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PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

pibox.io

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Re: PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

#21

Post by synergy20 »

sudobash1 wrote: post #12
synergy20 wrote: post #11

A litter pricey, great concepts. For me I will just use a rpi4 with two usb drives for a poor man NAS, that just backup stuff and nothing more, I can do it with less than $60(including housing, 2GB version, fanless)

I agree it is a little pricey for something that doesn't come complete with the SOC. I would rather use something like the ODROID-HC4[1]. It isn't as fancy as this or have as broad of support as the RPi, but it is $80. 1: https://ameridroid.com/products/odroid-hc4

Yes that looks very attractive, I am buying one so I don't need run usb cables external to my USB drives which is a bit messy.

On the other hand, you can have a USB3.1 hard drive docking station(around $30 for 2 hard drives) to hook into any cheap SBC board that provides a USB3 port. another way to do poorman NAS.

Re: PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

#22

Post by OConnor109 »

Anyone know of a similar solution that supports 3.5" drives?

I have a bunch of 4 TB externals that I would love to put to use. I know Synology, etc. exist but I don't need something so heavy. Just a simple Pi based case that can take one or two disks would be awesome.

Was really looking forward to the Helios 64 but unfortunately, they closed shop: https://kobol.io/

Re: PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

#23

Post by jagger27 »

geerlingguy wrote: post #15
Shank wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want that many drives you’re better off with a proper NAS and a RAID setup imho. If you want an M.2 drive for caching, you’re basically in Synology territory if you throw your other requirements on top. Sure, it’s not running an OS flavored for the Pi, but everything else you want is covered.

Ditto—though I'm also testing the Radxa Taco, which is hopefully coming soon. It has a 2.5 Gbps network port and M.2 slot, but the overall bus is still limited to 5 Gbps (3.6 Gbps real-world) because of the Pi's internal PCIe x1 Gen 2 lane. If you really need the sustained performance, especially if you want to use it for things like transcoding, it's better to get more supported hardware.

It's stunning how much can be done with a single ancient PCIe 2.0 x1 lane.

Re: PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

#25

Post by erulabs »

anderspitman wrote: post #20
erulabs wrote: post #14

PiBox is built by us, KubeSail! We're a YC S19 company that focuses on home-hosting and shipping open-source software to customers. Happy to answer any questions!

Love the product and hope to see more success in this space. Will it be easy for users to bring their own domain and/or buy one through you, or will they have to use a domain you control to use KubeSail tunneling?

It's already nice and easy - users can even add custom domains on our free-tier currently!

Re: PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

#26

Post by rektide »

anderspitman wrote: post #18

Interesting. Usually my critique for products like this is something along the lines of "great, but how are you going to access your data from the internet?" Typically the answer to that is you need some sort of tunneling service like ngrok to get around port forwarding, CGNAT, firewalls, etc. I maintain a list of solutions here[0]. The problem with most of these services is that they're targeted at developers and ar…

i have a systemd cron job (timer) that runs miniupnpc every couple minutes to ask the router to set up firewall rules that a box needs. for now i still manually update my home's dns records whenever there's a power outage and therefore new ip address. but i'll be building something dor dynamic dns soon enough.

but a couple boxes also ssh into a vps, and forward their own ssh ports to the vps, so i can jump into them indirectly if the main door/direct ssh way isnt working. this is also an ok way to expose ports on the internet if i want them proxied, if i need rate limiting.

Re: PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

#27

Post by erulabs »

rektide wrote: post #19

it's gonna be amazing when low end a starts packing some real io. some day there'll be more than a lane or two of pcie.

Ohhh yes, we agree strongly. We don't expect to be beating SoftIron.com or anything, but we have some ambitious plans for home-hosting!

Re: PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

#28

Post by westpfelia »

geerlingguy wrote: post #15
Shank wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want that many drives you’re better off with a proper NAS and a RAID setup imho. If you want an M.2 drive for caching, you’re basically in Synology territory if you throw your other requirements on top. Sure, it’s not running an OS flavored for the Pi, but everything else you want is covered.

Ditto—though I'm also testing the Radxa Taco, which is hopefully coming soon. It has a 2.5 Gbps network port and M.2 slot, but the overall bus is still limited to 5 Gbps (3.6 Gbps real-world) because of the Pi's internal PCIe x1 Gen 2 lane. If you really need the sustained performance, especially if you want to use it for things like transcoding, it's better to get more supported hardware.

The max bus throughput was always something that was the real limit with Pi's. Luckily they are getting better and better. I'm still rocking a first gen Pi as my Pihole. Dont need too much power for dns queries.

Re: PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

#29

Post by erulabs »

anderspitman wrote: post #18

Interesting. Usually my critique for products like this is something along the lines of "great, but how are you going to access your data from the internet?" Typically the answer to that is you need some sort of tunneling service like ngrok to get around port forwarding, CGNAT, firewalls, etc. I maintain a list of solutions here[0]. The problem with most of these services is that they're targeted at developers and ar…

This is exactly the goal - a box that anyone could buy, plug-in, click a few buttons, and get an on-the-internet service (like PhotoPrism or Plex) ready to roll. Bonus if they can easily control access, invite friends, and also if it's totally open and hackable - as much a learning platform for technology as a plug-and-play box-for-media.

That's the vision anyways!

Re: PiBox Mini – Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server

#30

Post by m0zg »

Pricing is on the nutty side. You can do a lot better than that for $250 nowadays, though it won't be as compact. That said, I'm looking for something like this but able to take 3.5" hard drives (2 of them) and at half the price. Doesn't need to be pretty or have a screen.
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