Is freenas right for me.

[danb35]

Won’t that be only one way?

Ah, yes, I think you're right. Nextcloud external storage could be an option (and if OP wants to go small, light, and cheap with the Odroid unit I mentioned above, NextcloudPi works well on it as well). Syncthing I believe can do the job as well. Lots of ways to handle this piece of the job, depending on what else OP wants to do.

 

[danb35]

So, @Lxkev, the gist of my disagreement with John is that we assume people who are using FreeNAS care about their data, and are willing to invest in their systems as appropriate to achieve that result. To get a solid system that will protect the integrity of your data, regardless of whether you're using FreeNAS or some other OS, is going to cost a bit, though it doesn't need to be terribly expensive. Where we seem to disagree is on how much of that cost is unique to FreeNAS. But yes, FreeNAS can do what you've asked about.

If you're less concerned about data integrity and availability, there are other simpler and cheaper ways to accomplish this as well. I haven't come up with a good way to make the Odroid units do ZFS, which was what I first bought them to do, but they do make for a nice little NAS or Nextcloud platform.

 

[Lxkev]

Thanks for everyone input. A lot to read and process.

Budget is a big factor, but I do like the power of freenas, I also found a good guide on syncing with Google which is a win for freenas

How To Back Up Google Drive to FreeNAS

Google Drive and G Suite are widely used tools for creating and sharing documents, spreadsheets, and presentations with team members. FreeNAS and TrueNAS offer the ability to back up Google Drive easily, using the built-in cloud sync. This blog will explain how to set up Google Drive sync with...

www.ixsystems.com

I am also looking at openmedia vault.. One of disadvantages of living in NZ, especially at the moment is computer hardware is expensive and nothing being imported thanks to covid.. So I have a while to think about it.

I'm on tight budget, I might go down the open media vault.... With that in mind what would be the cheapest way to go with freenas... The actually hardware requirements don't seem to be that crazy for freenas..

I was looking at a systems built form x79 and e5 processors...

Wish I had an old pc I could run it on to have a play, if I new I liked the interface and It did what I wanted I would push some more $ towards the system

Thanks for the info on the odroid, that's something I'm exploring.

 

[Yorick]

Have a look at https://www.ixsystems.com/community/resources/specific-build-components-list-up-to-32gb-ram.109/ or even cheaper, this: https://www.ixsystems.com/community...anges-to-upgrade-as-high-as-512gb-of-ram.110/ . If eBay parts are a thing in NZ, you can put together a nice FreeNAS rig from inexpensive older server parts. DDR3 ECC Registered in particular is dirt cheap used.

 

[danb35]

I also found a good guide on syncing with Google which is a win for freenas

That guide's using the built-in cloud sync feature, which uses rclone to do the heavy lifting. It works well, AFAIK, but it doesn't do true two-way sync. If that's a requirement, you'd want to investigate another solution. @garm mentioned Nextcloud with its external storage system; Syncthing may be another way to make it work.

The actually hardware requirements don't seem to be that crazy for freenas.

Well, there's "required", and there's "recommended." What's required is a 64-bit Intel-compatible CPU, 8GB of RAM, some disks, and a wired NIC (FreeNAS doesn't support Wi-Fi adapters). What's recommended is proper server-grade kit with ECC RAM and an Intel NIC--which is really a good idea for any server, and there's nothing about FreeNAS that makes it any more essential than for any other, but you're not likely to hear this pushed as much on (say) the OMV or XigmaNAS forums. This comes down to the question of "how important is your data." We tend to assume here that at least some of the data you're storing on your FreeNAS box is important. It's a solid OS with a near-bulletproof filesystem, but none of that helps if your hardware is flaky.

A few years ago, at least in .us, there were some really good deals to be had on small servers--at one point, the HPE Proliant ML10 could be had (with a Xeon, IIRC) for under US$200. Add some RAM (it only came with 4GB at that price), a boot device, and storage disks, and you're set. I haven't been keeping up with the market lately, but I don't recall seeing similar deals recently--though if they are, this really is probably the best way to go. Other models I remember seeing were the Lenovo TS140 and the Dell PowerEdge T20.

Another option is used server hardware. Again, in .us, there's lots available on eBay, and performance vs. cost or watts hasn't improved greatly for several years.

 

[danb35]

Wish I had an old pc I could run it on to have a play

Oh, forgot to mention this--if your PC is reasonably capable, you could always install VirtualBox, and then put FreeNAS in a VM. This would be strongly discouraged for storing any real data, but it would let you play with it, see how the GUI works, etc.