this could theoretically make a compelling alternative if I don't dive in soon -- or if a larger scale NAS proves to be more than I can set up (or than I need). I'm off to watch that and read up on it more.
