Plugging Away: DIY File Server Using Samba

“The Plug Computer is one of the latest products in the newly
emerging micro-server market. It doesn’t have a video card,
keyboard, mouse, fan, or hard disk. It does have Gigabit Ethernet,
a USB port, an SD card slot, a 1.2 GHz processor, 512 MB of RAM,
and a matching 512 MB of solid state storage. The thing is accessed
over the LAN using SSH. Oh, yes… it’s about a quarter of the size
of a brick and costs US$99 (development system version). Add an
external disk and Samba for a simple, low-cost networked drive with
a lot of potential.

“You can build your own, which is the subject of this article.
Or, you buy one already set up to accept your external disk drive.
Here are a couple of examples, before we launch down the DIY
path.

* Cloud Engines PogoPlug: Just connect the Pogoplug to your home
network and attach an external drive or memory stick. Then, go to
the Pogoplug site and register your machine. A little setup program
will run, you’ll answer a few questions, and then the new drive
will be available on your LAN or over the Internet.
* CTERA Cloud Plug: CTERA has a similar product that also features
automated backups to their cloud.

“Let’s see how you put your own system together.”

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