Reddit reviews WD 2TB My Cloud Personal Network Attached Storage - NAS - WDBCTL0020HWT-NESN,White

What it sounds like you're trying to do just isn't possible. The TV is not going to be able to share USB-attached storage to other devices that are hooked up to it over HDMI cables. HDMI cables and hardware are not designed to transmit a USB signal. It's a bit like expecting a laptop to be able to read a USB drive plugged into a desktop computer just because they happen to be attached to different inputs on the same monitor.

Now, there may be a way to kind of do what you want by turning the "smart" part of the TV into a media/file server. There are even apps out there that will turn Android devices into little file servers, and you might even be able get some standard stuff like Apache, Samba, or NFS working with a little jiggery-pokery — if the Android version Sony shipped weren't locked down.

But none of those is really a good solution. You don't want your entertainment center doing double-duty like that. You'd be much better off getting a NAS of some kind and setting up your shares on that.

Actually, if you don't want to spend the money to buy a networked hard drive and your router has a USB port, it might already support creating network shares. I have my Asus RT-N66U running DD-WRT with a drive plugged into each of the USB ports on it, and it works great for this purpose.

Alternately, if you have an old laptop or desktop that you don't really use any more, you could easily tuck that away somewhere and have it act as file server for you, too. Even a fairly old one will do the job.

If you don't have any of those things, but you do have the USB hub and spare USB drive(s), you could always consider getting a Raspberry Pi, instead. Those make a more than passable file server for light to moderate use, and they're only $35 apiece.

Actually, in that image I linked in my router comment, you can see examples of each of my latter three suggestions within about a foot of each other in my house. They're all feasible and within the technical reach of even a novice at this sort of thing, particularly the latter two. I threw together a quick and ugly graphic pointing each of them them out.

western digital myclouds have gigabit ethernet and usb ports for adding more drives.

like this one:
http://www.amazon.com/Cloud-WDBCTL0020HWT-2TB-Personal-Storage/dp/B00EVVGAFI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1422046393&sr=8-1&keywords=western+digital+mycloud

I use an older 2 TB version of this Western Digital NAS drive. Been using it for about 2.5 years now without any issues so far. Come configured Raid 1. My fiancee has been using the non-RAID version for about 3 years without any issues as well.

RAID version: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ITI054G/ref=emc_b_5_i

non-RAID: https://www.amazon.com/Cloud-Personal-Network-Attached-Storage/dp/B00EVVGAFI/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1525704853&sr=8-7&keywords=wd+nas

Does it matter which external drive you use. I have one of these: https://www.amazon.com/Cloud-Personal-Network-Attached-Storage/dp/B00EVVGAFI

and one of these both unopened: https://www.amazon.com/Book-Desktop-External-Drive-WDBFJK0030HBK-NESN/dp/B00E3RH63A

Are these overkill? Need the Y cable for either?

> Actually, one of the upgrades was an Adaptec SATA card and a couple of 10,000 RPM Western Digital 150 GB SATA Velocoraptors. So I got that going for me.

Ow right, that's something I did read as well and forgot to change. Well, if you have a SATA HDD, you can install the HDDs into the new system without any issues and not lose data or use the same adapter cable I linked to get those files into the new PC / HDD / SSD.

> I'm not going to wait for CES kind of things because there will always be some incremental change that's just around the corner. I'm mainly interested in prices right now.

True, but well! Don't say I didn't warn you when in ~1 month time, there will be some fancy new parts available for less money.
I do understand that sometimes, you don't want to wait and that's absolutely fine.

> I'm in San Diego so I could drive up to MicroCenter if I have time. Is there really that big a savings? I'll look into it.

It's roughly 1 hour and 20 minutes drive, so fairly long trip. Perhaps you can do something else over there right away when you go there?
It depends, but it can be some nice savings for sure. Especially the CPU + motherboard combo deal that they offer is very nice, because their CPU prices are extremely awesome already.

i7-6800K is $340 at MicroCenter that's $40 off compared to Newegg & Amazon. But you also get a $30 discount if you buy a compatible motherboard there too. So that adds up quiet nicely.
I don't know how much gas you've got to spend to drive 2 and a half hours. But it's something to consider.
They also have other products there that are fairly cheap and they also sometimes price match with Amazon (and/or Newegg). So you can potentially pick up a lot of stuff at your MicroCenter and not having to worry about shipping times and damage.

> I don't really have a budget for a monitor, keyboard, and mouse. I haven't really thought about it.

Okay well a high quality monitor is something I would recommend for your work. This can quickly go above $300 for just the monitor alone.
You probably don't need a high quality keyboard and mouse, but I do recommend a mechanical keyboard to most people if the budget is available. It's just such an awesome and great typing experience, that will benefit you as well. You type better and get less strain on your fingers, because the mechanical switches don't require as much force to register the key strokes.
So for the keyboard and mouse, you're looking at a ~$100-125 as well if you go for a mechanical keyboard. Else you could get away with ~$30-40.

> I was actually looking at a Brother printer. I forget the model now but it was 11" x 17" all in one.

No idea, I am no printer expert haha! I actually just realized that the Brother that I linked above does not print in color, woops? I found this alternative which is a slow printer (6 color pages per minute), but does the job very well. So if you're not in a hurry to print, this would work very well.

> I've got them configured as a RAID 1 because I have lost a disk or two and the last time I had to send it out to one of those data recovery places. I realize there can still be errors but I do sleep better. I've thought about the NAS backup but I guess I've been too lazy to actually do it.

Okay, understandable! I will suggest to just get a NAS! Do you have any idea how much storage you would need? I mean, prices for HDDs dropped a lot and you can get, 8TB for $240 that's $0.03/GB. or $30/TB.
You could also get 4TB of high performance storage at MicroCenter for $120.

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As for a NAS, a NAS is a mini PC with storage. So they're not super cheap, depending on the speed that you want and if you like to expand the thing or not. I personally have a 2TB non expandable "budget" option that is not even close to full yet for our job.
But if you spend more money, you can get more storage and with 2 drives, so that you can RAID1 them.

> That's a pretty good idea to keep a spare video card around. Maybe I'll do that instead of having it on the motherboard. Does that mean the processor will be more powerful?

Yes, the CPU that I linked above from MicroCenter is a very powerful one and only available for the "prosumer" platform from Intel. The X99 / 2011-3 socket. These CPUs do not have on-board graphics compared to the mainstream ones that do have on-board graphics.
The big difference between the Xeon suggested earlier and the 6800K is the core count. That Xeon is a quad core, where as the 6800K is a hexa core. For programs that are well multi-threaded, this means that the performance will be better on the 6800K.

> I definitely get it about the filters and do try to keep everything dust free.

Perfect! I mean, all modern cases have at least solid enough dust filtration these days, so it's just a matter of cleaning it 2 to 4 times a year, depending on how dusty your room gets.

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I'll start working on my suggestion right now!

Well you could probably use both as externals, though you'd need two USB ports on the EeePC. At a basic level you could just share them both out as separate drives. If you want to combine them into one I'm not sure of a way to merge two drives (JBOD array) over two separate USB ports.

Alternatively, you could buy an empty NAS box and use your existing drives for not too much money. Or go with something like the Western Digital MyCloud. 2TB NAS with internet access for $150.

Honestly, a WD Mycloud will suffice for that amount of data.

I know this is the US site but I'm sure you can find the exact same from the UK site.

https://www.amazon.com/Cloud-Personal-Network-Attached-Storage/dp/B00EVVGAFI/ref=sr_1_4?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1466048697&sr=1-4&keywords=NAS


This what you're looking for basically?

By the time you're into the TB's it seems better to just to buy a personal network attached storage drive, and plug it into your router. You get alot of storage. for an unlimited amount of time. its on location, so you can use it for video streaming to multiple computers, and free up space. I'd even go so far as to install Plex on a computer and get a super pretty, easy to use interface that is awesome for offsite use. Actually, I think I may need to buy this setup.

Edit:

Or, if you want security, use a shared drive and Bittorent sync, and share your file with an encryption and security scheme that the NSA couldnt crack! ^Let's ^be ^honest, ^they ^already ^have.

Fair enough but honestly one of these plugged into your router is easy as pie: https://www.amazon.com/Cloud-Personal-Network-Attached-Storage/dp/B00EVVGAFI?th=1&psc=1. I'm not sure about hapless playback but I think so.