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Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer?

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  Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? Tom Browder <tom.browder@gmail.com> - 2022-04-28 12:50 +0200
    Re: Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? Jonathan Dowland <jon+debian-user@dow.land> - 2022-04-28 13:10 +0200
      Re: Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? Tom Browder <tom.browder@gmail.com> - 2022-04-28 13:40 +0200
    Re: Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? Dan Ritter <dsr@randomstring.org> - 2022-04-28 13:30 +0200
      Re: Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? Tom Browder <tom.browder@gmail.com> - 2022-04-28 13:40 +0200
    Re: Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? Christian Britz <cbritz@t-online.de> - 2022-04-28 14:10 +0200
    Re: Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? basti <basti@unix-solution.de> - 2022-04-28 14:10 +0200
    Re: Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? "Andrew M.A. Cater" <amacater@einval.com> - 2022-04-28 15:40 +0200
    Re: Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> - 2022-04-28 17:20 +0200
    Re: Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer? Greg <pld@sojka.co> - 2022-04-28 17:50 +0200

#247693 — Can an NAS appliance be used as a regular computer?

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All I want is a small PC able to host multiple drives for redundant
storage. Can a typical NAS appliance be used for that?

Thanks.

-Tom

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#247696

On Thu, Apr 28, 2022 at 05:42:38AM -0500, Tom Browder wrote:
>All I want is a small PC able to host multiple drives for redundant
>storage. Can a typical NAS appliance be used for that?

I believe popular NAS appliances by manufacturers such as Synology can
either be "rooted" so you can run your own stuff on them, or support
running applications via containers on top.

Turning the question inside-out, a regular computer can be used as a
NAS.

-- 
Please do not CC me for listmail.

👱🏻	Jonathan Dowland
✎	 jmtd@debian.org
🔗	https://jmtd.net

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#247699

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On Thu, Apr 28, 2022 at 06:03 Jonathan Dowland <jon+debian-user@dow.land>
wrote:
...

I believe popular NAS appliances by manufacturers such as Synology can
> either be "rooted" so you can run your own stuff on them, or support
> running applications via containers on top.


Thanks, Jonathan.

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#247698

Tom Browder wrote: 
> All I want is a small PC able to host multiple drives for redundant
> storage. Can a typical NAS appliance be used for that?


There's no such thing as typical, here.

If the *only* thing you want is a networked filesystem,
most NAS boxes are adequate for that: after all, that's what the
manufacturer intends them to be used for.

The problem with NAS boxes is that the manufacturer not only
doesn't want to support other use cases, the manufacturer doesn't
expect to run arbitrary software - only their own. So they feel
free to put in their own proprietary everything.

Debian can run on some NAS boxes directly, with more or less
effort.

https://wiki.debian.org/InstallingDebianOn/QNAP

https://wiki.debian.org/InstallingDebianOn/Synology

Some Synology models support running virtual machines on
the NAS.

https://www.synology.com/en-us/dsm/feature/virtual_machine_manager

That's pretty flexible, but they tend to be relatively expensive
and low on RAM... and while the disks are upgradable, the RAM
frequently is not.

-dsr-

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#247700

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On Thu, Apr 28, 2022 at 06:08 Dan Ritter <dsr@randomstring.org> wrote:
...

Debian can run on some NAS boxes directly, with more or less
>
effort.
>
> https://wiki.debian.org/InstallingDebianOn/QNAP
>
> https://wiki.debian.org/InstallingDebianOn/Synology
>
> Some Synology models support running virtual machines on
> the NAS.
>
> https://www.synology.com/en-us/dsm/feature/virtual_machine_manager
>
> That's pretty flexible, but they tend to be relatively expensive
> and low on RAM... and while the disks are upgradable, the RAM
> frequently is not.


Thanks, Dan.

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#247701

On 2022-04-28 12:42 UTC+0200, Tom Browder wrote:
> All I want is a small PC able to host multiple drives for redundant
> storage. Can a typical NAS appliance be used for that?

As suggested by me and others before, I would look for a cheap device
like the Raspberry Pi for home use. You can configure and install
everything like you want and you are not limited by the use cases
intended by the manufacturer.

I replaced an older Synology NAS myself this year with a Raspi based
solution and I am totall happy with it. For file serving I use sshfs,
which better fits my needs than SMB or NFS. I think there are also
clients available for Windows and Mac (if you need that).

I use it completely headless, but - if you wish so - you can also use it
as a low-end ARM based desktop PC.

If you have any questions regarding setup, please come back.

Regards,
Christian

-- 
http://www.cb-fraggle.de

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#247702

I would prefer a system with x86 CPU. But be aware that GPU is not the 
best.

I have a x86 QNAP NAS running Debian, I use it a file server. So I can't 
say much about Desktop computing.

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 
Atom/Celeron/Pentium Processor x5-E8000/J3xxx/N3xxx Integrated Graphics 
Controller (rev 35)


On 28.04.22 12:42, Tom Browder wrote:
> All I want is a small PC able to host multiple drives for redundant 
> storage. Can a typical NAS appliance be used for that?
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> -Tom

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#247704

On Thu, Apr 28, 2022 at 05:42:38AM -0500, Tom Browder wrote:
> All I want is a small PC able to host multiple drives for redundant
> storage. Can a typical NAS appliance be used for that?
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> -Tom

Tom,

Things like the Synology / Buffalo or similar are designed as storage
appliances. They often have a low power ARM processor in (or similar)
to run the disks/Samba/a web interface or similar.

The expensive business ones are expensive but quality: the cheap ones
are cheap. They're all designed to be used as easy storage but not
designed for power users necessarily. They may be running Linux under
the hood - but you'll be on the hook and dependent on the vendor
doing the right thing because you can't do much, if anything, to 
patch it or keep it up to date outwith the vendor doing it right.
[And their quality of security is ... mixed ... ]

The quality of disks/disk interfaces and proprietary filesystems are
all in the mix.

If you want to _use_ the system for anything else, then the Dell / HP 
Microserver route might be a good one: two Microservers here are useful
for more than one thing, for example. A four disk system will handle 16T
with no problem.

All the best, as ever,

Andy Cater

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#247706

Tom Browder [2022-04-28 05:42:38] wrote:
> All I want is a small PC able to host multiple drives for redundant
> storage. Can a typical NAS appliance be used for that?

Not sure what "that" is.  OT1H your description sounds like a NAS, so
the question becomes vacuous, OTOH you say "regular computer" which
sounds like you might want to connect a keyboard and screen and use it
to browse the web.

Most NAS boxes are ill-suited to browse the web, because they don't have
enough RAM and lack a video output.  But if you want to use them as
"home servers", then yes they *are* regular computers (tho some of them
come with sufficiently poor support that it's virtually impossible to
replace their crappy software with something like Debian).


        Stefan

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#247707

On 4/28/22 12:42, Tom Browder wrote:
> All I want is a small PC able to host multiple drives for redundant 
> storage. Can a typical NAS appliance be used for that?

For several years I used NETGEAR ReadyDATA 516 (RDD516) as both, desktop 
and NAS. It's equipped with HDMI port, so connecting monitor (up to 
1920x1200) is not a problem. Main problem was 13-3220 CPU. I upgraded to 
i7-3770 and active cooling.
So, there are NAS device capable of acting as a desktop PC but it may 
require some effort.

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