(2014-03-31, 05:38)CaptnJB Wrote: Okay. We need to allow a few exceptions to the search here on XBMC.ORG, NAS should be searchable.
Anyway, my XBMC box is on most of the time. I'm starting to run out of room on it's 2GB drive and on my home PC drives.
So..what I was looking at is running it as a NAS server as well. Anyone else do this? My other PC's are Windows 7.
I'm running XBMCBuntu on a M4A785-G AMD Phenom 2 with 8GB ram. Plenty of power.
How do you guys setup your home network? Your thoughts on this idea? I tried to post in off-topic, but I can't post there for whatever reason.
Thanks,
CaptnJB
Honestly, I think the NAS and the media player should be separate from each other. That's just how I prefer to setup most of my devices, so that I can customize each one as needed without compromise.
I currently use a PogoPlug with external hard drives as my NAS setup and it's very formidable given the size, price, and power consumption of the device. Depending on how much storage you want (let's say you only need 3 TB, or don't mind hooking up multiple external HDD's), you could go this route and it would probably work quite well for you. I needed more storage, so I am currently in the process of building a FreeNAS server so I can expand my storage without having external HDD's lying around everywhere.
At this point, I would probably convert that M4A785-G to a server (the specs say it has 5 SATA ports, and you probably have everything else you need except the hard disks themselves) and buy an NUC or other device to use as an HTPC. If you don't like the NUC, you could consider building your own mini-ITX HTPC, but the NUC is a pretty quick and easy solution IMO.
The only one rule I would say that you
must abide by is to use a wired connection whenever possible. If it's not possible, make sure you have a good wireless N or AC connection that you can test for stability while streaming. In my office, my PogoPlug and FreeNAS server are connected via Gigabit ethernet. I didn't want to run a cable in my apartment and my apartment is small enough for a 5 GHz 300 Mbps N signal to stream 1080p comfortably. If you're in a bigger space, the range and stability of a wireless connection may not be strong enough.