[HN Gopher] PiBox Mini - Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server
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PiBox Mini - Modular Raspberry Pi Storage Server
Author : geerlingguy
Score : 88 points
Date : 2021-10-25 20:43 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (pibox.io)
(TXT) w3m dump (pibox.io)
| sudobash1 wrote:
| There is a list of other inexpensive arm boards which are Linux
| compatible here: https://wiki.debian.org/CheapServerBoxHardware I
| have been wanting to build my own NAS similar to PiBox Mini, and
| have been finding this list helpful. Nothing seems as polished as
| the PiBox though. Best of luck to them.
| synergy20 wrote:
| A litter pricey, great concepts. For me I will just use a rpi4
| with two usb drives for a poor man NAS, that just backup stuff
| and nothing more, I can do it with less than $60(including
| housing, 2GB version, fanless)
| sudobash1 wrote:
| I agree it is a little pricey for something that doesn't come
| complete with the SOC. I would rather use something like the
| ODROID-HC4[1]. It isn't as fancy as this or have as broad of
| support as the RPi, but it is $80.
|
| 1: https://ameridroid.com/products/odroid-hc4
| synergy20 wrote:
| Yes that looks very attractive, I am buying one so I don't
| need run usb cables external to my USB drives which is a bit
| messy.
|
| On the other hand, you can have a USB3.1 hard drive docking
| station(around $30 for 2 hard drives) to hook into any cheap
| SBC board that provides a USB3 port. another way to do
| poorman NAS.
| sliken wrote:
| I was hoping for a bit better performance. Any suggestions for
| similar that could max out 4-5 drives, maybe add a M.2/U.2 for
| caching (or 2), and handle 2.5 gbit ethernet?
| Shank wrote:
| If you want that many drives you're better off with a proper
| NAS and a RAID setup imho. If you want an M.2 drive for
| caching, you're basically in Synology territory if you throw
| your other requirements on top.
|
| Sure, it's not running an OS flavored for the Pi, but
| everything else you want is covered.
| geerlingguy wrote:
| Ditto--though I'm also testing the Radxa Taco, which is
| hopefully coming soon. It has a 2.5 Gbps network port and M.2
| slot, but the overall bus is still limited to 5 Gbps (3.6
| Gbps real-world) because of the Pi's internal PCIe x1 Gen 2
| lane.
|
| If you really need the sustained performance, especially if
| you want to use it for things like transcoding, it's better
| to get more supported hardware.
| westpfelia wrote:
| The max bus throughput was always something that was the
| real limit with Pi's. Luckily they are getting better and
| better. I'm still rocking a first gen Pi as my Pihole. Dont
| need too much power for dns queries.
| jagger27 wrote:
| It's stunning how much can be done with a single ancient
| PCIe 2.0 x1 lane.
| TedDoesntTalk wrote:
| Synology 420+ ticks all of those boxes. I have one and love it.
| m0zg wrote:
| Pricing is on the nutty side. You can do a lot better than that
| for $250 nowadays, though it won't be as compact. That said, I'm
| looking for something like this but able to take 3.5" hard drives
| (2 of them) and at half the price. Doesn't need to be pretty or
| have a screen.
| [deleted]
| erulabs wrote:
| PiBox is built by us, KubeSail! We're a YC S19 company that
| focuses on home-hosting and shipping open-source software to
| customers.
|
| Happy to answer any questions!
| geerlingguy wrote:
| I spent a little time testing Kubesail when I was testing the
| PiBox, and I have to say I really liked it. I typically don't
| run 'managed' solutions for K8s, but the way everything
| connected together gave me Rancher Labs vibes, it was simple to
| use and mostly intuitive.
|
| With a little more polish I could see myself recommending it to
| more people, especially in tandem with units like the PiBox.
| anderspitman wrote:
| Love the product and hope to see more success in this space.
|
| Will it be easy for users to bring their own domain and/or buy
| one through you, or will they have to use a domain you control
| to use KubeSail tunneling?
| erulabs wrote:
| It's already nice and easy - users can even add custom
| domains on our free-tier currently!
| jagger27 wrote:
| I love everything about this except the included 15W power
| supply, which seems too low for a CM4, fan, display, two SSDs,
| and the SATA controller.
|
| The CM4 draws somewhere between 7 and 9 watts under peak load,
| and each SSD would be around 2W under load. That feels pretty
| tight already.
|
| I'm sure it would be totally fine at idle and low loads, but I
| just can't see it being enough juice at full load with two
| drives, especially if there are other services running on it and
| the storage is encrypted.
| AstroDogCatcher wrote:
| Looks great - exactly what I've always wanted to do with a Pi.
| Won't be buying one however, as the price is frankly outrageous;
| considering what you can get from a NUC or a Lenovo ThinkCentre,
| I would want to pay no more than PS100 for the novel components,
| then bring my own CM4 and drives.
| anderspitman wrote:
| Interesting. Usually my critique for products like this is
| something along the lines of "great, but how are you going to
| access your data from the internet?" Typically the answer to that
| is you need some sort of tunneling service like ngrok to get
| around port forwarding, CGNAT, firewalls, etc. I maintain a list
| of solutions here[0]. The problem with most of these services is
| that they're targeted at developers and aren't something the
| average user should have to mess with.
|
| In this case, the PiBox is being offered by KubeSail[1], a
| company which specializes in services like tunneling (they're
| already on the list mentioned above). It will be very interesting
| to see if they can bundle it in such a way that people don't have
| to worry about how the tunneling works. Extra points if they make
| it easy for users to buy/use their own domains.
|
| [0]: https://github.com/anderspitman/awesome-tunneling
|
| [1]: https://kubesail.com/
| rektide wrote:
| i have a systemd cron job (timer) that runs miniupnpc every
| couple minutes to ask the router to set up firewall rules that
| a box needs. for now i still manually update my home's dns
| records whenever there's a power outage and therefore new ip
| address. but i'll be building something dor dynamic dns soon
| enough.
|
| but a couple boxes also ssh into a vps, and forward their own
| ssh ports to the vps, so i can jump into them indirectly if the
| main door/direct ssh way isnt working. this is also an ok way
| to expose ports on the internet if i want them proxied, if i
| need rate limiting.
| erulabs wrote:
| This is exactly the goal - a box that anyone could buy, plug-
| in, click a few buttons, and get an on-the-internet service
| (like PhotoPrism or Plex) ready to roll. Bonus if they can
| easily control access, invite friends, and also if it's totally
| open and hackable - as much a learning platform for technology
| as a plug-and-play box-for-media.
|
| That's the vision anyways!
| KennyLogins wrote:
| Just finished watching your video on it. I'll be curious to see
| how the quality improves on the production units. I don't think
| I'll need 2 8TB drives for it lol but this seems to be one of the
| better RPI NAS form factors so far.
| geerlingguy wrote:
| Heh, the 8 TB drives was more for show than anything else--I
| actually have them in mind for a separate project but it's more
| fun saying 16 TB SSD than 4 TB... plus one of my 2 TB Crucial
| SSDs seems to have burned itself out this week so I guess it's
| two good things!
|
| I hope they make the 3.5" model too, though--it would be more
| cost effective (and fit the Pi's performance better) to use
| 3.5" HDDs that are a lot cheaper per GB, and could still easily
| saturate the 1 Gbps network jack.
| rektide wrote:
| it's gonna be amazing when low end a starts packing some real io.
| some day there'll be more than a lane or two of pcie.
| erulabs wrote:
| Ohhh yes, we agree strongly. We don't expect to be beating
| SoftIron.com or anything, but we have some ambitious plans for
| home-hosting!
| temp8964 wrote:
| I am not confident enough to put all my personal documents on a
| home server which runs 24/7. It's basically open for hackers in
| the whole world to scan and eventually put ransomware in it.
|
| I feel I am more comfortable with saving my documents on
| respected cloud service.
|
| I do have a NAS at home but its not open to the internet and I
| don't put my documents on it, just media files.
| OConnor109 wrote:
| Anyone know of a similar solution that supports 3.5" drives?
|
| I have a bunch of 4 TB externals that I would love to put to use.
| I know Synology, etc. exist but I don't need something so heavy.
| Just a simple Pi based case that can take one or two disks would
| be awesome.
|
| Was really looking forward to the Helios 64 but unfortunately,
| they closed shop: https://kobol.io/
| antattack wrote:
| What's the price of this thing? Kickstarter prompts me to sign in
| before I can scroll down to see it.
| diskzero wrote:
| $100 boards only
|
| $250 PiBox Carrier and Daughter Boards Powder Coated Steel Case
| Noctua 5v PWM Fan External WiFi Antenna 1.3" LCD Display 15W
| USB-C Wall Adapter
|
| Raspberry Pi CM4 - 8GB RAM / 8GB eMMC / WiFi model - Pre-
| flashed with PiBox OS for easy setup
|
| $450 Everything above but with SSD drives installed. Ready to
| be plugged in and used in seconds.
|
| - Includes 2 x Crucial MX500 1TB SSD Drives
| _jal wrote:
| It is cute, but I've far outgrown devices like this.
|
| Currently on the hunt for a short-depth (<500mm) 19" drive shelf
| with at least 16 3.5" slots.
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(page generated 2021-10-25 23:00 UTC)