This is a low power home file server I built from a raspberry pi and two USB drive cases. Iāve mapped it as a network drive on all of my home computers, so we have one common repository for files, documents, and pictures. Itās set up with two hard drives, one a mirror of the other. Iāve had it running for 3 months without any problems.
The whole unit is not much bigger than a coffee cup, and my measurements show it uses between 6 and 7 watts of power when idling (which it usually does).
This is a fabrication exercise rather than a software tutorial; I will show how I modified the drive cases, but not how the software is set up. For that phase, I recommend reviewing
https://melgrubb.wordpress.com/2014/08/01/raspberrā¦
or
http://www.instructables.com/id/Ultimate-Pi-Based-ā¦
Iād recommend getting the pi working with remote access before inserting it into the case, as you wonāt be able to attach a monitor once the pi is mounted in the caddy.
Step 1: Low Power Raspberry Pi Fileserver ā why?
I have about 15 years of accumulated personal data on my home desktop computer. I back it up from one hard drive to another every week, and copy everything to DVDs about once a year. Itās not a safe way to store important data. Itās also difficult to access the data from my laptop (even though the drive is mapped, I hibernate the desktop when itās not in use to save power).
I bought a dual drive USB case and two WD Red NAS hard drives, and attempted to attach it to the USB port of my router to work as a network drive. However, the router wouldnāt recognize it, so I had to try something else.
What I wound up with is a headless Raspbian (Debian) file server that draws very little power and takes up very little space. When I save a file from my desktop, the pi automatically mirrors that file to the second drive, keeping both in sync for backup purposes. The drives are formatted as NTFS, so if I ever have problems with the *server* (raspberry pi) , I can just plug the *drives* into a Windows computer and read them via USB. Since it really *is* a server, I can set up a remote administration program (Webmin) to monitor the hard drives and alert me if they begin to have problems. And if I want, I can even set up a VPN and securely access my files from any web-connected location.
Step 2: Low Power Raspberry Pi Fileserver ā what?
I bought my first dual-drive case on-line for about $30 after rebate. The price varies widely, and frequently comes with a rebate; The second case was about $20 after rebate. Thatās not much more than a plastic project box big enough to hold a raspberry pi. Total cost (before drives) is about $85, plus $10 for the power supply.
The drive case contains two small circuit boards to interface between the USB cable and the drives themselves. The drives and circuit boards are powered by the USB cable, or by an optional 5 volt power supply.
Step 3: Low Power Raspberry Pi Fileserver ā how?
It was easy to remove the circuit boards from the second case in order to make room for the pi. I fabricated a plastic āplateā to fit inside the framework of the drive caddy, and taped it in place with two strips of black electricians tape.
The next step was to carefully grind away the rear of the drive caddy and the locking faceplate in order to gain access to the USB ports and the network adapter on the pi. Once the grinding was done, I carefully inserted the pi and screwed it down to the plastic plate.
When fabricating the plate, itās important to make sure you donāt block access to the SD card, as you will need to insert/remove it in order to make backup images. Leave the locking features in place on both the caddy and the rear faceplate (donāt grind them off) to make this easier.
For more detail: Low Power Raspberry Pi Fileserver
