Raspberry Pi 4 OpenMediaVault NAS

[@rorschacht8478]

Most of the time I watch just purely for entertainment, I have usually have no plans to actually do what is being explained. This one time is an exception and it's so easy to follow along.

[@dj_paultuk7052]

If your going to build a NAS for home use, and you really want to Build one, rather than purchase a dedicated unit. Then i recommend FreeNAS. I recently made use of a old Dell i5 PC. Installed FreeNAS to boot off a fast USB key. Then fitted 4x 4TB drives inside the PC which FreeNAS has setup in RAID5 for redundancy. All i had to buy was the drives, since i already had the PC. And i decided to fit a Intel Pro 1000 Server NIC card, rather than the on-board one. Its absolutely superb. The old Dell is near silent and now we have a huge NAS for the entire family to use. The kids now keep all their college work on it rather than locally on their laptops which could get lost. The data is secure and has good redundancy. win win...

[@jonneymendoza]

Try nextclound. its amazing!

[@mavamaarten]

OMV runs on normal PC's too, and I have found it much easier to configure and use. Its docker integration is also superb. FreeNAS is nice if you want to dig a little deeper.

[@Cicirifu]

@@jonneymendoza Nextcloud is not NAS software.

[@jonneymendoza]

@@Cicirifu yes it is plus more

[@stanpotter7764]

Cheers from the U.S. You're my new favorite channel! I've officially added this to my list of pi projects. Not only do you explain the project itself amazingly clearly, but I love that you include the names of programs you use, and even where to download them! I've added at least 2 or 3 tools to my toolbox because of your videos. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU! :)

[@ExplainingComputers]

Thanks Stan. :)

[@63straycat22]

Hi Christopher, I know I'm late to the party, but thanks had some down time and a raspberry Pi and followed your tutorial and now have a fully working NAS no more running around with a usb disk drive backing up the family computers. I really enjoy your programs and have followed a few years now. Regards. Stray

[@ExplainingComputers]

Great to hear. :)

[@nolanmcclain]

Hi Chris, just commenting in case anyone else had the same problem I did. After following all your steps, I went to map network drive and tried to browse for the shared folder but windows was not detecting any network drives, even after I made sure network discovery was turned on. The problem was, I had to go to Control Panel>Programs and Features>on the left hand side click "Turn Windows features on or off'>scroll down and make sure "SMB 1.0" is checked. I believe is unchecked by default in later windows 10 versions. After restarting, I was then able to detect the raspberrypi network drive. ONE MORE STEP, windows security now wants log in credentials for the Pi which by default is Username: pi Password:raspberry. Now finally I was able to map the shared folder I created in OpenMediaVault and it works just fine. Hope this helps someone out there!

[@ExplainingComputers]

Thanks for sharing this.

[@Stoney_Eagle]

THE tutorial I needed ages ago, it covers the "is it right for me" and the how to. Great job 😉

[@dylandowdy3687]

Thank you for exposing in detail, as a beginner to computers it makes a huge difference when trying to learn. 🙏

[@pulesjet]

After getting out of the USAF I talked to the Ducts quite often for a while.

[@darwinvinci7744]

Especially about making tea and talking to ducks. It's very important. Not being satire. I have screwed many times just because I was not patient enough, then end up spending double the time fixing and starting again.

[@richardwicks4190]

@@darwinvinci7744 Something I find enormously useful under Raspbian Pi (now Raspberry PI OS) is that I can install it under a virtual machine. I setup a "raspberry pi" under VMWare then archive my setup. Next, I start experimenting with it and record the steps. When I screw it up, I restore the archive and start over. Once I have a list of things to do in order to setup a real pi, I have all the steps needed. It's much faster to work on a virtual machine than a real one. Restoration takes a minute. All the packages for a real pi are available on the simulator. One thing I've noticed though - Kodi doesn't work well under a simulator. It's fine for understanding setup, but it's not usable that way.

[@ijabbott63]

The low write speed could be due to using NTFS on the network drive. It would be interesting to compare it with a native Linux filesystem such as ext4.

[@ExplainingComputers]

Very good thinking.

[@faumnamara5181]

@@ExplainingComputers Yes please do a follow up :)

[@razorray6273]

Xfs for larger files.

[@blinkinglightsandsmokingcaps]

Indeed. NTFS support will be via user space processes such as Fuse, which will add some latency.

[@burcakb1]

It could also be due to the fact that the SD card used is a regular SD card - those are designed for sequential large data writes. When trying to set up the program it's doing random io read/writes in small chunks - regular SD cards totally suck at that. Try using an A1 rated SD card - these are optimized for running apps. (i hear the A2 rated ones don't really offer any extra benefits despite the much higher performance ratings on paper).

[@wilfridoa.landaira2518]

This is the first video of yours that I've watched, and you're such a good teacher. I enjoyed your suggestion to go talk to some ducks.

[@johnfairfield7498]

Excellent video. I followed along with my PI 4. Only problem I had was I used a USB that was formatted from the factory in xFat. I got an error when I tried to create the share and allow guests only. Unmounted the drive, reformatted on my PC. Remounted the drive on the PI and everything worked perfectly. Was never sure it had really finished installation. But after enjoying two cups of coffee, I was able to web into my PI. Perfect! Always love these videos

[@stephenlittle7534]

I am always interested on how you make things work so easy that we can understand how to do it ourselves. Thanks for all your hard work.

[@Chris.Brisson]

We can appreciate how much time and effort is put into working out the solutions prior to making these videos.

[@jackkreighbaum783]

I used a previous video from ExplaningComputers to configure a NAS for my home system and it works flawlessly. Thanks, Christopher.

[@ExplainingComputers]

Great to hear! :)

[@ThriftyAV]

I've been thinking about an NAS... I had not considered the Raspberry Pi option! Thank you for this excellent idea. This is going to happen!

[@GaetanoSalvatoreFalco]

Buy another board, like an odroid hc1 or similar ;)

[@sethrd999]

I would be careful if you plan on more than one drive which would make sense in most cases, this would negate the Pi from the equation as you would want to look at a board with PCIe so you could use a 2x NVMe etc etc. Raid cards will be coming shortly also. Definitely a time to not be hasty

[@GaetanoSalvatoreFalco]

@Tony Lewis you don't really need a fast processor on a server, depending if you want a sftp server or a samba one. For the rest i agree with you, raspberry pi 4 is still a terrible idea.. as it will not even be a silent nas :D

[@GaetanoSalvatoreFalco]

​@@SplatPearled Yeah yeah... there are dozens of better SBC, support is nothing. If you want to enter in the linux world you can manage to read some manual, only lazy asses always go to ask on a forum to do simple tasks. ARM processor is preatty bad as you cannot even run scientific software like Matlab, and it is still behind any x86 processor in terms of speed. Then, as this video shows, the gigabit ethernet is a plus but still lacks behind the older odroid xu4 (as you are able to get 100MB/s). The processor is still a quadcore (which is bad if you want to do heavy programming through multi-threading). The RPi4 is good for the maker who wants to participate to the maker faire, The raspberry pi foundation is proving itself to be really bad, as this is another hot SBC and they even managed to forget a resistor for the USB-C. I hope new SBC will use RISC-V architecture, I am preatty tired of ARM. I hope more guys will support the RISC-V architecture, so i will not read "lot of support" anymore!

[@1MinuteFlipDoc]

look at your router for NAS options as well.

[@fr3ezeee]

The way you explain stuff is very informational helpful. Most tech youtubers do not explain how these software and hardware configuration goes in a real life situation like you do. Subscribed!

[@ExplainingComputers]

Thanks for the sub -- welcome aboard!

[@lennytheleopard]

I've been in IT for 3 decades, but certainly networks is a black art. This is a fantastic video. Much thanks.

[@_zelatrix]

I think this is especially true with things like IPv6. That's pure witchcraft. I can do IPv4 but those hex numbers confuse me. No wonder they didn't teach it at my university: only IPv4

[@nicolaspatouillard]

Thank you for this nice test. I am a French IT student, I don't know how I can understand your english so easily. Thank you :)

[@extremelydave]

For we of the uninitiated in NAS, this was a godsend!!! Thank you Chris! I will be streaming like mad as soon as I get all my parts. No more copying to flash drives for me!!!!!!

[@srdansavkovic]

For everyone coming to this video in the late 2020 like myself please note that USB drives are not supported for raid setup in OMV. You can still mount them individually but no RAID goodness.

[@haircutboys]

Is there a RAID solution for Raspberry Pi and OMV?

[@srdansavkovic]

@@haircutboys since OMV 5 does not support USB drives for RAID personally haven't tried to find a workaround to make RAID work.

[@adunford2664]

Excellent clear explanation as always, very encouraging. As a low cost experiment I built a media server with a Pi 1 model B Rev 1.3 running librelec Kodi. Attached an old sata HD to it. Cable connection to my router, using the usb output to power the Pi. All bits I had lying around. The music can be accessed by my iPhone on a Sonos app through the Sonos system, no other software setup required. Kodi is very easy to use. Took about 2 hours in total.

[@toysareforboys1]

Thanks to your videos I bought a Raspberry Pi 4 for my 4k media player, works so flawless it isn't funny. Running it on the slowest SD card on the planet, ancient 2gb one, LibreELEC OS. Ran into some thermal throttle issues but bought the pimoroni fan shim and that solved it 100% :) I tried quite a few "4k media player" boxes, but all of them struggled, didn't support some types of 7.1 audio, had stuttering with h265, etc. Zero problems with the Pi 4 and LibreELEC. Thanks again

[@philippe5394]

I really enjoyed this tutorial and your clear and factual way of explaining the process. For a long time, I wanted to install a "NAS", I still have to order a Raspberry Pi. Many thanks for your work.

[@AnimatorElite]

Wow, This video explains a whole lot better then most video talking about this topic

[@ExplainingComputers]

PLEASE NOTE THAT, since this video was made, the process for installing OpenMediaVault has changed. I have made an updated video featuring the new install method here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/goDKZaucebaUnMU

[@garyjenkins2258]

Would you possibly have the time to make another video that outlines the different installation process?

[@michiel8625]

@@garyjenkins2258 It is quite easy if you just follow this: github.com/OpenMediaVault-Plugin-Developers/docs/blob/master/Adden-B-Installing_OMV5_on_an%20R-PI.pdf

[@ExplainingComputers]

I may well do this. Though I would be surprised if the image files are not re-posted. I see that only the Odroid HC1/HC2 and XU4 now have directly downloadable OMV files -- which is a real shame.

[@drwombat]

What do you think about the changeover? And why do you think they decided to switch? Seems odd they would go from a full install image to an operating system install then package install via terminal

[@ExplainingComputers]

@@drwombat It is a very strange decision and change, as a lot of SBC owners used to download OMV images for their boards. It may, I guess, be a choice to reduce the use of OMV on SBCs. I am not sure. But it is a great shame. The new install method can work though -- as some in the comments here have indicated.

[@strontiumstargazer3124]

These videos have reignited my interest in Pi. I’ll be buying the Pi 4 and and getting back into pi land. Subscribed.

[@ExplainingComputers]

Great to hear -- and welcome aboard! :)

[@RobTheSquire]

Finally an easier way to make a nas, even though my broadband hub lets me add a drive to it. My hub is a bit awkward at times so this will help me out loads.... Since my first comment I bought a new Pi and an external drive, now my 4tb nas is up and running and all my vids and music are being migrated over there. I'm really glad that this vid exists it was a big help. 👍

[@sebastiendefra8877]

as always, it's Cclear as water of rock. I would have liked to have a teacher like you in high school ! Great job, mister E.C.!

[@62shalaka]

Ingenious use of the Pi4. Thanks for the presentation, with terrific attention to detail!

[@jackhickey5716]

I really appreciate the effort and care that went into this guide. It helped me get my NAS up and running, thanks! p.s. you may have mentioned this but I had to erase the disk and reformat it in ext-4 for it to be recognized as a device when creating a Shared Folder. It was in ex-FAT.

[@erikheinemann4671]

One of the best AND cheapest NAS i've ever seen

[@keithw6026]

This guy is brilliant.......very direct explanations in simple clear language..........many thanks, please keep the videos coming.

[@wikwayer]

Talking to a duck is the best therapy ever

[@scott_harrison]

Not if it talks back 😬😂

[@PhilipLeichauer]

Eating it with pancakes would be better

[@PauloSilva-ll4vs]

@@PhilipLeichauer kkkkk.....

[@knightshousegames]

Just make sure it's a duck and not a goose. I've heard those British geese can be quite rude.

[@freesaxon6835]

You must be quackers

[@jasonclifford2]

I am huge fan of your videos. I love to share them with my friends and family that aren't so computer savvy. Even as a nerd I don't have enough time to keep up with all this awesome SBC projects. This gives me a chance to listen while I am writing code updates or scripting in my own work environment! Keep it up man!

[@ExplainingComputers]

Thanks.

[@steveritzel559]

Thank you for this video. I've been want to set up a Pi NAS since the 4 now has 1GB Ethernet. Tried the hard way, no luck. I was up and running in no time.

[@kjamison5951]

I was seen talking to a couple of ducks once. People thought I was quackers! But seriously, this is exactly what I need to expand access to multiple drives. I currently have a single bay NAS on the network.

[@steamgaming6568]

Thank goodness I have watched loads of videos on this subject and yours is by far the easiest to follow. Great video thanks :*)

[@send2gl]

Bet the Raspberry Pi Foundation never imagined their devices would be used for all these different projects, absolutely amazing. I have two (zeros) scanning live aircraft traffic.

[@pointerish]

I think it's the opposite. That was the main idea. To have people tinker with it and learn. O course I don't think they were able to foresee all the options and ideas. :)

[@SweBeach2023]

@@pointerish But the first Pi was really underpowered. Don't forget it in just seven years have gone from a very slow 700 Mhz single core SoC with 256 MB of RAM to a 1,5 GHz quad core SoC with far higher IPC and 4 GB of RAM. If most computers have since seen an performance increase of roughly 50-100 percent in the last seven years RPi have seen at least a 1000 percent increase in performance. As well as added wifi and bluetooth, more ports, higher power-draw etc.

[@send2gl]

@Samantha Anders Links shown below, I use a zero but of course any Pi will do. To track a USB ads-b tuner is needed (not expensive at all, between £8 to £20), this plugs in to the USB socket of the Pi and is used for picking up signals from aircraft. The software is freely available and a preferred one is from FlightAware.com who also have a brilliant forum. If the zero is used then, as it only has a microUSB port then an adapter is needed, this is often sold with a zero or can be purchased separately from same link below where ads-b tuner bought. Also, if you've heard of FlightAware or FlightRadar24 (similar but different) both offer enhanced services if you submit your data to them. It is a great fun project, useful too. shop.pimoroni.com/products/dvb-t-dongle-ideal-for-ads-b-real-time-plane-tracking flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/build

[@1234mattyman]

That sounds a great idea but can I monitor ATC on a Windows PC @GeoffLane as I don't have a Pi but I have plenty of windows PC's thanks in advance. I just want to be able to listen to live ATC on my PC then broadcast it live to some website for everyone to listen to on PC/tablet/Phone or what ever device has an internet browser

[@twmbarlwmstar]

@@SweBeach2023 7 years ago there were NAS out there with 800Mhz CPU, even 5 years ago. You don't need a powerful CPU for NAS, indeed the Pi4 would be considered quite punchy even today. Unfortunately what you do need the Pi is generally missing, SATA being the obvious one. The Pi4 is being pitched as a desktop replacement so it should be able to act as a NAS at least.

[@richardhobson3623]

Really interesting. I have a pi 3 sat doing nothing at the moment. I’ll also be looking at whether open media vault can raid drives or if there is an auto backup solution so that the shared drive is protected. Food for thought. Great video.

[@travis1240]

If you can the pi 4 is much better suited to NAS use than the 3. The 3 has much worse bottlenecks in IO

[@dtsdigitalden5023]

Useful, thorough, excellent, funny ... what more could anyone ask for? Thank you Chris!

[@garrockwaters304]

That was a lot of fun. I did it while having a root canal. The root canal made this process much more bearable!

[@MikeT1775]

Great video. Probably one of the best examples of how to actually set a NAS and provide an example of it working. Great job. Also, I want a duck now.

[@NumbersSans]

That's a shame that they removed the image. I was able to follow the instructions for the other installation method in the description. It was fairly simple. Thanks for keeping up with the changes.

[@timmytard2305]

i wanna copy too. wonder where out there in the abyss i could find a copy?

[@SRCN999]

If you use EXT4 as the hard disk format, your ''write speed'' will be up to 120MB per second

[@ExplainingComputers]

Good point. I had not thought of the file system being a constraint.

[@bobtheelectrician6692]

@@ExplainingComputers I have a 2 TB drive hooked up to an Archer C9 router to do a basic NAS. Can't pinpoint the operating system the router uses, but NTFS drive writes are only half the speed of any prior Miscrosoft formats such as FAT32. There must be some serious overhead issues using NTFS on non-Microsoft systems.

[@ExplainingComputers]

@@bobtheelectrician6692 Very interesting feedback. IT certainly looks like it is NTFS that is responsible for the slow write speed in the Pi 4 NAS.

[@poglavicas]

@@ExplainingComputers NTFS driver in openmediavault is probably based on NTFS-3G driver that uses FUSE and is known to have painfully slow write performance. Please format your SSD to ext4 and then try the write speed.

[@jeffpara9113]

Would love to see a follow up video of how to change it and how much the difference is!

Awesome tutorial! Good and clear explanation is what I was needing to setup something like this. I’ve been watching some tutorials on KZbin and all of them seemed very complicated.

[@mandelbro777]

Awesome video. Thanks for supporting the Raspberry Pi community through your efforts. Knowledge sharing is pivotal in creating innovative open source communities. Love your work, keep it up.

[@linuxrobotgeek]

I used the new tutorial to set up OMV on my Pi 4 and used your video. And it worked. Just to be clear that I used the same SSD you did lol.

[@horizon42q]

Excellent explanation. You give great clarity in explaining how to do something. Keep the educational videos coming. I always learn from watching your videos.

[@Madmax23419]

Prompt command “arp -a” will give you all the ip's in your network on windows machine, no need for extra software.

[@DejanTesic]

Works only *after* the local network traffic has been established (the device you want to see IP for already has to exist in the routing table of the machine you're on, and if not then arp doesn't "see" that device).

[@chrisyoung519]

@@DejanTesic wonder if a that OS would respond to a broadcast ping. To run the ARP -a afterwards.

[@miaudottk9080]

nmap

[@srtcsb]

You could spend thousands of $$ on pre-made NAS systems but, as usual, it's the RPi to the rescue. If you're just transferring files a few times a week, this solution is excellent. Possibly you could show how to extend this for access from anywhere (with a web connection), or even access over a VPN? Thanks for another great video Chris.

[@ExplainingComputers]

We are clearly on the same wavelength here -- this is a basic solution which is sufficient for what many people need -- and also helps people to learn about technology. Absolutely it could be extended as you say, and I may well do a video on that. :)

[@captjim925]

@@ExplainingComputers Please do this! I've love to see a guide explaining how to extend this to accessing files remotely via the web.

[@BlazeOGlory]

I love your sense of humor. Especially the bit about the ducks in the park. After watching this I may have to set up a NAS at home now for my home to hold all of my content for my KZbin channel and important files that I want to access at the house but I don't want to keep them on my pc or I want to be able to access it on either pc.

[@evolv_85]

Recently discovered this channel and I think it's absolutely fantastic. So much thorough information. Thank you.

[@ni_kabiu_john]

SURPRISE SURPRISE... I love his EXPLANATION

[@DouglasWalrath]

i'd recommend having OMV reformat the SSD to ext4, NTFS does work under linux (which OMV is) but i have seen some rare problems with NTFS under linux so ext4 is safer

[@ExplainingComputers]

Thanks for this. Many here have suggested that it is the NTFS format that is constraining write speed.

[@travisdirk]

I love this tutorial soo much! You have taught me so much about how easy it has become to set up a nas on a pi as well as an important life lesson about patience. Thanks mate! Ps. I knew you were serious about patience when you went to settings and waited for the scroll bar to appear so that you could click and drag it down as opposed to just scrolling, it’s a small touch that made this a great tutorial ♥️

[@ExplainingComputers]

Thanks for your positive feedback, appreciated.

[@geoffhalsey2184]

I did try OpenMediaVault out on my home server a Thecus N5810PRO Nas, last year. It worked without any problems and recognised the existing Raid setup too. A very versatile Nas OS indeed.

[@cavvads]

I think this is the best solution for a low cost NAS considering it's own low power draw,i used a raspberry pi 3 and a simple usb HDD for over an year now and it's working great for it's job (torrenting and smb file sharing mostly)

[@sterlingphoenix]

Oh man, you had to have an Aero in there... do you know how hard it is to get those in the US??? Not very, that's how. But I've been trying to avoid them.

[@cdl0]

Another way to find the network address of your server is to open the configuration web pages of your router, where there will likely be a table in one of the sections showing what is connected.

[@grotekleum]

46 dislikes (so far)? What's not to like? Great instructional video Chris, thanks for sharing it.

[@Garyscott7]

2000 years ago even J.C. had dislikes.

[@JosephFrietze]

It's nice to know that OMV can read NTFS now. I have several external hard drives full of media in NTFS that I wouldn't want to have to copy over to new/reformatted drives.

[@efreinshtick]

You have one of most interesting channels on the tube and like always your video is great. kudos on all the work.

[@grillodon]

I think that SMB has to be enabled also in Windows 10.

[@hotroof]

So fallowed this tutorial step by step, which resulted in a very heated political debate with a couple mallards down at the park. Great video. Thank you. Any chance will you do a video on FreeNAS? Maybe a non web based solution?

[@ExplainingComputers]

I may well make a FreeNAS video. :)

[@dodgersfnshepard8673]

Me: wants to make a Nas pi Instructions: go to park & talk to ducks Me: seems legit *grabs bread*

[@ExplainingComputers]

:)

[@menelaostsafarakis7727]

You wouldn't believe how much time I could have saved if I had found your video earlier...

[@francisdonsmg6819]

I didn't know omv4 has such a long and independent first setup process thx for that info.

[@jepolch]

Another excellent video. You describe every step very thoroughly! I use OMV as my home NAS. I'm running it on an HP Z400 with 32tb storage. So glad I did this rather than buying a NAS. I also run other services on the server using Docker. By the way, please use the flash memory plugin in OMV to decrease writes on your microSD card and preserve its lifespan. I love your wallpaper. Can we get a copy please?

[@AndrewJackson2000]

Oh,.. by the way ..... you are doing a great job!

[@sihy]

I have to mention that when searching for the IP address of the Pi you may need to go a little outside the scope of the suggested parameters. For example my Pi was 192.168.0.103. It caused a little confusion because I was searching in the 192.168.1. ... range.

[@97Giorgos97]

You can easily find your network devices using the free WiFiman Android / iOS app 😉

[@bestbattle]

Is that hard to enter your router's administration interface and see all the devices in the DHCP server?

[@viledanew]

Isn't it your router that gave a dhcp ip address?

[@Solar_and_Security]

Set one up this morning, using both an SSD, and then adding a 2.5 hard drive I had laying around to see if adding storage would be easy, it was with a powered USB hub. I plan on now adding a raid system for my plex server soon. Thanks Christopher!

[@ExplainingComputers]

A productive morning then! :)

[@EdwardRLyons]

Brilliant video. Thanks for this - I've been contemplating setting up an NAS mainly for multimedia files, and this seems to offer an ideal solution. All I need to do now is get my Raspberry Pi 4, etc ......

[@jayrowe6473]

Great video and a perfect excuse for me to buy another pi.

[@svengeorgi6553]

To increase write speed on the SSD you should format the SSD with EXT4.

[@ExplainingComputers]

Yes, you are correct. I wish I had thought of this when I made the video!

[@Pekeliini]

@@ExplainingComputers Will there be any issues using it with Windows PC when it's formatted as EXT4 instead of NTFS?

[@ExplainingComputers]

@@Pekeliini Windows will be able to write to the drive via the network just fine (as Windows will be unaware of the format of a network drive). But you could not plug the drive directly into Windows and access it.

[@kopiwe]

Could you make a tutorial for a Raspberry pi firewall?

[@ExplainingComputers]

Nice idea, noted.

[@khalidelgazzar]

I come to watch this video every while & then. Great educational video.

[@coltronex]

Great production,I am currently in need of another Nas and will be using my Pi very soon,keep up these interesting videos,many thanks,Colin

[@neumdeneuer1890]

Nice video. Could you maybe try out the raid options ? I had trouble with them on the Rasberry 3 and would like to know if things got better with the Model 4.

[@Chris.Brisson]

Yes, it would be nice to have an automatic mirror of whatever is stored to ease the pain of recovering from drive failure. I would love to see a tutorial that also includes the recovery.

[@adoby83]

OMV doesn't support RAID over USB. For most RAID is a very bad idea. Instead attach two HDDs. Use one for shared files and the other for versioned backup snapshots of the first. OMV has a plugin for this, or you can use rsync.

[@Toliman.]

While the rPi has the speed across the USB 3.0 port as a PCIe device, the usb3 has logistical problems operating as a RAID reliable access method. There are options like UASP which switch the drive into SCSI over USB, but RAID requires parallel writes to ensure safe and secure writes of data. The advantage of RAID is that it improves speed, but if the data is not arriving at the same time, it has to wait for the slowest device, or wait for the slowest device on the USB hub to finish before the next operation takes place. Software RAID, or MD can be used, but it can be difficult to get reliable raid over UASP or USB for the same reason, that if something does happen, it will be out of sync between the drives, always. It is doable, but you have to expect problems or loss of data The other option is to duplicate across the drives using rsync or a MD type software RAID, which will be more practically duplicated as the NAS will sync drives when there's downtime or gaps between requests. A third option is to create a mixed RAID with a Hot drive and a cold drive(s), or a backup NAS , such as cloud storage, which will sync up with a cloud storage system, or pull down files that haven't been used for a few months or weeks. The new idea is RAIN, redundant NAS, or clusters. This way, you can also add 2 or more rPi devices with OMV as a cluster, one will be the main NAS, and the others will point to the "fast" rPi which will be the main controller sending and scheduling tasks. This way, you can mix hard drive sizes and speed, etc. A bit more expensive, but it's possible to cluster storage like this with different software/OS too. At $50-60 each rPi will be quite powerful independently. Past the $250 price point, you should just get a NAS device, and past $400, build a thin PC. There's probably a better scale for value, but it depends on how reliable and fast you need data storage and how much the loss of the data will affect you. The principles are to keep the same data in 3 places.

[@-Gadget-]

2:11 Awwwwww, CUTE , look at that tiny little HDD (Sarcasm 🤣🤣🤣) EXCELLENT video by the way, but I do however feel that Any RaspPi for running OpenMediaVault is kind of useless due to network read/write speeds and its own internal clock speeds for file sharing etc, however this is Ideal for someone just wanting to setup something that is quick and cheap. Ps. I have also encountered OMV wining about RAM so it may be better to either go for the 2 or 4GB variant (but as you said, for something this cheap to setup, you can't really complain) Ps. Another VERY easy way to locate your IP of the RaspPi, is to have an android device on the same network with "Fing" installed, and just do a refresh on Fing and presto, no messing about with WinBlows trying to find the IP 👍👍👍

[@HiFutureMeHowAreYou]

Thanks for the fing tip. I used to use it very regularly. No idea how I forgot about fing XD

[@alexandru2882]

Thank you for another of your verry good videos! I have several requests: 1. Please make a video where you show how to create and configure the NAS software from Raspbian. 2. I have several 3.5 HDDs lying around and I would like to create a NAS solution using at least 4 of them. I would like to put them into a dedicated case (a very cheap one) and connect the raspberry pi 4 to that case to use all of the HDDs. They would draw the power from a plug. Could you create a video for this, in a similar fashion to the one above? 3. Could you connect an external battery to the pi 4 and the battery to the plug? Would this work like a UPS for the raspberry? I would very much enjoy a video testing this idea.

[@raribeir]

I normally select your channel rather than others just because of your cool accent! Keep up with this great work.

[@PauloSilva-ll4vs]

This video helped me a lot,I was just planning to do that. Thank you Mr. Barnatt for this wonderful material.

[@spaceiswater6539]

Can you add two SSD's so they mirror each other, so if one drive was to go faulty you have the other as a back up? Great video I really enjoyed watching and learning this.

[@ExplainingComputers]

Yes, you could set up a RAID like this in OMV. Although personally I would not do so using USB connected drives. So if you want a RAID configuration, use OMV on a computer with SATA or M.2/u.2 connectors for the drives.

[@spaceiswater6539]

@@ExplainingComputers Thank you so much in your reply that helps me out lots.

[@adoby83]

OMV doesn't support RAID over USB. it is possible to configure on the command line. But why? Better two drives, one sharing the other for backups of the first. You could have a fast SSD for the shares and a cheaper and slower spinning HDD for backups.

[@twmbarlwmstar]

RAID is not a back-up. Also consider you can get a second-hand NAS for about £100. £150 will get it populated with a few drives, although trusting used drives is a pint of debate. If I need a NAS I have found it cheaper just to get on eBay (And also we didn’t have the Pi4 it must be said). There are lots of benefits to this approach. In general upgradable memory, decent RAID and usually a half decent OS already installed. Along with SATA, it all depends on what you get and what is available. I don’t find the Pi4 solution cost effective in comparison. The last one I bought, about 6 weeks ago was a Lenovo, which came with a factory fitted Blue Ray drive which was a bit new on me, plus 4 500GB WD Blue HDD. The BR drive won’t play media disks but will record data disks- still useful but a missed opportunity really. That cost £120 which is cheaper than the Pi4 solution. If you get a 4 disk NAS then go for RAID 10, it is the best option for us mortals giving both speed and resilience. Remember RAID is not a back-up.

[@yvindnilsen94]

@@twmbarlwmstar but raid nas can absolutely be a backup.. First up it is a network drive.. Only morons have Just 1 version of the really important stuff. And raid can be set up as 2 drives that mirror each other..

[@RichardAugust]

I like that. And it's true. "Be patient. Make tea. Or go go for a walk, talk to a duck."

[@Being_Joe]

Oh this is cool. I was literally thinking of building something like this last night. Except I'm thinking of building a setup like this for a small MySQL database. I'm a user of the open source DAM DigiKam and I have a NAS where I plan on moving everything to. I can run a MySQL server off the NAS but I'm not sure if the HDD setup is fast enough since the app generates thumbnail previews and stores them in the database. If I go this route I'll be using this as a jumping point.

[@dooovde]

You sir are a true living legend. Never has the phrase "Not all heroes wear capes" been more appropriate! Thank you!

[@nedelkafelix6696]

maxium RESPECT ! You are a great tutor/mentor for all of your follwers (too.) i do it since c64, but i always learn something new from You ! GiGA THNX EC Guy !

[@ExplainingComputers]

:)

[@markconger8049]

I noticed the SSD showed as being NTFS formatted. Did OMV do that as part of its setup?

[@ExplainingComputers]

The drive had already been formatted as NTFS on a Windows machine. OMV can format drives in "disks" if necessary.

[@markconger8049]

Could another file system type speed up the write speed perhaps? Since ext4 is native to Linux I’m thinking it could boost it a bit. Regardless, a great video. Your channel really has become a favorite of mine. Thanks for the many hours you put into the production. Looks easy on video!

[@paulhumphries7017]

Any chance you can update this video - as the software is no longer available to directly download and the new stated online instructions are hard to follow - a chance to repost for you?? Paul

[@ExplainingComputers]

I may indeed do an update -- it is a shame that OMV have just withdrawn the software for direct download. I think I'll wait a bit to see if the situation changes. Maybe I'll do a video called something like "OMV 5 SBC Installation".

[@ExplainingComputers]

@Circuit Trainee These are the files to be used with the new pdf guide -- the pre-install images (like the one I used in this video) have been removed. See my pinned comment.

[@TrekkerPlanet]

Loved your video. Thanks for demystifying OpenMediaVault for the rest of us.

[@nikobellic570]

The Pi foundation just made it easier to usb-boot from a usb drive in their latest updates! They've added options in terminal raspi-config, so projects like this are simpler to set up. Also, with rpi os booting from usb, the sdcard slot becomes an additional external drive for extra coolness. Hope this helps someone

[@donporter8432]

Greetings from Thailand Sir Chris!

[@ExplainingComputers]

Greetings Don. Here we are again!

[@boomwithpeter623]

Alao i want to pint our that most of the router/switch/ap combo units these days come with a usb3 port that can enable file sharing, good example are cisco broadband modems, all of theme have at least 2 usbs, one for printer sharing and one for file sharing, thus can eliminate the need of many cables and aditional power usgae. Still this is a cool little project to do in spare time

[@SweBeach2023]

Most of these also tend to be very very slow. Even on a high-end router don't expect more than 30-40 MB/s, and on many mainstream routers 4-5 MB/s is not uncommon. Which is a bit of a shame considering a router with a single 2.5 inch drive for many could become a simple of not 100 reliable backup solution.

[@perrymcclusky4695]

I feel the need to talk to a duck. Looking forward to your next video!

[@davecarrera]

Your probably not going to be to amused at this "Blue Peter" style request but how did you mount the parts at 4:18 on the plasticard ? I ask as I would like to achieve the same with my setup. Kindest Regards Dave

[@ExplainingComputers]

No problem! :) The Pi was mounted using screws and standoffs through holes drilled in the plasticard -- this kind of thing: shop.pimoroni.com/products/premium-pi-standoff-selection The SSD I think I also screwed down, with standard drive mounting screws coming up through holes into the threads on the base of the drive.

[@davecarrera]

@@ExplainingComputers many thanks Im off to the shops to get some and thank you for your time.

[@konstantinosaidinidis3504]

Thanks for the quality content videos. Very clear explainatory. I recently bougt a rasberry pi to play and tweak. Though i was wondering if i can do a combo of some projects in just one pi running at the same time. 1- NAS. 2- Pi Hole . 3- Media centre with retro pi and cody. 4- Web server host. Thanks in advance guys to all this beautiful community.

[@ExplainingComputers]

Potentially, yes, but not using OMV as it is usually configured.

[@konstantinosaidinidis3504]

@@ExplainingComputers thank you

[@skyak4493]

This is fantastic. I requested a NAS server in the Pi 4 comments and BANG! Now I know I want one of these to be my "low power always on Linux computer" but NAS is just the beginning. Can I run Pi-hole as a service at the same time? It would also be awesome to use this as the secure web access to turn on my powerful computers with POE. I have a couple questions I think will be quite common -is this the right board for NAS or would something with better drive connections be worthwhile? Rock Pi? -can this be set for Apple ecosystem access? The measure of a great How To vid is it spurs many great how to requests!

[@ExplainingComputers]

OMV runs as a standalone OS, so cannot be easily combined with other apps. But there are other options! :) Apple access is no problem. The best NAS SBC for a single drive system is, in my view, an Odroid HC1 or HC2 -- kzbin.info/www/bejne/d6Wrq5uqoN18mZo -- as a SATA drive mounts on the board. For dual drive for stuff like RAID, I would use a RockPro64 with its SATA card: kzbin.info/www/bejne/b3SmgpyZfdyZeqs But it all depends how costly and sophisticated you want to get.

[@skyak4493]

I think my situation is common -I have been using a USB drive connected to my router for years. I upgraded to a new ASUS router in the hope of getting better performance and was sorely disappointed! It is pathetic when it is working, and it regularly goes on long pauses..... It would be a nice video to show how this Pi-NAS destroys the performance of common router drives.

[@ExplainingComputers]

Now this is a great idea for a video -- noted! :)

[@adoby83]

You can run other apps like emby, plex or pi-hole in Docker. A 4GB RPi4 with OMV is a nice machine for this.

[@xesior]

In my experience SSD's have never been able to write faster than 50MB/s when pushed through an USB interface. Regardless if USB3.0 can handle more. I always figured it had to do with the controller in the interface.

[@ExplainingComputers]

SSDs can write several hundred MB/s via a USB interface. The issue here is I now know using the NTFS file system on the drive, for which the OMV driver is slow.

[@LacyMorrow]

I met some ducks, thanks for the walkthrough.

[@soundstudioman]

Thank you - A brilliant NAS done and dusted in no time - Once again Thanks!

[@DFX2KX]

This is far nicer then the Samba/SMB NAS functions built into this router, I can tell you that. Getting that to work consistently was... fun.

[@knightride9635]

Could we have access to the drive from an Android phone or an iPad ?

[@RaduRadonys]

Of course, at least for Android, it can use samba (SMB) to communicate with network drives. Just use a good file system application, that allows network drives mapping.