More Downloads, More Bandwidth, More Expansions, and More Hard Drives. I have needed to upgrade my InfrantNV+ Ready NAS for some time now since it has reached 96% capacity, I have just been using the hard drives on my main server. I’m going to have to rethink the roles of my NAS on my network once they are combined.
For the Infrant to recognize space, the four discs must be four of identical space, it will always take the lowest space of all the drives. If you have 3 x 1TB Drives and 1 400 GB drive, then it will assume all four drives are 400 GB for the sake of redundancy if you have X-Raid running.
I went to Hawally and found that they had the Western Digital 1 TB drives available which is my best choice for about 70 KD a piece, which is lower then the 91 KD I purchased the first couple of hard drives a few months back. The prices keep dropping so I picked up 5 Hard Drives, four the for the NAS and one for the Server. The process of upgrading the NAS Storage Space is a step by step process, so it takes sometime to change the space and retain the current data on it.
I’m on a ridiculous downloading spree, I have spent weeks reorganizing my files and moving things around. Now that I do have some I plan to take full advantage of it. Very soon I shall have one combined network with a load balancer and link aggregator, so I just have to set the policies of the network device and I am good to go.
I am downloading a total of 192 GB right now, and its a combination of 720 p Movies and full anime series that I am missing or looking for. The list can grow a lot faster, but I just want to see how long this will take for my connection to digest, my top speed is 480 Kbps that I have seen but we shall see what happens when I combine the networks. The more space, the more downloads, and the cycle continues.
Over the past couple of weeks, I have been filling up drives very quickly, I added a 750 GB thinking it would last for a while, but I was wrong. Dump Space is almost 90% filled up and BigMofo was filled up as well. I had to add another 1 TB drive move files over to it, I previously had a 250 GB hard drive their but I’m only using it to transfer between PCs right now.
Luckly I have a few 1 TB drives available to me so I installed it post haste. Now I’m in the process of combining the networks which will help me move files around correctly. I am just waiting for the patch for Windows Home Server which will solve the problem of corrupted files which are directly edited on the machine. So when that is solved I will be able to managed all my Back Ups and Media correctly. Right now I have too many copies of the same thing, but I’m not sure which ones are the most updated and trying to figure that out between all the data is nothing short of insane.
I have the server up and running, dumping files from three machines and the Infrant NAS. I have the Videos in duplication mode, so all my videos are duplicated on the server. Most of drives are in the Athena Backplane, most of it is in the storage pool except for one drive which is what I am going to be using to switch data between drives. Its faster to connect that one drive to the SATA drive of each computer and copy the data, then copy it over at one go by connecting it to the Backplane inside the server. Now to transfer the data from the different networks over to the one location, more drives to be added, and then there is the idea of combining the network.
Due to complications with the setup we had to change the server case from the Alienware case to the Thermaltake Kandalf which is large full tower case that handle all the drives I was looking to install. The main issue of the Alienware case was that we weren’t able to install the Silverstone 1200 Watt PSU and the Athena Backplane, they were pushing against each other without allowing any of them to fit in.
The Athena Backplane was holing 5 Sata Drives 3.5″ in the place of 3 5.25″ Drives, so basically 3 CD-Roms for 5 Hard Drives. The PSU fit in the Alienware, and the Athena Backplane fit in the in Alienware case but just not together.
The Thermaltake was the only highquality full tower case available in Hawally at the time that we picked up for 75 KD, and even though it is overpriced the case was worth it and needed to continue our work. So we transplanted everything in the Alienware case to the Thermaltake case. I was dismantling while K was putting it together which was going smoothly.
It took us sometime to take off a few pieces from the Thermaltake since they weren’t needed. The hardware wiring was cleaned up, we removed the extra USB/Firewire/Sound connections of the case to fit the 1200 PSU, its a large one so it takes up space. It fits vertically rather then horizontally which makes things very accessible when connecting all the items for power. We fit the Athena Backplane, and everything was going very smoothly. We removed the LED fans and installed quiet fans on this case, these fans would provide ample cooling by pulling cool air from the front and the back to would pull out of the case. Even though there were four fans (1×120 mm & 3x92mm) running, the machine is extremely quiet, this isn’t even including the fan of the PSU.
Then the wiring came into play, we had a total of 7 SATA connections, and one IDE. Then there was the Addonics SATA controller for more SATA connections at a later point. This will help support a total of 15 hard drives if I wanted to fit them in the machine. Right now I have a total of 7 Hard drives in the machine which are enough to start off with.
After all the hardware configuration we started it up, it started which was good without shorting so everything seemed to be connected correctly. We started the Windows Home Server installation but we were too tired to continue except the next day. When we did continue it was only about mounting the new hard drives on Windows Home Server Share pool. It is going to take some time to tweak everything but overall everything is very straight forward in this machine, can’t wait to fully utilize it. There are still some steps to take.
So most of the hardware came in and K had the other half of the solution for this beast of a machine. I had all the 1 TB Drives but not all of them are going into this machine. I spent a good part of the day trying to rewire some of the items, but I did a horrible job so K redid it again.
The Hardware:
- Processor: Intel Core 2 Dou 3.0 Ghz/4MB/1333MHz
- Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R
- Ram: Kingstong Hyper-X 2 GB/PC800/
- Graphics Card: XFX NVidia PCX 7200GS/256MB DDR2
- Main Drive: Seagate 750 GB
After all the work that was done, it turns out that he case is too short. The Silverstone 1200 Watt PSU was too long in the case to fit with the Athena Backplane for the hot-swappable Hard Drives. At this point we went to Hawally to see what our options were for a big PC case with ample space. Other then that the Gigabyte mother board is fantastic for server needs with 8 Sata ports, 8 USB ports, it doesn’t have a graphics card so I picked up a decent graphics card. It didn’t matter much since this will be automatically connected to the system through remote access. This is turning into a monster of job, but I’m loving it and it keeps looking better.
I have needed a major upgrade for a while now, for some reason the old blog was falling apart at the seems. It was just a matter of time until something went really wrong. Previously the search box disappeared, couldn’t post certain things, the back end was a mess but I was managing.
Thanks to Jacqui and Ananyah my blog looks refreshed, I love how organized it is and I really like the Theme. The header includes my Truck and my Bike, and there are a few other headers in the work. I removed the Flash header due to problems I was having with it when loading in certain programs and that it wasn’t completely upgradeable for WordPress 2.5. I prefer the static look, but the header will be tweaked a bit, there are still some content that I fixing but most of everything they took care without any help from me. I just remained a by stander, I thought they were going to update it a different day, they both stayed up late into the night making sure it was ready to go live. I was surprised in the morning, and very happy with the result. Now I just have to upgrade a few things in the content pages which I have left on the back burner for a while now. I’m happy a lot of people like the new look, some have a different opinion, but overall its more organized then before.
I have been following up on my packages everyday since I ordered them from Amazon. There were two things I was worried about, one was the large amount of Hard Drives I was ordering, and the other was the Voip phone which supposedly illegal in Kuwait.
I called up Aramex and they said my package didn’t arrive, so I took the tracking numbers and headed over there to get my packages. The website didn’t update throughout the trip, just that the packages were in the box last Sunday, and then arrived in Kuwait by Saturday. After giving them the tracking numbers they somehow found the items with them and they were cleared which is great.
I wanted to rip those boxes open as soon as I got home, but I waited a little while before opening them.
- 1 TB Hard Drivers, Qty 8
- Addonics Host Controller
- Phillips Voip Phone
I knew that I am probably going to start ripping into my Windows Home Server but that is going to take some time to work on.
Since the success of the Asus EEPC, HP and a few other companies are coming out with their version of a minipc, i like that they are coming out with a usable minicomputer with good battery life.
At 2.5 pound it has 8.9 inch WXGA screen, up to 2GB ram, up 160 GB HD, VGA Camera, Wifi, optional Bluetooth and you can either have SUSE Linux or Windows Vista for the OS. It is really small and portable for those on go.
Starts at $500 and goes up, I would rather go for strong processor and ram, small HD and thats about it. Its about portability rather then a laptop replacement.
Link: UnCrate
Its always a very nice feeling when you press the purchase button on the Amazon checkout, then you want the items in your hands yesterday. This order was a large chunk order mostly for you my Windows Home Server and a one other thing, I have a few books on my wish list but I will keep it there for a while.
Items:
- WD 1 TB Hard Drives (Quantity 7)
- Addonics Host Controller
- Phillips Voip Hand Set
The Phillips Voip Hand Set has got the best reviews and uses Skype, you can just type in your username and password without having to have a PC on. For me that is a great solution since its annoying talking into a big headset plugged into a PC. Now I just have to wait for Aramex to take their time and bring it over, I’m hoping that this goes under the radar of customs.