File Server construction guide-operating system and processor (1)

The surge in mobile devices, multi-computer homes, broadband Internet access, low-cost massive storage, and many other home electronic products have been replaced by PCS, for example, media devices such as DVDs, Blu-ray discs, and CD players are replaced by the home theater PC, which leads to an increasing interest in dedicated file server computers. Whether you are an ordinary home user with a desktop or laptop, or an advanced user with multiple desktops, laptops, netbooks, and tablets, if you access your home system remotely at work or on the road, your computing experience may be enriched by shared data access. Regardless of your budget and storage requirements, the file server system build guide described in this article can meet your needs.

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File Server Operating System

Windows Home Server 2011

Microsoft released the latest version of Windows Home ServerWHS earlier this year ). Its sales price generally does not exceed $50. Among all file server operating systems on the market, WHS2011 is the easiest way to build and manage Windows desktop operating systems and users who are not familiar with Unix or Linux. If you have installed and configured Windows XP, Vista, or 7 before, you can install and configure WHS2011, which requires almost no additional effort. Of course, although it is easy for new users to use family file servers, its disadvantage is that the cost-WHS2011 is not free.

FreeBSD and FreeNAS

FreeBSD is free of charge. Since it is a Unix operating system, it takes a little time and effort to learn how to use it. Although the installation process uses the old text-based method and the interface is based on the command line, you can use a terminal such as PuTTY to manage it through Windows PC. I usually do not recommend that users who are unfamiliar with Unix use FreeBSD. However, if you are obsessed with the Unix world and are interested in trying to use a non-Windows operating system for the first time, it is relatively easy to learn how to use FreeBSD to build a file server.

FreeNAS is based on FreeBSD, but is specially used for running as a file server. In addition to the command line interface, it also provides an intuitive and easy-to-use Web interface. Both FreeBSD and FreeNAS support ZFS, which is like NTFS and FAT32. Compared with NTFS, ZFS has many advantages, such as the maximum file and partition size, automatic repair, and RAID-Z, which are not restricted for home users. Although ZFS targets enterprise and commercial users rather than consumers, Matt wrote an article http://www.anandtech.com/show/3963/zfs-building-testing-and-benchmarking last year, which mentions a lot of useful information about ZFS.

Ubuntu and Samba

Ubuntu is probably the most easy-to-use Linux release for Windows users. As a result, it has the largest user group in all Linux releases: the number of users exceeds 12 million, which is not surprising. Although the Ubuntu server version is available, one of the easiest ways to turn Ubuntu into a home file server is to install and use Samba. Samba can be used on both Ubuntu and FreeBSD .) Samba is particularly useful if you want to use a Home file server for a mix of clients, such as Windows, OS X, and Unix/Linux. Although FreeNAS must be compatible with Windows clients, Samba sets a standard for seamless integration with Windows, and interoperability is one of its focuses.

Simply put, WHS2011 is easy to use, but it costs money. Installing Ubuntu and Samba is not particularly difficult. Even if you have never used any Linux, it may take half a day to build and run the Samba Home file server. FreeNAS may bring more difficulties than Ubuntu and Samba, but it takes only a few hours for beginners to master it. FreeBSD features may be much more powerful than WHS, Ubuntu/Samba, and FreeNAS, but many of its features are basically irrelevant to the Home file server, making it quite difficult to use. If properly configured, all of the above solutions are safe enough for ordinary home users. Most importantly, all these operating systems are fully applicable to family file servers. The advantages and disadvantages of each operating system in the Home file server environment are not covered in this article. Now, we have discussed several operating system options worth consideration. Next, we will discuss the hardware!