Home NAS

[David Fletcher]

On Wed, 2022-06-22 at 09:24 +0100, Peter Flynn wrote:
> I'm looking for a NAS or similar solution at home, mainly to hold my 
> private SVN repos in such a way that I can also get at them when I'm 
> away (my ISP won't hear of running SVN unless I cough up €€€ for a 
> private server). My connection is stable but it isn't a fixed IP 
> address, so some kind of answerback trigger would be needed from
> outside.

Hi,

Until I got rid of vermin media I was using the NoIP service to direct
email to my home server. You set up a little client software on your
server that keeps NoIP updated with your current IP address. You set up
what is effectively an A record with NoIP that will then always point
at your home IP address. If you have your own domain name you can then
point your MX record at the NoIP server A record and your email will
then be delivered at your home.

You should I expect be able to do something similar with SVN, it's a
long time since I last used it.

The best way though is to change ISP to get a fixed IP address and IPv6
service. I get both with 100M service and FTTP from Zen at a decent
price. I asked my local LUG for advice which was either Andrews&Arnold
or Zen.


> Before I start looking, does anyone have any suggestions? Build or
> buy?

I would always say, build. About 15 years ago I made my own mini server
case that takes a hard drive, an industrial mini-ITX board and an off
the shelf 12V power supply. It runs Ubuntu Server. Others will say that
you need to run RAID but, honestly, I've run it with a single drive
ever since and never had a problem. This cycle it has a 2TB Toshiba
drive which will be replaced with a new one when I upgrade from 20.04.

If you look at somewhere like https://www.mini-itx.com/ you should be
able to get everything you need. They used to do little cases too, from
which you can omit the ATX power supply and either build in a 12V
switcher or get a high quality power brick from somewhere like CPC.

Take a look at https://www.thefletchers.net/ which takes you to the
server in my house, built as I describe.

Dave